It was a day to empower students and what better way than to hear from the students themselves.
The Horizon School Division Student Day 2017 on April 25 saw 200 students gather to represent all 41 Horizon School Division schools and Englefeld including many student leadership presenters from all across Horizon School Division.
This year’s student leaders included those who traveled to new places and those who are a part of new initiatives into their school.
Student Day Committee Chair, Jolene Koopman, wants students to be leaders and showing them leaders among their peers is the best way to encourage that.
“They don’t have to be in a leadership position to be a leader and they have all shown that today that they are strong leaders for our youth and they have a great future ahead of them.”
This leadership was evident throughout the day in many different ways, says Director of Education Kevin Garinger, from media presentations to talks to musical performances.
“They all can make an impact, not only within amongst their family and peers, within their classrooms and schools but also they can make that impact globally that they have that within themselves.”
Elias McNab and Tiara Pelletier from Punnichy Community High School presented on their time with Sigmund Brouwer, the Horizon School Division Writer in Residence and the author of Innocent Heroes.
The grade 9 students from the school worked closely with Brouwer as his First Nations consultants for the book.
Pelletier says that she wants fellow students to know the contributions of First Nations people in the First World War and what they were still denied after returning from war.
“They were still denied citizenship even after they volunteered to go to war,” she says.
McNab says that seeing First Nation representation in the book is important for the students.
“We gave our perspective and a lot of people when they read that will see that perspective not the perspective of say Hollywood or any of that other stuff.”
The day finished off with some musical performances to get kids out of their seats.
The Winston High School Garage Band performed some classic rock n’ roll, while Codie Prevost brought his country rock sounds, even coming together to play some Bob Seger’s Old Time Rock n’ Roll.
Hannah Gill and Kyle Sather have been playing music for a while but were brought together with other students to form their own senior garage band under teacher, Vlad Osatiuk.
The band is its own class and is formed by members from grades 10 to 12.
This will be Gill’s last performance as a grade 12 student so it was very fun to perform for fellow students.
Gill wants all her fellow students to get out and try something new.
“Don’t be afraid to get out there and show yourself off.”
Prevost, being a product of Horizon School Division himself, is always very proud to come and share his story with the students year after year as well as sing some of his songs.
“The biggest thing I found with these days is that they embrace leadership and courage to go out into the world after you’re done in the school and do whatever you want to do.”
Starting out in Rose Valley School and on the verge of releasing his fourth album, Prevost wants students to embrace that message of following your dreams.
“When I was growing up, a musician wasn’t quite a common job that everyone wanted to go to but it was something that I felt I really had to do.”
Garinger also wants students to take away that message that nothing stands between them and greatness. Student Day is a testament to that, says Garinger.
“Our students and what they’re able to accomplish as young people in our world is tremendous.”
Parents get tips on raising the selfie generation
With new technology comes new worries for parents.
Including what their children are doing on Social Media.
Thanks to the Horizon School Division, parents and educators had the opportunity to discuss these issues at Dr. Alec Couros’s presentation, Raising the Selfie Generation on April 25 following the Horizon Student Day.
Couros, an Associate Professor of Information and Communication Technologies at the University of Regina, also presented to the students earlier in the day on having a positive digital footprint but for the parents, he focused on the dangers of social media.
Children’s lives have changed compared to their parents’ generation in drastic ways and parents have to try to understand that.
“There’s so many apps and so many places to look that a parent doesn’t know how to bring it down to one app or one particular space on the internet...understanding where your kids are is the biggest challenge.”
Parents learning and using the apps is a good way to connect with their children that way, says Couros.
“Not just simply that stronger relationship that you’d normally build as a parent but using technology to augment those relationships as well, while learning about the technology kids are using.”
The amount of apps kids use is mind boggling but the current generation is refraining from getting into unknown relationships with many young people learning from older siblings and family.
“A lot of them in the half generation before have gotten burnt by a lot of people that they know so older siblings are getting kids to think more locally again.”
Local is also where concerns lie when it comes to bullying and assault risks with the statistics showing that predators are commonly known to the victim.
Cyber bullying is harder to track and more persistent going beyond the confines of the school yard within the school year.
Those are some of the bigger issues that we have to consider when giving kids technology, says Couros.
It is very easy with one post for a child to create problems for themselves. Couros addressed this with the parents during a discussion on making sure the kids have a positive digital footprint.
Schools should also be addressing this issue but Couros is not seeing that at a local, school-wide level.
“There needs to be more happening more often,” says Couros.
By the age of 9, students are lying about their age to get adult accounts and many of them are going in cold without any information on how social media works and what is deemed appropriate.
Many examples that Couros is seeing starts students off as young as grade 1 and continuing digital education as they get older.
What it all comes down to however has little to do with the digital world. Couros also promotes parents having a good offline relationship with their children as a way to make sure kids are comfortable coming to their parents when there is a problem online.
