THS ‘What Not to Wear’ fashion show

Incoming freshmen at Tupelo High School got to see what’s appropriate to wear to school and what’s not during orientation on Thursday. Click video above to see the show. Read all about it in the DJ Friday.

Tupelo High cheerleaders lead fight song …

Tupelo High cheerleaders led incoming ninth-graders in the school fight song at freshman orientation on Thursday. Go Golden Wave!

Do I really look that old?

So I’m at Tupelo High School this afternoon covering freshman orientation. No sooner than I sat down did a ninth-grader whirl around and say, “YOU’RE a freshman?” Shoulda told him yes…

Church plans BTS bash in Ida Street area

Here’s a brief I’ll have in tomorrow’s DJ:

TUPELO – The Church at Trace Crossing, located in the West Main Shopping Center, is conducting a community outreach for the Ida Street area at Hancock Park on Sunday from 4-6 p.m.
The event is for children in grades K-6 and will include several hundred bags of free school supplies, 500 free hot dogs and drinks for attending children and their families. Several grand prizes will be awarded to adults and children.
The event also includes games, bouncing inflatables, a fire truck, rock climbing wall and face painting. Several local businesses have donated to the event including Chic-fil-A, McDonald’s, Todd’s Grocery, Skate Zone, Burger-King, Wal-Mart, Kroger, Kilgore’s grocery, Chuck E. Cheese Pizza and Staples. Members of West Jackson Street Baptist Church also will be assisting with the event.
For more information, contact Pastor Kevin Wood at 891-6396 or event coordinator Tricia Robbins at 397-5097.

From the Tupelo school board meeting

I wish I could have blogged from today’s meeting, but TPSD blocks access to WordPress, Yahoo and other entertainment/social/personal sites. It’s not that I wasn’t paying attention, I just thought you’d like to get info from the meeting as it was happening. Anyway, the big talk today was about the budget. At tonight’s public hearing, the administration will present its budget to the five-member board and a proposed ad valorem tax increase will be considered. Any millage increase will have to be set by the Tupelo City Council, and the final decision on the budget will be made at the Aug. 12 school board meeting.

14-year-old college freshman

In today’s Daily Journal I wrote about Juliana Norton, a 14-year-old from Fulton who will forgo high school for college. What an amazing girl she is! You can read the story here and included some portraits of Juliana taken by DJ photog Thomas Wells. One thing the story didn’t mention is that Juliana was awarded the Augusta Scholarship, worth $10,000 over the four years she spends at Mary Baldwin College, where she’ll be enrolled in the Program for Exceptionally Gifted.

Amory High at Envirothon competition

My colleague Chris Wilson at the Monroe Journal wrote about Amory High School’s participation in the international Canon Envirothon 2008 competition. You can read her story at Monroe360.com.

State test standards

Yesterday I spoke twice with Dr. Hank Bounds, Mississippi’s Superintendent of Education, about the state’s test standards. The Board of Education is meeting today and tomorrow and will wrap up their 2-day meeting with a news conference to announce how Mississippi students compare academically with students across the nation. We’ll have a mini-editorial board meeting with Dr. Bounds later this afternoon for a story in tomorrow’s DJ. I’d better get back to writing that, but wanted to let you know that even though it looks like Mississippi students didn’t do so well, the positive news is that we now have a curriculum in place that has a level of expectation the same as every other state in the nation.

If you give a child an author

Wow! I can’t believe what a fantastic opportunity children in Tupelo will have this fall. You know the popular children’s books “If You Give a Pig a Pancake” and “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie”? Well, the author is coming here in September!

Susan Hankins, a first-grade teacher at Thomas Street Elementary School, applied for a grant through the Association for Excellence in Education to bring Laura Numeroff here. The grant is for a little more than $8,800, and the project is aptly named “If You Give a Child an Author.”

Hankins’ goal is the show children the pleasures of reading, as well as to build their writing skills. While Numeroff is here Sept. 15-16, she’ll talk to Thomas Street students about the writing process. She’ll also speak at a community event on Sept. 15 that all Tupelo families are invited to!

I’ll have the full story in an upcoming edition of the DJ, which I hope also will include comments from Numeroff herself!

It’s back to school time again!

Hey, all you school fans! It’s that time of year again! I can’t believe the summer has gone by so quickly! The DJ is working on its annual Back to School section and I’ve been gathering school calendars to be included. It looks like most schools will begin sometime between Monday, Aug. 4 and Friday, Aug. 8. Are you as excited as I am about the new school year?