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Education Elevat g Damisch .. cont’d. that are combined differently to form 72 spelling patterns, which are referred to as phonograms. Linnig ... cont’d.

local businesses. In addition, Dimmick CCSD #175, a rural district of approximately 150 students in La Salle County, partners with area businesses to sponsor a bridge building competition in which students from area schools design, construct, and test their engineering skills. “With the rising costs of college, the worst time to try and figure out what you want to be in life is after you enroll in college and set foot on a university campus,” Linnig said. “The earlier you can introduce career exploration and help kids find out what they’re passionate about, they will be more prepared to make decisions in high school and beyond.” Under Linnig’s leadership, the district adopted a program uniquely designed by one of its teachers, known as Dimmick Fit, which focuses on physical fitness, nutrition, and social-emotional learning. In addition to daily physical education classes where students wear monitors to track heart rates in real time, all K-8 students train for and participate in a school sponsored annual 5k race called the Dimmick Dash. This event is also open to the public. An obstacle course challenge has also been a hit with students. Students are asked to create their own course and submit a video of them completing it. On the nutrition side, the district invested resources to update its kitchen. Sixth, seventh, and eighth graders now participate in a cooking unit each trimester to educate them on how to safely prepare healthy and nutritious meals. Regular challenges to consume fruits and vegetables in lunches are also baked into the district culture, along with parent outreach and a Chopped competition where students design a menu and prepare a meal for judges. The SEL piece has also played a major role in Dimmick Fit, which has resulted in local assessments scores in math and literacy for students who are active participants ranging from 10-30 percent higher than their counterparts. Dimmick CCSD #175 provides weekly health and SEL lessons that focus on empathy, respect, being assertive, taking other people’s perspectives, managing strong emotions, decision making, self esteem, problem solving, mental health and anti-bullying. “We’re seeing that by getting kids more engaged in good diet and exercise, as well as giving them strategies associated with social emotional learning, it is having an overall impact on academic achievement,” Linnig said. “Developing those strong habits early on is going to help them out significantly later in life.” Outside of the two major initiatives within the district, Linnig said he is most proud of his work around legislative advocacy and educating legislators on the impact of unfunded mandates and importance of local control.

Dr. Damisch said she is not aware of any other Illinois public schools who have adopted the Hillsdale College Model, so her district is uncharted territory, adding implementation has been an intensive process because nothing about it is prepackaged or turnkey. “It’s a big, heavy lift because it’s not flashy or in a box. Teachers really have to follow the program. We’re already seeing amazing results,” Dr. Damisch said. “I have third graders that are diagramming sentences. They can identify nouns, verbs, pronouns, modifiers, adverbs, adjectives in third grade while breaking down the word structure.” In addition to the new literacy initiative, Dr. Damisch is proud of how her district has maintained fiscal responsibility while updating facilities. Consistently, Marengo Union Elementary CSD #165 has received the highest financial rating from ISBE. Creating a strong culture where people want to work and feel like a team has also been one of her crowning achievements, Dr. Damisch said. “I invest in people. Over 80 percent of the people that work for me in this district are taxpayers to this district,” Dr. Damisch said. “I also have 16 former students coming back and working for me and giving back to the community - I think that speaks of the integrity of who we are.”

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