In their quest to be not just “Mississippi great,” but competitive nationally, officials from the Petal School District used a recent visit to schools in Goochland, Virginia, to share practices and policies, as well as to get helpful ideas to bring back to their home district.
The visit was made possible by the district’s membership in the Eastern States Consortium, one of several consortiums developed by the American Association of School Superintendents to allow school district leaders to learn from each other with the goal of improving education for all children.
“This gives us an opportunity to share best practices, do a site visit and see great things going on across the nation,” Petal School District Superintendent Matt Dillon said. “We can potentially apply a new program, apply a new class, or just take away some best practices.
“And sometimes it can just re-affirm what we’re doing in our own district. So it’s just a great way to network and build new relationships with another district. And just beyond that site visit, there’s conversations that take place in between our meetings.”
One of the foremost ideas brought back from Goochland is the possibility of adding more Career and Technical Education classes at Petal High School.
“When we were at the site visit, we saw how they partnered with their community to provide needs for maybe a job shortage in a particular area,” Dillon said. “We started that with our Utility Lineman Program that we already have in place in our district this year, but this allows us to further look at other ways that we could do more of that, and they did a good job of that in their district.
“We not only looked at instructional practices; we looked at operational, finance issues and how they do school business there. It was really a good takeaway for the principals that went and some of the other administration who were able to attend.”
Some of the attendees, including Petal Upper Elementary School Principal Emily Branch, were sorted into groups and given tours around the school. Branch’s group was paired with the Director of Innovation for Goochland County Public Schools, who showed the school’s use of technology in the classrooms in which every student is allowed an Apple product.
“That’s something that we talk about a lot at our school – how to make sure that as we’re implementing technology and thinking of ways to engage and interest students, that we’re not changing our expectations,” Branch said. “I think I was able to see that, and it kind of affirmed some of the ideas that we have about that.”
Petal High School Principal Rob Knight, who even got to commandeer some heavy equipment used in the Career and Technical Education program, said he noticed a lot of school spirit displayed during his visit.
“It was during homecoming, so they decorated the halls,” he said. “They put a lot of work and effort into that, and they have a lot of pride in their school.”
