Self-advocacy at the heart of Gilman administrator’s dissertation

Walter Leipart, District Administrator for the Gilman School District, went to Madison on March 18, to defend his dissertation to earn his Ph.D.

At Monday’s meeting of the Gilman School Board, Leipart reported to the board about how it went.

Leipart said “It has been a collective effort to everyone who has been involved in my life thus far.”

Leipart gave a presentation to the board members on the overview of what his dissertation was centered around. Leipart’s dissertation focused on behaviors and efforts that support our self-advocacy in order to achieve our goals.

Leipart said “With the research that was done, I discovered how our behaviors determine our success and how our mindsets are one of our most powerful assets.”

Respondents in Leipart’s study determined that people who have been successful before in the past are more likely to know how to be successful in the future.

Leipart said “I’ve tried to implement this practice myself when I say ‘Leaders need to be the change they want to see in others and when this occurs, people change organizations.’ Even as a board, you being the change that you want to see in this school district, will have an impact on others, and people will see that and then they change the organization.”

After defending his dissertation on March 18, Leipart successfully received his Ph.D.

An integrated math curriculum will be a new course that gives kids an emersion to math that looks at Algebra, Geometry and a combination of Calculus and Physics. It will be taught in an application type way, which means it will cover all the concepts, it takes three years. The integrated math is for students who want to have more of an applied math class or who are having trouble with math concepts.

Leipart said “The students who are sufficient in math, would still have access to Algebra 1, Geometry, and all the other advanced math courses. This class would take the place of the three-semester Algebra, the three-semester Geometry, and consumer math. So actually what we are doing, is we are freeing up a whole school year, for a student to go to the integrated math.”

This course will be implemented in 2023.

Valerie Kulesa asked, “So the 8th graders won’t be eligible to take Algebra? Will they have to wait until their freshman year to take it?”

Leipart said, “There is still an option for 8th graders to take Algebra 1, we just haven’t had a group of students that have tested into Algebra 1 in the last couple years.”

In other business:

_ The School District of Gilman is expected to receive $1,546,453 in ESSER III funding (COVID relief money).

Funds may be used to support the school’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic taking place from March 13, 2020 through September 30, 2024.

Leipart said “We have to use these funds by September 30, if we were to want to use the money in December of 2024, we wouldn’t be able to.”

_ Jeannie Drier has been hired as the middle school/assistant high school track coach.

_ Brian Phelps and Michelle Fasbender have turned in their resignations to retire at the end of the school year.

_ Food product bids for Winger Distributing as the milk distributor and Reinhardt Foods as the food distributor were approved for this fiscal year and next fiscal year as well.

_ There are 10 students enrolled into the Start College Now program, there are 13 courses total. Three of these students will be taking academy courses which have to be completed this summer, these same students are also taking start college now courses. There are seven other students, who are taking additional start college now courses, for the 2022-2023 school year. If there is room in the fall, for students who haven’t applied yet, they may be able to enroll this fall.

_ The district of Gilman is going to require that students take a half credit personal finance course starting with the 2024 graduates. Having this course included in the curriculum will not require any additional staff for the district.

_ There will be new computers purchased for the business lab. The existing computers will be repurposed for another lab.