Latest news with #StudentTechnologyLeadershipProgram
Yahoo
14-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
More improvements to come at Armco Park
CATLETTSBURG Improvements at Armco Park are expected to continue as Boyd County Fiscal Court have begun the process to upgrade a second shelter house this summer, including inclusive playground equipment and new restrooms to neighbor the wiffleball field. According to Boyd County Judge-Executive Eric Chaney, the county has planned to upgrade at least one shelter at the park per year after revamping Shelter House 3 in 2024. The commission approved the start of an RFP process for the installation of playground equipment fit for ages 2-12 during Tuesday's regular meeting, meaning the updates will soon begin. Chaney said Shelter House 7's improvements will closely resemble Shelter House 3's, which also included new playground equipment and shelter. The newest improvements are expected to be completed by August, including new restrooms, turf and padding, inclusive merry-go-round, swings and playground equipment for a wide range of ages and abilities. The upgrades will also feature another wooden sculpture by Travis Williams. In other events: • The Boyd County Fiscal Court issued a proclamation declaring May 13, 2025, as Boyd County STLP Day to recognize the recent first place wins of Summit Elementary and Boyd County Middle School's Student Technology Leadership Program teams. • The court approved the use of AMLER grants to construct a roadway from the soon-to-come quarter horse race track and Camp Landing, which Chaney said will allow a connection between the two destinations and 'will allow it to grow together.'
Yahoo
28-04-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Local teams come home winners from STLP championship
ASHLAND Several area schools scored big at the Student Technology Leadership Program (STLP) State Championship in Lexington last weekend. It's the largest event Rupp Arena hosts, with 25,000 attending, according to Cara Ryver, sixth-grade language arts teacher at Boyd County Middle School and STLP coach, whose student Peyton Moore won first place in a creative digital arts category called Kentucky Travel. 'Entrants were tasked with choosing any town in Kentucky and finding something about the town to focus on,' Ryver said. 'The theme was Bluegrass Bites and students were to find a restaurant and review it.' She said Moore's video focused on The Mill AKY in Ashland. 'This is typically a team project, but he did it all by himself, from beginning to end,' she said. Moore, a seventh-grader, is the son of Greg Moore and Heather Moore-Frame. 'It was notable how well eastern Kentucky was represented, between Greenup and Boyd counties,' Ryver said. One of the two teams from Russell High School won Best Technical Project in the state, encompassing all grades. Coach Carolyn McGranahan, who also teaches AP U.S. history, world history and fine arts, said the winning team created Project Lockdown, a small computer unit that collects visual information to help first responders to school shootings see where problems exist. Using their technical skills and information they collected from the school resource officer, e911 experts, teachers and IT people, they developed an inexpensive information processor that aims to help save lives, especially in school districts that can't afford more expensive systems. McGranahan said for the students, the project was personal. 'We're living in an age where lockdowns, unfortunately, have become a normal thing,' she said. 'Kentucky was the first state in the United States to have a school shooting and it was close to us.' She said they chose a project that would make a difference and would be affordable to all schools. 'It's outstanding,' she said. 'It's truly remarkable what they've accomplished.' Summit Elementary's team won first place in its category, as it did two years prior. The coach is Letitia Rudie. Russell Middle School entered robotics categories using Legos, coach Luke McCallister, seventh- and eighth-grade science teacher, said. The school's three teams were winners. In the RCX Extreme Competition, two teams entered and placed first and second. McCallister said students designed, built and programmed a Lego robot with attachments aimed at completing various tasks required by the competition. A team competing in Robot Royale Line Follower not only won first, but set a state record for speed. The goal was to create a robot to follow a line; the winner was the team with the fastest robot. Russell's team broke the 12-second record with a time of 11.8 seconds. The distance traveled was about 20 feet, McCallister said. Ashland Middle School took second place with its custom-built helmet sensor system which aims to detect potentially concussion-level impacts. Sensors fit inside a helmet and send data to a student-developed app when a collision exceeds a force threshold, coach Mark Harmon said. The app stores the data and notifies coaches so players can be assessed for possible head injuries. The team consists of student-athletes, of whom so many have experienced concussions. 'Their goal wasn't to prevent all head injuries — something they acknowledge isn't realistic — but to raise awareness and create a tool to support coaches and teammates in responding more quickly and safely,' Harmon said. 'I couldn't be more proud of these students, not just for the award they earned, but for the heart, effort and real-world thinking they brought to this project,' Harmon said. 'They saw a problem that affected them personally and turned it into an opportunity to help others. That's what true innovation looks like.'
Yahoo
03-04-2025
- General
- Yahoo
DCMS Newcomers practice language skills through podcast
Students arriving at Danielle Mead's Newcomers class at Daviess County Middle School come from all over the world. That's not an exaggeration: More than 30 languages are currently being spoken in the Daviess County Public Schools system. What all of those students need, of course, is a command of English, and the Newcomers program is a way the district works to rapidly build English skills in students who are relatively or entirely new to the language. 'It's a variety: Some of them have no English,' Meade said in a recent interview. To help build their skills in a new way, Meade and a group of Newcomers students created a podcast, where the students talk to each other about their lives and share their stories. The podcasts were selected, out of thousands of entries, to be judged at the Student Technology Leadership Program state championship later this month in Lexington. 'It's a real celebration of where education and technology merge,' said Jana Beth Francis, assistant superintendent of teaching and learning at DCPS. 'We have worked in the district to work the podcast into the curriculum. 'To be a good podcaster, you have to read, write, speak and listen well,' Francis said. DCMS media specialist Kate Albers said one of the ideas behind the podcast was to help the students gain confidence in their language skills. 'A lot of times, they are afraid to speak English because they are still learning,' Albers said. Putting together the podcast wasn't difficult. 'We've had the equipment for a couple of years, so we've done podcasts before,' Albers said. The podcast is hosted by sixth graders Ehsanullah Mohamadi, Jeremiah Kuriakose-Kocheril and Henry Soni, and by eighth grader Fernando Gonzalez. 'I think it was kind of cool,' Gonzalez said. 'I'd never done that before.' A script was prepared beforehand, so the students were prepared for taping. The process was easy, Mohamadi said. 'It was just reading,' he said. The students spend half of each day with Meade, learning English through reading, learning words and concepts, answering questions and by using tools such as videos of Steve Hartman's 'On The Road' series. The students build their vocabulary, learning through written passages that connect to their other classes. The class follows a routine, with students building on their language skill days. For example, the students begin the week by reading a passage and progressing with it to where they are able to discuss the passage's key ideas by week's end. 'Each day the students spend three hours with me,' Meade said in an email. 'In those three hours, everyone has had a chance to speak. It may be a one word response or a two to three sentence response, but in my room we celebrate all speaking that a student (does). When a new student realizes that we are in this together, they will take more risks in my room and each day grow in their English proficiency.' For the remainder of the school day, the students go to their regular classes. Meade said the staff works with the new English speakers to help them succeed. 'When I first got the job, I met with the teachers,' Meade said. 'We looked at how to modify their assignments and how to address their needs.' Fellow DCPS students are also very supportive of kids who are new to English, Meade said. 'Their peers that are English speakers area always able to help them,' Meade said. Meade described the Newcomers class as a place where the students help each other and where they know they have an instructor they can turn to for assistance. 'The first thing I do on day one of getting a new student is just building a relationship with them,' Meade said. 'They quickly learn I am their advocate before, during, and after school hours. I am here to make them feel welcomed in America.'
