“You are the inspiration,” Superintendent Dr. John Federline told a packed crowd of teachers and staff during today’s annual employee kickoff at the Union Performing Arts Center.
“Nothing could be more true,” Federline said. “As we begin this ’24-’25 school year, please know that all of you are an inspiration to our students and our families, every day. It is you who are truly building hope for the future! God bless you and have an incredible school year!”
Speaking of incredible, the 80’s-inspired kickoff show, under the direction of drama teacher Erika McGhee, featured musical numbers from teachers and students, powerful video segments, a dance routine from the Highsteppers, confetti, special guest speaker and Union alum Elliot (with one T) Nelson, and LED bracelets worn by the audience that lit up the auditorium with vivid colors.
Each speech or number touched on the show’s theme, “Hope For The Future.”In her speech, Board of Education Stacey Roemerman noted how difficult a first job can be, and encouraged teachers, especially new teachers, to remain hopeful as they face hurdles in their jobs, whatever that job might be in the district.
Union graduate Elliot Nelson (Class of 1996,) founder and CEO of McNelllie’s Group, a restaurant and hospitality company based in Tulsa, recalled how teachers made an impact on him that eventually led to his entrepreneurial career pursuits. He made one new request too: “Please beat Jenks this year.”
The show started with a boisterous Jim Douthat, now assistant principal of Student Life at the High School, who introduced the current Site Teachers of the Year, who bounded down the stage as bracelets from their coworkers in the audience lit up the room. Senior Class Student Council President Sholape Osifesco also welcome teachers and staff to another new school year.
Ellen Ochoa media specialist Kirby Mackenzie was recognized as last year’s Teacher of the Year, while bus driver Flute Ngo received a similar tribute as the Support Employee of the Year. Rebecka Peterson, who just finished her reign as the 2023 National Teacher of the Year, also got a nod as she returns home.
Midway through the show, a funny video segment introduced Union’s new superintendent, Dr. John Federline, poking run at his “singing ability.” He did a speech instead.
In his remarks to the staff, who filled the auditorium and balcony and spilled into the lobby area, Federline noted that like several in the room that he too is new, stepping into the role of superintendent, and shared his hopes for the future as Union readies for the first day of school on Thursday, August 15. (That’s tomorrow, by the way.)
“In all seriousness, to those of you who are new—you have chosen a profession that is the most fulfilling that you could possibly imagine,” Federline said. “It will be filled with moments that are exciting and rewarding. But it is also extremely challenging. There are times when you will feel frustrated. That is when it is imperative that all of us in this room who are experienced, seasoned, refined-- reach out to you. For those of us in this room who have been where you are—it is vital for us to make sure that we have established relationships, that we have welcomed you and made you a part of the culture of Union Public Schools. Because it has a culture like no other.”
It is The Union Way.
The show ended with another exciting dance number and a bonus dance number to “Footloose,” which will be this winter’s all-school musical.
Video
- Kickoff - Entire Program
- Carpool Karaoke with Union Superintendent Dr. John Federline
- Celebrating Union's Teacher of the Year - Kirby MacKenzie
- Celebrating Union's Support Employee of the Year - Bus Driver Flute Ngo
Following is the speech by Union Superintendent Dr. John Federline.
Good morning! I hope your eardrums weren’t too damaged by my performance, and I hope we made up for it with the incredible voice of Erika McGee!
A nuestros empleados de habla hispana, bienvenidos! Nos anegramos de que estes aqui. Lo siento, mi Espanol no es muy bueno, pero estoy aprendiendo. Agradecemos su servicio a nuestros estudiantes, y al Distrito de la Union. Gracias.
I am so honored to be here with all of you! If you are an experienced educator or have been with Union for a while, welcome back! We need your wisdom, your experience, and your insight. If you are new to Union, we are so glad you chose us. This is a special district because of the people in this room. You have made an excellent choice. If this is your first job, or you are brand new to teaching, you might be feeling a little nervous. You are in good company—It’s my first day too.
In all seriousness, to those of you who are new—you have chosen a profession that is the most fulfilling that you could possibly imagine. It will be filled with moments that are exciting and rewarding. But it is also extremely challenging. There are times when you will feel frustrated. That is when it is imperative that all of us in this room who are experienced, seasoned, refined-- reach out to you. For those of us in this room who have been where you are—it is vital for us to make sure that we have established relationships, that we have welcomed you and made you a part of the culture of Union Public Schools. Because it has a culture like no other.
