President Mandy Kwasnica opened the meeting tonight a little late. She was waiting for any late arrivals due to the road conditions. We were a little on the light side as far as members present tonight, perhaps winter getaways, or the conditions outside! President Mandy took control for the O Canada start as well as for Rotary Grace. She then handed the meeting over to the Sarge for guest introductions.

 

Sarge Mike was away tonight, so Lyle Miller stood in for him. Guests tonight were Iain Scott, Chido Hambira, Troy Calder (speaker tonight), Penny Spence (Janet`s mom).

 

 

President Mandy had a few announcements:

 

 

Bob Antymniuk reported that feedback for the initial draft of this year`s lobster fest tickets has been received and adjustments have been made. A second mock-up will be produced this week and sent out for committee review. Final draft should then be produced, and approval should be able to be given at that point for printing.

 

 

Jack Wilson introduced our speaker for the evening, Troy Calder, Principal of Westgrove School. Troy stared his education career working at Knowles Youth Centre where he developed a passion and belief of helping children affected by poverty. He spent 3 years in Japan in the Japan Exchange Teaching program. He lived in England for 3 years teaching in a variety of high needs schools. Troy began his Canadian career at Arthur A. Leach Middle school as a grade 7 ELA/Social Studies teacher and then as Vice-Principal for 5 years. He then moved to Dalhousie Elementary for 5 years as a Vice Principal. Troy is currently in his fifth year at Westgrove. He is the father of 2 children-ages 5 and 8 and spends his free time coaching hockey, camping and hiking.

 

Troy advised that the support provided by the Charleswood Rotary Club helps the 108 students at Westgrove School as well as the associated community at large. The provided support has impact on all connected individuals and families.

 

Westgrove School has a Vision Statement; all students will have access to basic needs. The staff at Westgrove School believe that a school needs to be a place where students feel safe, experience new things, have fun and develop happy memories. The students need to be kind, respectful and resilient. A study done internally at the school discovered that 86% of the students at Westgrove School feel that the school is the safest place in their lives. Student quote, “I love Westgrove, they take care of me”.

 

A good school must be concerned with relationship building. The students must be engaged, have a degree of curiosity, passion and motivation to learn and progress their education.

 

Westgrove School has 108 students with 90% of them living in some form of social assisted housing. There is a homogeneous population at the school that has an impact on the moods in the school. The students tend to all feel the same way at the same time to the various social issues going on in the community and the city on broader terms. The students tend to be sleep deprived and have experienced traumatic events in the past. The parents are not unfit, they are impacted by the stressors that accompany poverty. The parents do not feel judged at the school.

 

Some stats regarding Westgrove school students and parents:

 

 

The high indigenous population in the school is an asset.

 

The attendance at Westgrove School is phenomenal. However, there are 11 kids from 3 families that do have ongoing attendance issues. The school has done poorly on the provincial grade 3 reading assessment in the past. They are closing the gap over time. Three students are not reading at grade level. These students need special assessments done to help determine if other issues are at play.

 

School spirit and engagement is being improved with staff effort as well as Rotary support.

 

New staff have made a positive impact and increased engagement as well as provided new energy in the school.

 

In the past it was common to have many students on suspension at the same time. Suspension does not help to control student behaviour. In recent history there have only been 4 suspensions handed out.

 

The support from Rotary has had a positive impact on the lives of Westgrove students and by extension, their families. Staff also wants to thank the Rotary club members for their volunteer and financial support. Charleswood Rotary Club has helped to make Westgrove School a “safe and inclusive school”.

 

Classroom libraries have been upgraded with the support of Rotary. The books were old and not culturally friendly in the old libraries. Each classroom has $300 to upgrade their library. The result is an increase in students reading to themselves. 90% of grade 5`s are reading at or above grade level.  The students were given 30 minutes of library time at the start of the restocked libraries. This turned out to not be enough time, the time allotment had to be increased to 90 minutes. The goal is to have students hooked on reading by grade 3, but success is to have them reading something.  All the books have a Rotary sticker on them. The sticker has prompted some students to ask more about what Rotary is, this is an opening for Troy or others to describe the many things that Rotary does locally and globally.

