Each month we will post the employee recognized by his/her peers and the chosen by the committee.

Learn more about District 287 Employee Recognition Program.

Wall of Honor

Meet our

Employee

Jennifer

Nelson

 Professional Learning

of the

Teaching and Learning Group

Responsive
Jenny has provided numerous PEM (PCM) training sessions for the Administrative Services Division, and the training sessions have always been of the highest quality. All staff in Admin Services have completed at least two full days of PEM training and many have participated in the review sessions she has offered as well.  In addition, 12 leaders in the Division have completed the 2 day Advanced Training led by Jenny, with assistance from Anne Becker.  Jenny always makes herself available for questions and support as needed, which has proven to be a valuable resource for our Division. She does this all in addition to her normal day-to-day responsibilities.
Jenny’s contributions to our PEM initiative are truly making a difference in the way we serve our customers and each other!
Jenny provides personal examples of how she has learned to use PEM in her life and how it has made a difference for her personally and professionally. This allows us all to have understandable examples to recall and know that we too can make it work for us.
Jenny develops and holds PEM training sessions with staff from the division every other month.  The material she covers is SPOT ON!  Jenny shows both her understanding of PEM and Administrative Services Division staff.  We could not have made it this far without her!
Over the past two years, Jenny has made time in her schedule to continually meet with the planning leadership team of the division,  to ensure that Leaders of the Administrative Services Division have the tools and training they need in order for the division to reach it’s PLC goals   Her insightful and creative training materials have been invaluable to the team.
Jenny offered employees who have taken PEM training a “Friends and Family” program that allows each us to take the PEM training one step further with our loved ones. Additionaly, she offered  the same group an option to have our students up to 12th grade do an on-line PEM assessment. These programs help us to use PEM skills as we learn and grow in the process outside of District 287. This offering is truly above and beyond the normal workday.
Jenny is truly a leader in the District

Solutions
The PEM training is a key component to the major Customer Service initiative that is the focus of the Admin Services PLC goal this year. Through her trainings, review sessions, modeling PEM concepts, etc,. she has been a huge asset to the Division by providing necessary tools we can use each day to improve our customer service.
Not only does Jenny provide PEM training and support for the Admin Service Division, she has also worked extremely hard to identify how it specifically applies to our demographic footprint here in 287, which is what makes the training so meaningful and that much easier to apply to our daily work.
In Jenny’s last training session with Administrative Services staff members, she role played with them on how to communicate with our customers by sharing that most personality types respond best to a request in the form of a question versus a directive.  It has been fun to watch the staff work on this small adjustment to improve relationships with their internal customers.

Innovative
Jenny is playing a major role in changing the culture in Administrative Services, and gradually the District as a whole, to incorporate the concepts of PEM into our everyday work life. She is making 287 the kind of work place that people want to work in and one in which high performers choose to remain.
Jenny took the training materials from our consultants and created her own to simplify difficult concepts and also created games for us to use for training. How cool is that?
District 287 is unique, which we all know, and Jenny took the PEM materials, also unique, and modified them to fit our situation. A truly innovative person.
Jenny continues to develop new tools to help us gain better understandings of PEM.

April

2013

Doris Moylan

Edgewood Education Center

of the

Responsive
Doris addresses the need of all 117 students at Edgewood.  She knows each student individually, works with their families and Group Homes to coordinate services for them, provides individual and group counseling, teaches SEL classes and assists in finding solutions for students, staff and families.
In addition, Doris co-chairs our Student Council where she assists students in planning and implementing many innovative activities throughout the school year such as; school sporting events, parties/dances, Women’s History month, Manuary challenge, charitable food drives and fund raisers, hallway etiquette, sweeten your words, name calling week, thought bubble/talk bubble technique and others.
Doris co-chairs our Be the Change week, and has worked with our Councilor and Psychologist to choose an SEL curriculum and organize staff training sessions. 
Doris is always present at school activities such as Open House, Spaghetti dinner and Bingo and Basketball.  She assists in writing our newsletter, supervises students over the lunch hour, provides rides to parents and students in emergency situations, makes home visits as necessary, and will always help out in any way she can, demonstrating her responsiveness.
Even given all of the responsibilities Doris takes on, she always appears calm, friendly and sincerely caring.
Doris has provided staff development to Edgewood several times over the past 5 years and this spring will be presenting at the MACMH conference along with 2 other district staff.

Solutions
Doris collaborated with a teacher to get a student with attendance problems to school.  This included making phone calls to the student in the morning and even making home visits a couple of times.  The student now has excellent attendance and keeps track of how many days in a row he has been at school.

