Civil Municipal - July 2024
regulation skills. This curriculum, in part, develops resilience and agency so our students can persist when there are academic or social challenges. INFRASTRUCTURE AND TECHNOLOGY School districts are more than just their human inhabitants. They contain the buildings and other physical structures that must be constructed and maintained. “We have 5.1 million square feet under roof and we take on improvements based upon the demonstrated needs of our buildings,” says Smith. “We have upgraded our schools with safety and security in mind; we built a new elementary school and it’s the safest structure in our entire county. I know that’s important to parents. We have several solar fields that will pay for themselves once they’re paid for and that additional money comes into EVSC. We’ve replaced all our lighting with LED lights; we’ve upgraded all of our water fixtures with water- reducing fixtures so the savings pay for the projects themselves.” EVSC schools are also equipped with modern technology. Its high schools have been 1:1, meaning each student has his or her learning device, since 2008. “At the time, I think it was the second largest deployment of 1:1 devices in the nation,” says Smith. “And we’ve been 1:1 in K-12 for a dozen years or so. We certainly do embrace technology, but we do it so that students know how to use it as a tool and be lifelong learners. We’re also, now, seeing how we can embrace AI (Artificial Intelligence). Some challenges lie ahead when it comes to AI, but the potential for good vastly outweighs areas where it can be misused. Our responsibility is to find a way to help students, in an educated way, to know how to utilize AI.” THE EVSC ETHOS Dr. Smith articulates his guiding principles and those of the Evansville Vanderburgh School Corporation: “We are a district that not only embraces but lives by continuous improvement.We have an unwavering commitment to getting better.That is the connecting thread. When you marry our thirst for continuous improvement, inherent in that is a requirement that you be very reflective in practice and very humble because you only get better by working on those areas where you have those opportunities for improvement. “On a more specific level, my mantra has been ‘clarity, action, and accountability.’ I want to be incredibly clear about the paths forward so that everyone understands, unequivocally, what we stand for and 461 CIVIL AND MUNICIPAL VOLUME 05, ISSUE 07 EVANSVI LLE VANDERBURGH SCHOOL CORPORAT ION
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