 

There is a weekly book draw that was developed because some of the students did not have any of their own books. The draw is so that all students will get a new book. The draw is on Fridays with 5 students getting picked to select a book that week. This continued until all students had been a winner in the draw and received a book.

 

This is all done to help develop great memories from attending Westgrove School. It is during Middle Years school grades that many students are lost out of the system.

 

The donation of shoes has had a great impact on some students. Some students arrive at school with shoes in disrepair and because of these shoes they try to avoid the gym. 13 pairs of shoes were donated to the school just prior to the winter break. The shoes are used by many students during the school day. There have been 3 pairs of shoes given to three students to keep, due to severe disrepair of their previous footwear. This has led to increased participation in physical activities at school.

 

The phys-ed teacher noticed a student with boots on that were being held together with an elastic band, toes were sticking out of the boots. The teacher got the student shoes and the kid is now a runner. Runs everywhere and participates in gym class. There have been two other students found in similar footwear situations. The shoes have made a big impact on the children and have increased engagements.

 

School-wide clothing with a custom Westgrove School logo have been given out. Students were wearing clothes in disrepair or not fitting well, due to them being handed down / second hand. The new clothing helps to create school pride. They were given a logo T-shirt and jogging pants at the end of the celebratory week. The result of this clothing give-away has been phone calls from parents thanking Rotary and the school. Troy did a private survey of clothing wear two weeks ago. He found that on average there were 20 students each day wearing the clothing.

 

Troy had many photos during the presentation. The photo of the students wearing the logo shirts and jogging pants, with Santa in the background, showed school pride, inclusion and engagement. A second photo showed a pizza lunch taking place in the gym on long group tables. There was pizza, music and a party atmosphere…this is how the students left school for the Christmas holiday break. This photo showed engagement again which helps to create a positive response and trust that school cares for them. A third photo shown at this point illustrated a lesson of how to give back. The students are allowed to pick two presents for the two most influential adults in their lives. They must write a short story about why they want to give these adults the gifts. Rotary funding has helped to support this program.

 

Future education initiatives include getting access to a specialist from Rotary to provide support for grant application writing for topic specific education. Horticulture support is being planned to work with the garden plots. There will be more initiatives to come.

 

Outdoor education expansion plans include developing an interactive outdoor education setting. Plans include development of an interactive living museum that will allow for the creation of scenarios leading to authentic writing experiences. The school is planning for a MYTP presentation. The school will also have a ‘Star Dome’ presentation focused on indigenous perspectives (http://stardome.ca/).

 

Troy finished his presentation by thanking the club for our ongoing support and kindness. He advised that we are changing the lives of many children.

 

Q/A

 

1.-Lloyd Talbot stated that Westgrove School is obviously building pride in the students. This area of the city has so much indigenous history. There was a river crossing near-by that allowed the transport of goods from Lockport though this area down to the USA. Mandan people lived in the area. There is a Mandan Street locally that the old river crossing came up to years ago.

 

2.-Bob Antymniuk stated that he was on Board of Stevenson-Britannia School and saw the relationship with the St. James School Division. They could have given more for the school but chose not to. He wondered what the relationship is like between Westgrove School and Pembina Trails School Division?

A.- They care. They want feedback to judge how the gap is being closed to become equal to reading scores from other schools in the division. They are working on equity, trying to make the schools equal related to funding. They fund, but not the extras. They trust and support the staff efforts 100%.

 

3.- Janet Spence wanted to know what the E.D.I. is like for Westgrove School Children?

    [The EDI is a questionnaire that measures Kindergarten children’s readiness for school across several areas of child development. The EDI measures how a community of Kindergarten children is doing compared to children in other communities or provinces. The EDI is never used to assess individual children.] https://www.gov.mb.ca/healthychild/edi/

A.- Westgrove School is lower than average. A 2 out of 4 on a scale. Westgrove School has Full Day Kindergarten trying to make up for this lower starting point. In reality, they are trying to teach social skills to the children.

 

4.-Ed Thompson asked if they have access to culturally correct indigenous books?

A.-Yes, they are in the libraries. The school was built for a much larger student population. This means that with only 108 students there is a lot of available space for indigenous based programs to be based in the school. Troy is always offering the space to appropriate individuals or programs.