We often talk about the Union Way. At its most basic level, “the Union Way” means excellence in all we do. But I wanted to take this opportunity to give you a few concrete examples of what the Union Way looks like in action.
First, I want to celebrate our Department of Hope led by Scott Pennington and Jessica Hogaboom. Using the work of Dr. Chan Helman, Union Public Schools established the Department of Hope in 2019 with the knowledge that Hope is a science. It’s not some amorphous concept, it can be measured, taught, and learned. The department of Hope works with our staff members and our students to ensure that they know how to establish goals, identify pathways and generate willpower and in doing so become confident that tomorrow will be better than today.
This investment is paying off in some dramatic ways, with student suicidal ideations down 12 percent across the district and 26 percentat the 6th/7th grade Center. The data from our annual hope survey shows that students are making gains in growth mindset, emotional regulation, and identifying supportive relationships.
And in 2024 we are excited to add to the staff of this department by welcoming home the 2023 National Teacher of the Year, RebeckaPeterson. After a year of travelling the United States to advocate for teachers, and public education, she will be working with Scott and Jessica to ensure that new teachers have the support they need to be successful and we are thrilled to have her back home at Union.
Our Finance department, led by Dr. Trish Williams, won the Association of School Business Officials award for Excellence in Budgeting, as well as the Award for Excellence in Financial reporting. Which, by the way, they have won every year since 1992.
Theresa Kiger laid the foundation for Union’s Community School initiative over two decades ago. It is more important than ever as we are expanding this model into secondary sites and ensuring that all of our families have access to the resources and opportunities that community schools provide. Unions work with Community Schools will be recognized in a nationally released documentary titled “Our Schools” that is expected to be released on PBS in 2025.
Our athletic department, led by Emily Barkley, continues to perform with excellence, with Coach Tim Dial and the boys track team winning a second straight 6A state title. Our Pom team were Oklahoma state champions and our Highsteppers won regionals, state, and a national title! Union’s head athletic trainer, Dan Newman, was inducted into the Oklahoma Athletic Trainer’s Hall of Fame, former Athletic Director Steve Dunlap was honored with the Tulsa World Lifetime Achievement Award and Head Football Coach Kirk Fridrich was inducted into the Oklahoma Coaches Hall of Fame!
Our College and Carrer Center continues to provide amazing opportunities for our students under the leadership of Dr. Marla Robinson. For 12 years in a row, Union High School is the Oklahoma Promise State Champion, and last spring, CCC counselors Chanda Gibson and Emily Ashley were honored by the Tulsa Higher Education Consortium with the Collaborative Champions Award.
Our Communications department, led by Chris Payne won two Silver Link awards from the Public Relations Society of America and Mr. Payne won the first ever Steve Turnbo Lifetime achievement award.
Our support staff is simply the best in the nation! Nothing we do in the classroom or on the field could happen without the hard work of our employees in support services. From operations to child nutrition, from grounds to transportation, from IT to security, we are so thankful for our amazing support personnel.
I believe the mark of a high-quality school system is how well that system treats members of its most vulnerable populations. To that end, we must recognize the work of our special services department led by Dr. Lindsay Smith. Our newly formed Redhawks Rise program will serve over 20 students this year, allowing students who earned an Alternate Diploma to stay at Union and receive vital transition services. In addition, earlier this spring we celebrated our 3rd annual Choose to Include event at Union Stadium. 359 students and staff members, 160 volunteers, and over 500 family members were on hand to celebrate and participate in an incredible, inclusive day.
Our fine arts programs, led by Dr. Matt McCready are leading the way for our students to be involved in amazing programs that are competitive on the national stage. The Renegade Regiment took 6th place at the Super Regional competition in Indianapolis, our Winter Guard won the Oklahoma State Championship, and High School Art teacher Stephanie Vaughan was named the Outstanding Oklahoma Art Educator of the Year. And as you can see by their performances here today, our kids are incredible.
The Union Schools Education Foundation, under the direction of Shea Ludwig, had an amazing year. They awarded over $140,000 in classroom grants to teachers throughout the district, and on May 4 at the Foundations annual fundraising dinner and auction, they raised a record $438,000. Year after year, our foundation continues to raise the bar and we deeply appreciate all those who contribute.
