More Vocational Education

"Thirty seven to forty seven percent of students that start college will not finish." That's what Principal Joe Amann of C.E. McCormick Area Technology Center told me when I interviewed him about about the students at his high school. He then posed a question to me, "Where are they going to work?"


Voc-tech...as we used to call it, and now it's Area Technology Centers, were looked upon as last ditch efforts to educate those who were "unable to be educated." Students who would rather work with their hands and would never be successful in a classroom, where books, and theories made up much of your day. "Those students." For years that was the stereotype, and we couldn't have been more wrong.

My twin brother was one of "those students." We were as different as night and day. The traditional school setting was not hard for me, and I looked forward to college and enjoyed it. He hated school, so I thought. He struggled in class, I was lead to believe, but he loved to work with his hands. And my mother often told him when he would be challenged in school and his ability questioned by teachers, that he was in many ways smarter than most of the students in his class... and Regina! I hated that then, as a mother I understand it now, just trying to balance out the unfair amount of comparing people often made between us.

But she was right. Students at Area Technology Centers are just as smart, creative, ambitious as students who can excel in a classroom setting. Area Tech students appear to quickly excel while concentrating on their technical skills because they see first hand, how algebra, science and geometry are relevant in the real world. And then they soar.

And we need to them to soar. Where would we live, how would we transport our families, how could we communicate with each other through the information superhighway? How could we stay warm in the winter, feel cool and content in the summer? Who would give us our medicine, rub our hand and tell us it's going to be o-k while taking critical information as we check into a hospital or sit in a waiting room.

They make the world go around.

There is room for every type of worker, and every type of student. And like a pair of twins with two different approaches to life, with the same support system there is more than one way to learn and more than one way to contribute in this world. But only if they are equally supported can they equally Make the Grade.

How Do You Measure a Lifetime of Service?

"525,600 minutes, 525,000 moments so dear." "525,600 minutes how do you measure, measure a year?"

The lyrics of "Seasons of Love" from the musical, "RENT" poetically asks the question how do you describe, measure a year in some one's life. How much harder is it to describe or measure 40 years of some one's life. That's what the Erlanger/Elsmere schools are preparing to do for Dottie Peeke. Ms. Peeke is retiring this year from Lindeman/Miles Elementary schools, after 40 years of teaching music. She is the only music teacher they have EVER had.

"In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights, in cups of coffee." "In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife."

Ms. Peeke is a petite woman with soft blond hair and an electric smile. Her personality fills a room. Gently. She is after all a southern belle, raised in the mountains of Asheville North Carolina. But for 40 years she's made Northern Kentucky her home. The staff, students, parents of Erlanger/Elsmere schools, her family.

"525,600 minutes, how do you measure a year in the life?"

Dottie didn't find work as a music teacher, teaching music found her. Dottie studied the violin since she was a little girl. Music consumed her. She's been teaching music all of her life. And in the process, teaching her students something else.



"525,600 minutes, how can you measure the life of a woman or a man?"


Dottie Peeke's students have not only learned how to read notes on a scale, or about rhythm and tempo. They have learned about self discipline, teamwork, focus, dedication. They've learned it's better to give then to receive. That anything worth doing is worth doing well. That it takes practice, practice, practice. They've learned what it means to have passion for something, passion for life.

We all have had a Dottie Peeke, or two in our lives. A teacher who may have spent her career teaching students, but during your year in his/her classroom, you felt they were there just for you. A teacher who opened your world to the possibilities that life had to offer and poured wisdom and knowledge into you that didn't come from a book. A teacher that transformed you while embracing you. And they did it for every student, every year. Year after year, after year. I bet you could remember his or her name right now.

How do you measure the impact of that? Quite simply,

" You remember the love." "You measure the love."

Best Wishes to you, Dottie Peeke. Well Done.

Appalachian History Month

St. Patrick's Day is one of my FAVORITE "holidays." All of my friends will tell you that. I love it, always have. Consider myself Irish on that day, truly and totally immerse myself in all things Irish on that day. I actually look forward to it.

I think in part because I always had fond memories celebrating St. Patrick's day at the Catholic school I attended. I loved the way the entire school, and then I found out, the entire community, city, country became all things Irish on that one day. For one day no matter what nationality, or ethnicity you were, you embraced the food, music, customs and history of the Irish.

I still celebrate it, secretly wishing that if we had a day just like that for all cultures, how much easier it would be for people to get along. We would all, celebrate someone different and in turn have others celebrate us. So much individual cultural pride that would become a collective global pride. What a world.

We have an opportunity to do that this coming weekend when the 40th Annual Appalachian Festival takes place at Coney Island, celebrating the rich culture and heritage of this region. Friday is Education day, students participate in events that help them learn more about Appalachian folk. Some schools in the area teach Appalachian culture in school, like St. William School in Price Hill. But ALL schools should be required to attend the Appalachian festival and have an Appalachian day during the school year. In part because one in every three students that attend a tristate school has a connected ancestry to Appalachia. But many don't know it.

About nine years ago I did a story on Black Appalachians, African Americans who settled in the Appalachia region and their dual cultural identity. Now how they settled here a very different story, but how they existed in the region, oh so similar. The iron cast skillets, mountainous region, respect of land and fierce loyalty to friends and family. Beans and cornbread, quilting, harmonicas, dulcimers and storytelling. A hard but honest day's work.

All things that should be celebrated, in school and in life, don't you think?