Friday, August 4, 2017

The Supt Dish            
                              August 4, 2017

                                                                                                                    Dave Plymale, Superintendent
As summer comes to a close, we prepare to open another school year, excited to welcome our staff and students.  All staff will be back on August 9th when we have our Rally Day to celebrate the start of 2017-18 while students return on August 16th.
As many of you know, one of my hobbies is golf. My father introduced me to the game when I was 9 years old. Probably no comparison between golf and life is more appropriate than the idea that it is necessary to persevere under trial.

If you have played golf for any length of time, you know trouble is just one stroke away. It could be your fault or it could be a bad break. On the "your fault" side, it could be a tee shot hit out of bounds, a bad iron shot from a perfect distance, or a missed three-foot putt. On the "bad break" side, it could be your ball landing in a divot, a perfect 3-wood plugging in the soggy fringe, or a 10-foot putt hitting a spike mark and just missing the hole. Some days are tougher than others.

Jordan Spieth's victorious Sunday performance in The Open Championship recently was the perfect example of persevering under trials. Spieth produced a flurry of excellence after yet another bad shot threatened to undo him on the thirteenth hole. With our legislature in a special session this summer, we are enduring what may or may not happen with our elected officials in the Senate and House. However, we, too, will persevere.

GISD had two school district trustees go to Austin July 24th meeting with Senator Kolkhorst, Representative Morrison, and Marian Wallace, Education Policy Advisor for Lt. Governor Dan Patrick.  Our trustees, Brandon Huber and Destry Gruetzmacher, represented GISD well in telling our story and what the legislature needs to do to ease our local taxpayers burden with funding issues of our public schools. We are also very proud of our retired teachers and staff members that attended a rally for public education at the Capitol July 17th.

With 12 days left in the Special Session, we are “on the back 9 with very few holes left to play”.   We need to, and our legislature needs to finish as Jordan Spieth did at The Open.  You can help by contacting our legislators and let them know that we want a school finance solution and until there is one, we need some relief with the loss of ASATR. Some of our neighboring school districts need relief with the elimination of the small school penalty. And our retired teachers need relief with their health insurance and retirement.
Regardless of what happens over the next 12 days at the Capitol, we will welcome our students with smiling faces, excited to begin the school year. We will continue to provide our students with quality and engaging lessons, preparing them for life’s challenges. For I know our teachers and staff have the perseverance to meet any challenge just as Jordan Spieth did!
Contact Information:
Marian Wallace, Lt. Dan Patrick’s Education Policy Advisor, marian.wallace@ltgov.texas.gov  (512) 463-6054
MacGregor Stephenson, Chief of Staff for Representative Geanie Morrison, MacGregor.Stephenson@house.texas.gov  (512) 463-0456
Ben Barkley, Education Policy Advisor for Senator Lois Kolkhorst, Benjamin.Barkley@senate.texas.gov  (512) 463-0118





No comments:

Post a Comment