Innovative
Many of the activities Doris and the student council come up with are innovative, encouraging student participation.  This year Doris worked with another from the Leadership team to plan and implement a Bingo and Basketball evening for student and their parents/guardians.  Families were served pizza and while they ate Doris gave a brief presentation on Nurtured Heart, the SEL curriculum we will be using next year.  Then families could choose to play basketball in the Gym or Bingo in the cafeteria.  Doris collected prizes to be given away to the Bingo winners, including Beanie Baby Eagles, our school mascot. 

Jenn Halvorson

North Education Center

of

Special Education
Group

Responsive
Jenn is always responsive to her students and the teacher she works with, willing to help with any technology needs that arise in the classroom. She has been a leader in the iPad and SMART Board initiatives that have taken place at NEC. She will often spend time on her own exploring Innovative Apps that will be helpful for the classroom she works with and for others. Jenn was asked to also take over the volume purchasing of Apps at NEC and has created, and is managing a system that is beneficial to all staff using this technology.

Jenn also is responsible for co-developing and maintaining the amazing micro site at NEC. The amount of time she devotes to staff and students is truly remarkable. If there is a problem a colleague may be having with their technology; she will problem solve or search out the solutions for staff so she can provide them timely responses. If she knows that it is related to a student need, she seems to be even faster.
Given her talents and gifts that she shares with the building, Jenn has been responsible for helping with much training to staff, and parents regarding iPads and SMART Boards.
She makes NEC a better place to work!

Solutions
Jenn has worked with another staff in the development of the NEC microsite. She has assisted other sites too in understanding and creating their microsites. Without Jenn the dynamic user-friendly microsite would be stagnant.

Innovative
Jenn understanding and use of technology in the classroom to support students.

Scott Swanson

 West Education
Center

of

Care & Treatment
Group

Responsive
Scott Swanson is an amazing young man with lots of talents and he has a passion for facilitating learning regardless of an individual’s age. He is always willing to help staff and students with technology needs and will always help individuals save time by showing them how technology can be used to make our jobs easier. WEC staff at know that when we have a question regarding minuet to ginormous technology questions, Scott with a smile on his face, will come running to assist.  He amazes staff every day with his talents, patience and willingness to help build others.

Solutions
Scott has created and or supported several unique technology projects that have helped create a positive and efficient work environment for all the staff/students at West Education Center.   

• Ipad documentation: student behaviors are documented through a Google doc form that staff can easily access for IEP documentation or guiding areas of need for the PBIS team.
• Bulldog Buck Banking system: Building staff can view what students can purchase with their positive behavior bucks.
• Staff/Student Orientation Moodle: Online lessons for new staff and students.
• Credit Tracking form for staff: He created a form that adds up the number of credits a student earns in a day.
• WEC Google Docs: At WEC a majority of our forms and meeting notes can be accessed through Google Docs.

• WEC web page: Allows anyone access to important information regarding the school.

Innovative
Innovation should be his middle name. He is amazing with technology and he continues to build on his own skills with technology by Google searching ideas and questions. He can always find a way to include technology in every aspect of an individual’s life.

 
Anne
Runck 

South Education Center

of the

Teaching and Learning Group

Responsive
Anne is extremely flexible in her job, taking on new challenges yearly.  She has done an amazing job leading in C-TRAIN and has been invaluable in her leadership within the AVID program at SECA. She is constantly responding positively to challenges within education and with our students.  She takes every opportunity to learn and grow as an educator and is a model of flexibility to her colleagues.

Solutions
Anne is constantly creating solutions.  One situation that has come up in SECA is AVID.  Because I am the Elective teacher, I am often needed to interview students and deal with AVID business during the school day.  Anne always steps in to sub for my classes so that I am able to get my work done.  She uses that time in my classroom to further the AVID program and connect with our incredible AVID students.

Innovative
One way that she is innovative is that she is always looking for the best solutions to problems that arise.  If something doesn’t work in her favor, she maintains a positive attitude so that she can still get things done.  She is a big advocate for student input, so she allows students to be in on the process of creating solutions.  In AVID, she gives the students a voice.  The student voice is creative and powerful, and she has helped me harness their wonderful energy.

Tabitha Johnson 

District Service Center

of

the Special Education Group

Responsive
Tabitha Johnson defines responsive.  When asked a question or brought a concern, Tab works quickly to develop a solution or find an answer.  She simply does not use the phrase, “I don’t know”.  If, in fact, she doesn’t know, she will state that she will look in to the situation and get back to you.  If an answer is difficult to find, Tab will develop a temporary solution to solve the immediate issue while developing a more permanent solution.  She has an attitude that reflects her willingness to work with others for students.  When a solution seems to create additional work or staff time, she is swiftly working to improve the process.  She is positive, upbeat, conscientious and willing to “Go Above and Beyond” for the district, the staff and especially the students!  She totally deserves this award!

