Editor: Over the last few months, I have been involved in a vision meeting for Langley School District, with a wonderful core group of teachers, principals, students and parents. This process is meant to get the “Good Stuff” the school district has to offer and make it better, growing with the technological times and ways of the world. I have been very inspired by this process, knowing that Langley is thinking ahead and identifying that some things need to change in our education system. I wanted to share my experiences with you.
The new vision statement is: “Langley School District is an innovative, inspiring and unified learning community.” The goal is to become all of these things. The process was to identify all the things that we want to grow towards.
It was amazing to hear and see, through all of the people involved, that we have a lot of the same core values and ideas. We seemed to all be in agreement that it takes a community to grow strong leaders for the future. We pictured that all types of community members could come together into the school systems and teach their passions.
When kids are introduced to someone with a great passion for what they do, they in turn become passionate about learning the subjects. There was talk about the core curriculum and how we need to be able to teach students to put their knowledge into real life experiences.
This would mean that all students, no matter what their abilities, could be involved in the creating process. This could be students teaching students or teachers teaching teachers.
We also spoke about having more project-based learning in the schools. Kids need those hands-on, involved experiences to identify what it is that they are passionate about.
Teachers also expressed that we need to allow for more time freedoms to be able to focus on learning, as opposed to teaching.
I encourage parents and students to visit the district website to learn more about what Langley is doing to grow towards the 21st century.
Natasha Patey, PAC Vice-president,
Wix Brown Elementary
