School's In!

Officially started back to school this week. What a busy end to the summer, a trip to Va to get all that furniture, followed by a week of inservice and then this first week. I am pooped out already with one more day to go.

This looks like its going to be another great year though. Last year I really had it made. I had 8th period off and 1st period off (block schedule) so it was like having a three hour conference period spread over two days. On one of those my lunch ran into the conference so I was off really early. Im going to be a LOT busier this year. Instead of 90 students, I have over 150, and Ive given up a conference period to coach Academic Decathlon again. Argh, the pain of grading!

Its been a long time since I did AcDec. My years at DeSoto were good with this program, building it up gradually until finally making state in the last two years there. My co-coach Rae Jean is still coaching over at Northwest and will be in my region this year, but we won't be competing against each other. It will be good to see her there and I hope things go well for her this year. I know its been tough for her to field a team, with I have found strange given that there are about 3K students there. The three years I tried to get the program going at Red Oak really soured me for a while, and it was time to step back for sure back in '03. There was just no way the program was going to work there, and not having support makes all the difference in the world.

Crandall looks like it is going to be great. I couldn't ask for more as a coach, everyone has been so supportive and pretty much set up the program like I thought it needed to be. I have a great energetic co-coach in Amanda, and people who are wanting to help out. Crandall is a very unique kind of place. I was talking with one of my students during the summer about what its like, and he had a thoughful observation. He said that it was interesting how so many people from so many different places had made it to this small town, and the combination of all of their talents and the talents of the students had meshed to make this a special place. I have noticed that as well. There is so much talent here for such a small place. There are a LOT of good programs here, so many that I don't know where to begin. The athletic programs are all pretty good (I get to be the announcer for Friday games, woo hoo!). The newspaper staff wins awards, as does the debate team. The drill team and cheerleaders are awesome, and the band is incredible. I am really in awe of our band director John. This year the marching band will be performing to the music of Styx, and all of the music was written by John. I have only been at schools where the directors bought the music, not actually wrote it for ALL the instruments. Very cool! How many schools offer Rock Band as a class? Last year I got to catch a couple of the different bands playing out back at the Cotton Gin, and these kids have a lot of talent. The drama folks put on a number of performances each year that are great, and very nearly made state last year. We have our own very cool television studio. Im sure I left someone off, but you get the idea. There is a lot here. I am glad that I found this place, and I hope during my time here I get to put my own stamp on a few things. We will see starting with our first competition in January.