Superintendent's Thoughts

When a new year begins, especially this year at the beginning of a new decade, we always grow a bit nostalgic. As we look back and reflect we also look forward. I am sure by this time you have heard and read enough about the woes of the past decade, referred to by some as the most difficult decade in the U.S. since the Great Depression. Agree or not, this certainly has been a decade of change, with wide swings in the economy as well as governmental policies. Someone shared an editorial with me from the Wall Street Journal written by Peggy Noonan. I know very little about Ms. Noonan, but I found her insights to be important. It is her premise that institutions that were designed and purposed to “hold us together” as a nation, the glue of commerce and living, have struggled, floundered and even failed this past decade because they had forgotten their mission. According to the article government, banks, Wall Street, even churches and schools have lost their way. They have forgotten or abandoned their missio