Kiwanis recognize September Seniors of the Month

Palm Coast Observer
Neighbors

The Flagler/Palm Coast Kiwanis Club recognized Marcus Polite and Adam Pryor as the Kiwanis Senior of the Month for September at its regular luncheon meeting held at the Grand Club at Pine Lakes.

Polite, from Flagler Palm Coast High School, is a member of the National Honor Society and has been a member of the varsity weightlifting team for four years. He was a District Weightlifting Champion this past year and selected for the All-Area weightlifting team. He also volunteers with PAL basketball of Flagler. Polite plans to attend Baylor University next fall and major in business economics.

Pryor, from Matanzas High School, is a member of the National Honor Society, the marching band, jazz band, choir, Tri-M Music Honor Society and the thespians. Pryor writes some of his own music and is employed as the Folk Music Director at St. Thomas Episcopal Church and also he works at Publix Supermarket.

Pryor was recently selected to serve as the Student Rector for the next youth retreat to be held by the Florida Diocese of the Episcopal Church at Camp Weed in North Florida. He plans to attend Florida State University and major in psychology or music education.

Matanzas DECA sets goals for the year
The Matanzas High School DECA organization has kicked off the year with officer elections. They are as follows: DECA President Nicole Corder, vice presidents Josh Hobbs and Jonathan Guilbe, Reporter Emily Vienrich and Treasurer Luis Marcalo. Their gold-certified Student Based Enterprise, The Coffee Spot, also has a new manager/CEO, Kristyn Steffens.

The Coffee Spot and DECA work hand in hand in preparing students to be emerging leaders and entrepreneurs for careers in marketing, finance, hospitality and management. DECA is a co-curricular program that is integrated into business and management classes taught by Barbara Tant, who has been the DECA Sponsor for eight years.

The group currently holds regular meetings at 7:30 a.m. every second and fourth Wednesdays of the month. Their goals for this year include sending 10-15 members to Florida Career Development Conference (CDC) and five to 10 members to the International Career Development Conference (ICDC). Students are currently preparing to qualify for CDC. Florida CDC will take place in Orlando, March 6-9. Students that place fifth or higher in their category will go on to ICDC, which will be held in Atlanta, May 3-6.

Fed by Grace weekend food program kicks off
Fed by Grace, the new program for Flagler students who are identified as Families in Transition (FIT, aka homeless), kicked off last week with the first pickup. There are five distribution sites (Bunnell Elementary, Belle Terre Elementary, Rymfire Elementary, Wadsworth Elementary, and the Government Services Building) where families may pick up the food allotment each Friday.

Families in Transition have been provided the information about the program and can indicate if they would like to participate in this service.

The School District said they are thankful and grateful to Pastor Charles Silano and Dottie Colletta with Grace Community Food Pantry, Second Harvest, and many community volunteers for facilitating this much needed resource for families in Flagler County.

FPC Future Business Leaders to offer healthy snack options
Flagler Palm Coast High School's Future Business Leaders of America has partnered with Richard's Foodporium to provide students the opportunity to purchase healthy snacks in the FBLA Snack Stand.
Ellen Berk, assistant manager at Richard's will be providing monthly sessions on healthy topics
during all three lunches. The sessions will be open to all students starting Oct. 1 with the topic reading labels.

Belle Terre Elementary iPad class serves as lesson for other districts
Over 35 principals, vice principals, and other representatives from Georgia, Clay County, and additional districts throughout the state of Florida, toured Belle Terre Elementary School last week and received a lesson of their own on Flagler Schools innovative 1:1 iPad paperless initiative.

“We are proud of our state-of-the-art classes,” said Dr. Terence Culver, principal of Belle Terre Elementary School. “We are happy to showcase our programs to help educate other districts.”

Belle Terre students and teachers showed the guests how the iPad paperless classes run, how the students engage and interact with the teacher via the iPads, and the benefits of this high-tech learning environment. They experienced interactive lessons from the students, and received hands-on demonstrations in Belle Terre’s Sandbox Lab.

The Sandbox Lab is the only elementary school lab in the nation wielding Tidebreak TeamSpot collaborative learning software, and encourages small group collaboration while promoting personal perseverance and maintaining “green wise” obligations.

Grove Park Elementary Principal Linda Pratt asked one student how her assignments get graded, how she gets the grades back, and could she show her a returned assignment. ‘Sure,’ the student responded and within seconds, pulled up her graded paper on her iPad.

Last October, Belle Terre Elementary School sixth grade students were the first to be a part of the 1:1 iPad Paperless Initiative. Based on the success of this pilot program, it is expanding district-wide. For a complete schedule of program deployment, visit http://flaglerschools.com/digital-learning.

Flagler Adult & Community Education Fall B classes to begin
The Flagler County Schools’ Adult and Community Education Department announced the beginning of the Fall B 2013 Term. Over 200 classes for adults and children will be offered in areas such as computers, arts, fitness, sports, languages, music and dance. Career training programs, and GED and ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) are also available. New classes offered this term include: painting – understanding color, shag and tango lessons, ethnic Italian cooking, tarot cards, social security optimization, aerobics boot camp, adult tennis business league, Microsoft Word certification and youth sports camp.

Fall B Session will begin Oct. 14. Students may register by phone from Sept. 30 to Oct. 11 by calling 597-5480 or in person at any Adult and Community Education Center, with locations throughout Flagler County including the Belle Terre Swim and Racquet Club, 73 Patricia Drive, the A1A Center in the Hammock, and Flagler Technical Institute, 1 Corporate Drive.