North Heights earns state honor

The leadership team at North Heights Junior High recently received the 2017 Shannon Wright award during the Arkansas Association of Middle Level Education Fall Conference. The award is given to schools that demonstrate outstanding achievement in the implementation of best middle-level practices. (Submitted photo)
The leadership team at North Heights Junior High recently received the 2017 Shannon Wright award during the Arkansas Association of Middle Level Education Fall Conference. The award is given to schools that demonstrate outstanding achievement in the implementation of best middle-level practices. (Submitted photo)

North Heights Junior High School recently received the 2017 Shannon Wright Award from the Arkansas Association of Middle Level Education, an honor the school's principal says brings a sense of accomplishment to her teachers and her students.

"Over the past few years, we've put things in place that made it possible for us to win this award," Theresa Cowling said. "Each year a school is honored for being bold and brave and just stepping out there and doing what's right for kids, being bold and brave and making creative decisions for kids."

The award is named for Shannon Wright, who taught at Westside Middle School in Jonesboro, Ark., and was killed in 1998 while protecting her students from a school shooter. College Hill Middle School received the award in 2007, while Cowling was assistant principal. She said when the award was announced during the Arkansas Association of Middle Level Education convention, she immediately called the school to tell her students.

"The secretary put me on the intercom to tell the students that we won," she said. "Everyone was so excited."

Dillon Roseberry, a NHJH geography teacher who is on the school's leadership team, said the award was a nice acknowledgement of all the hard work they've put in with the children to help them succeed.

"A lot of it is the whole teaming model," he said. "In teaming, a group of four or five teachers shares a common body of kids so the teaming model is essential to the middle level, and that's what the major thread of that application was."

This is the second consecutive year NHJH has applied for the award. Cowling said she gave her leadership team the option to apply again this year or wait until next year.

"They voted unanimously that we were ready and we were going for it," she said.

Art teacher Kim McVeigh said the school's student advising and clubs helped them win the award, as they are part of making sure there is something at the school for every single child.

"We had implemented things such as advisory programs where teachers get to know the kids," she said. "You really get to know your kids on a personal level."

School clubs meet daily and they include interests such as drawing, pets, movies, campus beautification, basketball, defensive driving, coding, books, walking and others.

"It gives them 30 minutes of their week (in which) they can look forward to doing something with people who have a common interest," Cowling said. "You find out a lot about kids when you do that. What's really cool to me is I find it is a very different combination of kids that wouldn't have met normally. They find they have something in common with people they wouldn't normally connect with."

The school uses The Leader in Me program, developed by Stephen Covey, which teaches children to be responsible for their actions and think of the consequences of what they do.

"We are teaching them organization, responsibility and some character education." Roseberry said. "I think what makes us different is it's about educating the whole child. Those middle grades are often forgotten. We focus on the elementary or the high school kids, but where are we? This is where they are growing the most mentally and physically, for sure."

McVeigh said using the teaming model, along with the advising programs has not only helped the students, it's helped the teachers too.

"It's just kind of a supportive environment for the kids and us," McVeigh said. "It's a win-win. That saying it takes a village it truly does. We as teachers compare notes and things about the children. It really makes a difference."

On winning the award, Cowling said she couldn't be more proud of her teachers who worked hard to make it happen.

"I think we've done a great job in the past six years to put every single piece together," she said. "This just means so much to me and to all of us."

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