Great Start to the New Year

UTS-Home-of-the-BearcatsWritten by Julie Giorgi, Vice President, Union Township School Board

The school year is off to a fantastic start here in Union Township School Corporation. Students, faculty and staff at Union Center Elementary, John Simatovich Elementary, Union Township Middle School, and Wheeler High School all began the new school year with characteristic enthusiasm and professionalism.

With the touch of fall in the air our elementary recreational sports teams, and middle and high school students involved in cross country, soccer, tennis, volleyball, golf, cheerleading and football are all very busy on and off the field. It's a great time to be a Bearcat.

Union Center Elementary is proud to welcome our new principal, Jack Birmingham. Birmingham said that “working with the UCE staff and our students thus far, I am excited just to be a part of this family."

There are many exciting things happening at UCE, including an overnight trip of all fifth graders to the Indiana Dunes Environmental Learning Center, and a major renovation of the courtyard sponsored by the UCE PTO. Birmingham stated one of many goals this school year, "We always strive for the highest levels of academic achievements. In addition, I would like to see our daily attendance reach a similar level of excellence. My goal is to foster a warm and positive environment for all our students and hopefully that environment will make the students want to come to school." We will be joining Birmingham and everyone at Union Center in working toward this goal and many more during this school year.

From some of our youngest students to our most veteran…Wheeler High School is also excited to be back in session. Don Gandy, principal at Wheeler High School, and his staff are committed to every student entering the halls at WHS leaving as a graduate. Wheeler has several programs in place to assure this happens. All incoming freshman sign a banner during a "commitment to graduate" ceremony, and the freshmen meet with an administrator personally. Each freshman is matched with a junior mentor who is available to help them strengthen study habits, improve time management skills, and learn appropriate social interactions. This program continues twice a week throughout the school year and helps to build strong relationships and support systems crucial to staying in school and graduating on time. "WHS students are highly motivated, involved in many extra and co curricular activities, and they drive the caring culture of our school," said Gandy. "WHS enjoys tremendous support from our teachers, administrators, parents, and board members. We believe and live our mission, 'Every Student, Every Day.'"

Union Township School Corporation strives every day to provide every student with the resources they need to be successful in all aspects of K-12 education. Unfortunately, this has become an increasingly difficult mission in today's world of decreasing funding from the state of Indiana. Our corporation, as well as many others, is searching for ways to continue to provide the exemplary programming we do in light of inadequate funding. The time has come for our community to make its wishes known. Without your help we cannot continue to provide these opportunities to our children. Please keep in contact with your schools and with your legislators to let them know you support public education and that you support the funding required to keep our schools operating at the highest level that is crucial to our children's success.