Williams Named N.C. Social Studies Teacher of the Year

After spending the last 31 years teaching history and social studies to the youth of the county, Ashe County High School's Terry Williams has been recognized by the North Carolina Council for the Social Studies as North Carolina's 2009 Social Studies Teacher of the Year.

The news came as a surprise to Williams, a 1973 graduate of Ashe Central High School who earned his BA in history from Appalachian State University.

"I was shocked, first of all," he said. "I work in a great department. Of all the end-of-course tests, U.S. history is the most difficult.

Hines Named Region 7 Teacher of the Year

In only her seventh year of teaching, Sherrie Hines of Ashe County Middle School has been complimented with two awards this school year. She was named the school's Teacher of the Year, an award voted on by the school's staff, and was recently named the Region 7 Teacher of the Year by the North Carolina Middle School Association.

For the award, Hines had to be nominated based on criteria such as building team identity/cohesion; curriculum knowledge and integration; student achievement and success; utilization of a variety of instructional strategies; service projects and special team activities. The state is divided into eight regions.

 "It's just a shock, because there's so many terrific people at this school," she said. "To get them both in the same year - it's just an incredible experience. I'm very humbled by it all."

ABC Results Show Progress in All Five Schools

One week after the Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) results, part of the national No Child Left Behind program, announced that only one of the five Ashe County Schools met AYP, the preliminary results from North Carolina's ABC's of Public Education (a state accountability model) tell a different story.

At a press conference held on Thursday, Aug. 6, Ashe County Schools Superintendent Travis Reeves announced that all five schools made positive growth during the 2008-09 school year. The ABC model is based on end-of-course testing in reading, math and science, and the results showed everything from schools meeting expected growth, such as Ashe County High School (which raised their performance composite from 81.4 percent to 82.8 percent) to the high growth achieved by the other four schools.

Ashe Technology Students Finish in National Top 10 in Animatronics

On Thursday, July 2, rising Ashe County High School seniors Dustin Roten and Daniel Farmer got the news: after months of hard work designing an animatronic dragon and winning the animatronics category at the North Carolina Technology Student Association (TSA) competition, their project placed in the top 10 in the high school animatronics category at the national TSA competition held in Denver, Colo.

"I was really surprised because we were up against some really good competition," said Roten of their tenth-place finish. "That's what we were shooting for ... we got top 10, and I believe we represented Ashe County well."

Ashe Middle Once Again Designated a 'School to Watch'

The National Forum to Accelerate Middle-Grade Reform has once again designated Ashe County Middle School as one of their Schools to Watch. Since the program was brought to North Carolina in 2002, ACMS is one of only three schools in the state to be designated three times (the school was originally designated in 2003 and was honored again in 2006) and one of only seven in the nation.

John Harrison, the executive director for the Schools to Watch program in North Carolina, said that the school's "can do" attitude has stood out during his visits to the campus in Warrensville.

Kastl Receives National Award for Entrepreneurship

For Thelma Kastl, technology teacher at Ashe County High School, a recent trip to the 27th Annual Entrepreneurship Education Forum from Nov. 6 to 10 in Norfolk, Va., provided more than just a good learning opportunity. Kastl was awarded a full scholarship to attend the conference by the Consortium for Entrepreneurship Education (COEE), and got a big surprise at breakfast one day when she was awarded the Entrepreneuship 101 Award.

"I had no idea," Kastl said of the national award. "I got that at a breakfast awards ceremony - they had the room divided by state, and when I got there it was on the table."

Ball Named Ashe Principal of the Year

Mountain View Elementary Principal Kim Ball felt good about the progress the school had made in her first year-and-a-half in charge, but didn't realize she was even in the running for the Ashe County Principal of the Year honors.

So when she was given the award - during what she believed to a safety training program - she was genuinely surprised.

"I was very surprised, being as new as I am," she said. "To have my colleagues think I was doing that good of a job was pretty cool. I was excited about it."

Dr. Travis Reeves, superintendent of Ashe County Schools, said Ball was selected "based on the hard work and the things she has done at Mountain View.

Ashley to Leave Middle School for Job with DPI

Over the last six-and-a-half years, Ashe County Middle School has flourished under the direction of Principal Bobby Ashley, receiving multiple national accolades including being named a School to Watch by the National Forum to Accelerate Middle Grade Reform, receiving the National Association of Secondary School Principals' Breakthrough Schools Award in 2008 and serving as a model school for the International Center for Leadership in Education.

But for Ashley, an enticing new career opportunity with the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction (DPI) became available. Ashley, who has resigned from the middle school effective Dec. 1, will serve as the Region Lead for regions seven (Northwest N.C. school districts) and eight (Western N.C. school districts).

Ashley said he will assist the DPI with "providing services for school districts. I'll be working with districts and regions to provide staff development and training that the districts need or request.

Pennington Named New Principal at Ashe Middle

After the recent resignation of Bobby Ashley as principal of Ashe County Middle School, it didn't take long for Superintendent Travis Reeves and the Board of Education to find a replacement in Ashe County High School Vice Principal Earl Pennington.

A native of Ashe County who graduated from Beaver Creek High School, Pennington has worked as an assistant principal of the high school for the past five years after earning his Masters in School Administration from Appalachian State in 2003. Before that he taught in Wilkes County for a year, at Beaver Creek for five years and at the middle school for five years.