Solutions
“Solutions” is another way to describe Tab.  Whenever we are presented with a new process or method for entering data into a system, etc, Tab always learns the system first to iron out bugs. She deals with the issues so that we can enter our information, and poof! we have useable data.  When I or my colleagues struggle, Tab is the one who figures out how to solve the issue for us.  She understands both the need for the data we collect and how limited our time is.  She streamlines our work with a smile and a can do attitude.  I would be lost without her and she’s not even “mine”!

Innovative
Tab is innovative in that she sees issues only as a need to develop a solution.  She will find information to help others reduce time spent on a project (a list of needed numbers, ID #’s for staff, etc.) and develops the list within a very short time frame so that we can get to the business of working with kids.  On more than one occasion, I have asked how to gather a certain piece of information about my staff and Tab’s response is typically “oh, I think I can get that from some data base or another and I will send it to you.”  It’s in my email typically within the hour! 

Thomas
Shultz

District Service Center

of the

Administrative Services
Group

Responsive
Facilities Director, Tom Shultz, is uniquely responsive to students and staff at 287 as he listens and responds to issues, ideas and concerns related to facilities each and every day. He works tirelessly to make sure that the District’s facilities are safe, clean and appropriate to meet the unique needs of our students and the staff who teach them.

Tom has made good use of his limited budget to improve staff & student safety by installing new security cameras, a new key card system, railings, lights & camera’s in parking lots and even new doors in buildings around 287. He has listened to staff about the need for a new “Jitterbug” and one was installed at West Education Center last year.

A day doesn’t go by when Tom isn’t thinking about, planning for and overseeing the installation of facilities related equipment or items to make the District facilities work for students and staff.

Solutions
Tom has led the effort to build a new school when it became apparent that Hosterman could not be repaired at a reasonable cost. Over the past four years, Tom has worked with district staff, administrators, the school board, and an array of architects and construction contractors in the design and building of the three story North Education Center. During the height of the most serious economic crisis since the Great Depression, Tom was instrumental in working with the school board as they determined that the best decision was to tear down Hosterman and build a new school building. NEC was designed to meet the unique learning needs of 287 students well into the 21st century. The design is environmentally sustainable, the wall system is removable so that room size can change as our programs change, and the classrooms are uniquely designed for students with plenty of quiet break out rooms. Lighting and sound systems, Smart Board and technology infrastructure and the geothermal heating & cooling system are all state of the art.

Innovative
The NEC building project represents the epitome of innovation. In fact, from the very beginning, innovation was the rule on this project. Tom brought “Best Value” to the District and 287 was one of the first school districts in the State of MN to use this alternative to the traditional low-bid procurement method to hire general and certain sub-contractors. This effort to use the Best Value approach took extra time, a lot of extra time! Tom and others needed to be trained in how to use Best Value, the Board needed to understand and approve of its use and a very thorough method was used to select the construction companies that would end up building NEC. In the end, we hired JE Dunn as our general contractor and the construction project has been on-time and on-budget throughout all of its phases. Tom is passionate about meeting the needs of the students and staff at 287. His leadership of the Facilities Department has resulted in highly significant improvements in all the District’s leased and owned sites. We are lucky that he is here!

Jan
Walsh

District Service Center

of the

Administrative Services
Group

Responsive
When it comes to responsiveness, Jan Walsh is responsive to the needs within the entire Admin Service Division, as well as site and program needs. Because of Jan’s wealth of experience in both our programs and district operations, she is able to respond quickly and effectively to everyone that relies on her. When Jan responds to a need, she is always thoughtful of everyone involved. Jan is a role model for clerical, administrative and unaffiliated staff throughout 287. Staff come to her for help and guidance on just about everything because she is known to be trusted, accurate, timely and highly respectful in her communications and information.

Solutions
Practically every day Jan creates unique solutions at the District level as a result of our dynamic work environment. In fact, it is very difficult to come up with one because everything that Jan touches will become improved, simplified and/or more efficient. One example of this would be when Jan developed a simple process for programs to receive their funds when recycling their iPads. What makes this particular solution unique is that Jan did so without impeding program workflow so they could focus their time on instructional issues, not administrative paperwork.

Innovative
Not only does Jan Walsh have a wealth of knowledge in district-wide operations, she is always on the lookout for ways to increase efficiencies whenever she sees something that needs improvement. Innovation is apparent as Jan’s suggested improvements have been put into effect in District wide procedures for cell phone use, independent contracts, p-cards, budget development and budget revision, mailroom/copy room substitutes, and transportation billing, to name just a few!

