With the new school year around the corner, new teachers attended an orientation at La Porte High School on Thursday, August 10. La Porte Economic Advancement Partnership (LEAP) had a surprise for them in the form of gift bags.
“We do this for five of the schools in the county,” said Erik Nelson, workforce development coordinator for LEAP. “It is a way for the community and LEAP to recognize our new teachers.. Teaching is not an easy profession as many know. We collect all these things from different businesses to show gratitude and show them some thanks from the community for being educators.”
The gift bags had various presents for the teachers including a one year free membership from the YMCA.
“All the businesses and organizations chose different things to give, and the YMCA was very generous,” said Nelson. “They are offering a one year free membership at the Y for all the new teachers, and they're doing that for all the schools in the county. It is a really cool gesture.”
Twenty different businesses and organizations donated as part of the gift bags. The information and gifts can help both teachers from La Porte and from elsewhere.
“We had probably 20 different businesses and organizations donate items, whether that be physical items or information,” said Nelson. “Some of these teachers are already from here, but there's quite a few that are new to our community. That's another reason to do this. There's a lot of information in those bags about different things to do in our community and in the county as a whole. It's good to have new teachers here in our community if they're new to our community.”
Being well integrated in the community is important for the teachers so they can better identify with their students.
“It's good for our teachers to be embedded in the community,” said Dr. Mark Francesconi, superintendent of La Porte Community School Corporation. “We obviously encourage them to be a part of our community by living in the community. There's a transiency now within teaching and so we don't always see that across the board. It is important to understand the culture and community as best as possible in order to identify with our kids. Where do our kids come from, or what side of town do our kids live on? How's that going to help me reach these students that come from either living on the lake to being on a farm, or they are from a neighborhood somewhere on different sides of town which all look differently?”
For Francesconi and La Porte, it is about taking care of the teachers so they can in turn take care of the students.
“For the new teachers, we want to support them so that they can relax, and be themselves,” said Francesconi. “We want them to be able to identify with students, and we try to take care of them because they can't take care of our students if they're not taken care of. That's was what a lot of today was about with them from seeing all the different departments that we have to support them, and then certainly LEAP being here to present them with a welcome to the community.”
The welcome would have not been possible without LEAP and their partnership with organizations and businesses.
“A big thank you to all the businesses and organizations that donated all the items that went into making up these bags, " said Nelson. “Without them, we wouldn't have anything to give them. We want to give them a big thank you for that.”
For more information regarding the La Porte Economic Advancement Partnership, please visit laportepartnership.com.