 

 

Jack Wilson was extremely pleased to have Chido Hambira as a guest tonight. She is the daughter of George Hambira. Chido has just recently received her PhD – Medicinal Chemistry. She will be moving to the Vancouver area for her first employment with her new degree. She has been hired by UBC Vancouver. Congratulations Chido!

 

Rod Delisle was happy to have been able to curl in his regular league on Friday night with the help of Chuck Crocker. They were short and Chuck came out to help on short notice.

 

Chuck Crocker`s initial concern was just how much he was able to actually help Rod and the other team members, they lost. Chuck was very pleased however, with the immediate start of his snow blower for the recent snowfall. The machine usually cranks over for a while before starting. He changed the fuel to a synthetic fuel recently and believes that this had made all the difference.

 

Brian Campbell was happy to visit with his 8-year-old grand daughter on the weekend. He was happy that the snow held off long enough for them to get home from the trip.

 

D.G. Elaine Thompson was just so happy to see Iain Scott here again tonight.

 

Lloyd Talbot was happy to be traveling in the Toronto and Ottawa area to visit grandkids recently, but the timing was bad. He got stuck in the Toronto airport due to the cold causing hundreds of cancelations but more specifically, two flights got canceled that he was booked on. He spent 24 hours in the airport. On a very positive note, Lloyd was at a meeting for the next leg of the Habitat for Humanity Cycle of Hope, July 6^th to 20^th, 2019. This year, the cyclists will start in Baker City, Oregon; head north along the Payette National Forest in Idaho, continue northeast along the scenic Lochsa River where the cyclist will be challenged by the longest gradual ascent on the TransAmerica trail, pass through Lolo National Forest into Montana and conclude their cycling adventure in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming.  Lloyd will be one of the volunteer crew and has been advised he will be on food service. https://www.habitat.mb.ca/events-cycleofhope.cfm

 

Eira Braun-Labossiere was happy to get back to Winnipeg after an extended stay down east. Toronto is definitely not “it” as far as she is concerned. Winnipeg is the place to live in a direct comparison. Eira was happy to have the experience seeing staff in the company warehouse slowly understand the importance of the can ‘tab’ collection. After first explaining the reason for the collection of the tabs, they had a blank look on their faces. The collection bottle started to fill up over time.

 

Iain Scott was very pleased that D.G. Elaine was so happy to see him here tonight. Iain was also happy to announce that his youngest daughter had her 25^th birthday.

 

Chido Hambira expressed how happy she was to be here tonight with the Rotary Club. She was “super happy and grateful for the support of Rotary over the years for her family”.

 

 

Ed Toews had a birthday and really wanted us to sing for him tonight.

 

Lloyd Talbot had 4 birthdays to celebrate. His trip to Toronto and Ottawa was related to those birthdays. His son and daughter-in-law have the same birthday. Adding to that oddity, Lloyd`s grand daughter has her birthday 4 days after Lloyd. He wished that we would sing as well.

 

Eira Braun-Labossiere had a birthday this week which had Martin spoiling her all week.

 

Even though we were down in shear numbers this week, we managed to sing a decent rendition of Happy Birthday for the celebrants.

 

 

Acting Sarge Lyle had our guest, Troy, pull the potential winning ticket. Long odds this week! The number pulled matched up to the stub that Ed Thompson held, even though Ed couldn`t get the ticket out of his pocket quick enough. He was the only one left to look while we waited. Ed made a valiant effort, but the odds were definitely not in his favor tonight. No win…the pot grows again.

 

 

Acting Sarge Lyle had a couple of late arrivals to get some cash out of tonight, Martin and Roh. Ed Thompson paid the fine for Roh tonight. Not sure regarding any ulterior motive behind that.

 

President Mandy received a fine for starting the meeting late tonight. She was in a no-win situation; trying to wait for late arrivals due to the driving conditions.

 

Ed Thompson was fined for not taking his gifted hat off tonight, after he received it from Lloyd.

 

 

Rod Delisle confirmed a planning meeting for lobster dinner Feb. 11^th, 2019 at 4:30pm just prior to the next regular Rotary meeting at Breezy Bend.