 
Megan
Dargis

 North Education Center

of the

Special Education Group

Megan Dargis is constantly using her skills to benefit the students, teachers, administrators and even parents.
Responsive: Megan is amazing with our unique students and she has a special gift  for connecting with them on many levels. Megan has been responsible for  the video yearbook creation in SUN for the past three years, using her incredible graphic design skills.

Innovative: Last year Megan was instrumental in the iPad initiative and training at North Education Center (NEC). She volunteered to pair with Jenn Halvorson to create and manage our website for NEC (the first in the district). She has been responsible for co-presenting on the use of the Smart Board with Jayme Bennett to member districts, administrators, teachers throughout District 287 and even to a group of teachers at the state level; offering both group and individual assistance.

Solutions: Because of her drive and passion for helping children succeed with technology, Megan was asked to join the Innovation Coach team as an adjunct this year. Megan is constantly giving of her time freely to better students, spending countless hours before and after school as well as at home developing activities for children.

Robert
Graham

Hennepin Technical Pathways

of the

Teaching and Learning Group

Responsive: Rob, or Chef Rob to his students, explains cooking instructions step-by-step so students understand what to do. He is kind and very patient with them.  He allows his students to be creative in the foods they cook.  If they want to cook a certain food, he allows it if the cost fits into his budget.  He keeps the students’ schools and families informed on how they are doing.   Rob does not miss deadlines, and he does not say no if someone needs help with something.  

Solutions: A couple of years ago one of our member districts asked Rob for a class that their less capable students could take.  Rob answered that request by creating the Cooking for Independent Living class for those special needs students.  He developed the curriculum and, after perfecting it, shared it with his counterpart at the Brooklyn Park Campus.  It is now taught at both EPC and BPC, and I believe it is to be expanded to North Education Center (NEC) next year.  Rob puts on a cooking demonstration every semester at one of our member district high schools. This has created a demand for his Culinary Arts classes to the point that his classes fill up faster than other Pathways classes.

Innovative: Through Rob’s Cooking class’s Cookie Sale, students also learn how to market their product, how to interact with the buying public, how many cookies are in a dozen, half dozen, etc., the math involved when selling by individual or multiple variations of a dozen cookies, plus how to make change.  Rob teaches his Culinary students grades of meat by butchering a whole dressed cow.  They also learn how to cut up fowl and to fillet fish.  Rob developed videos on these topics as an instructional tool. 

Larissa
View

Itinerant

of the

Special Education Group

Larissa View was nominated for her work with students who have classroom behavior issues:
Imagine for a moment a student with disabilities having a difficult time managing his behavior. Now, imagine that same student having that same difficulty day after day so much that he is only able to handle a few hours of school in an isolated part of the classroom.

Now enter Larissa View, Itinerant Behavior Consultant. In a matter of 20 minutes magic unfolds as I witness Larissa work with this young boy and transform him into a student who is willing to engage in learning once again.
Larissa was able to observe this student (responsive), see where she might crack into an opening to learning and then plunge right in (innovative) and model for the students staff how they may try new strategies to increase his academic skills while decreasing his challenging behavior (solutions). Larissa style demonstrated how important it is to work with students at their level, take them where they are at any given day, use humor, set good boundaries and have fun. Yes, this can all happen in 20 minutes. This student retreated under his desk as a way to de-escalate himself and when the time was right, Larissa crawled under the desk with him. In a few minutes, he came out and risked doing academic work with her; work that he was unwilling to do all morning.

Larissa even got a smile from him when she challenged him to do a problem that if he did correctly, she would do a dance. And guess what? She danced!

Kim
Kallroos

Gifted Education Services

of the

Teaching and Learning Group

Kim Kallroos has many roles in the Gifted Education Department.. Her responsibilities include: Fermi, Destination Imagination (DI), Honors Mentor Connection (HMC) and West Suburban Summer School (WSSS).

Kim is not only a secretary; she is peacemaker, team builder and trouble shooter (innovative). She is known for her daily “solutions oriented” approach to her job.

Many of her programs are lead by parttime staff. While they are away from their jobs, Kim is constantly updating them and coordinating their projects. (responsive) To catch up, you will often find Kim here late in the evening, replying to voicemails, emails and other inquiries.

You NEVER hear a cross word or complaint from Kim. You will always be given an informed answer, or she will admit she does not know the answer. This is her daily “solutions oriented” approach to her job.
While preparing materials for all of these programs, she makes event arrangements, deposits payments and coordinates hundreds of volunteers. Because most of her programs run simultaneously, Kim’s day includes jumping from one program to the next, all in the same ten minute time period.