It was so great to celebrate with the staff at Ochoa Elementary as Media Specialist Kirby McKenzie was selected as Union Public School’s Techer of the Year. And earlier this summer we had the honor of celebrating with our support employees as bus driver Flute Ngo was named Support Employee of the Year! And of course, a well-deserved and well-earned award for Dr. Kirt Hartzler as he was chosen by AASA as the 2024 Oklahoma State Superintendent of the Year.
And speaking of things to celebrate: I want to take a moment to thank our Board of Education for approving a negotiated average pay raise for all employees of 2.4 percentas well as a 5 percentretention stipend that was paid in July to all returning employees. Thanks to all who served on the respective negotiations teams as well.
Several members of the Board of Education are here with us today and we want to recognize them:
- Board President Stacey Roemerman
- Board Vice President: Joey Reyes
- Board Clerk Dr. Chris McNeil
- Deputy Clerk: Heather McAdams
- Board Member Steve Nguyen
We appreciate your service to Union Public Schools. Obviously, we are riding an incredible wave of success, but it’s a new year, and a new day. It would be a grave mistake for us to rest on past achievements. Nothing hurts an organization like complacency.
That’s why I am so excited to share with you some of the things that are on the horizon for Union. First, and most importantly, I want to talk about reading:
Our elementary teachers do an absolutely incredible job of teaching our youngest students to read. Reading is arguably the most important skill for any student, and it is foundational for all future learning. We know that as a student gets older, the more difficult it is to make up for gaps in reading proficiency. That is why I am so proud to tell you today that our elementary schools are All-in on an important new goal—for our students to achieve 100% reading proficiency by the end of first grade. This is another one of those big, audacious goals that Union is known for. It’s a goal that many believe to be impossible. I strongly disagree. This goal aligns perfectly with our mission of 100% graduation, college and career readiness. 1st grade reading proficiency will have an immeasurable positive effect on learning as those students matriculate. Students who are proficient readers have fewer discipline issues and are more likely to be involved in co-curricular activities, and more likely to graduate on time.
We are making great strides in ensuring secondary opportunities with the addition of our academy learning model at the high school. The construction academy, created by Mr. Bushyhead now serves over 300 students at two sites. Union’s Aerospace program, created by Dr. Kenny Moore now serves over 250 students. These academies are all about two important things: opportunity and relevance. When we say college and career readiness, we mean it. Regardless of the pathways our students may choose, we want to provide them with as much preparation and hands-on experience as we can—giving them a competitive advantage against their peers across the country, while also solidifying our role in our community as a source of scholars, innovators, and industry-trained professionals.
And I am excited to announce to you today that we have begun work on a new medical academy. This new academy will serve as a hub for all students interested in careers associated with the medical profession, as well as engaging students at the middle and elementary school levels. This is a natural extension of our existing pathways through our science curriculum, PLTW classes, and biomedical engineering classes.
Consider this for a moment--- we are preparing students for careers that don’t even exist yet. The world is changing at an unprecedented rate. We must give our students the opportunities to be exposed to the latest innovations in technology, AI, and digital creativity.
We are excited to return to professional collaboration with early release Fridays. Educators, like any other group of professionals, need time during their week to meet, to review student learning, and to modify instruction. I am so glad that we were able to adjust our calendar to provide teachers with this much needed time for collaboration.
With our strategic plan guiding us along the way, we continue to cultivate strong partnership with corporations, non-profits, and philanthropic organizations throughout the Tulsa metro area and the nation. These partners provide us with valuable resources, advice, insight, and feedback as we create programming that is relevant and innovative. To our community partners and all of those who work so hard to cultivate those partnerships, thank you.
We have begun our remodel of the Union 6/7 Grade Center. Our operations team calls this the mother of all projects. It is one of the most complex undertakings we have ever attempted but the results will be incredible. A moment ago, I mentioned AI—artificial intelligence. AI is poised to have as great an effect on public education as the introduction of the internet did in the late 90s. It will be the defining technology of our generation and we must do everything we can to allow our students and staff members to learn about it, to use it appropriately, but to also protect them and ensure proper guidelines and guardrails. This is a monumental task, especially since the technology is growing and evolving week by week.
Yes, we have some wonderful opportunities coming up, but we have challenges to overcome as well:
Recruiting and retaining high quality staff members continues to be something at which we work extremely hard. That’s why we are so thankful for all of you here today. We are thankful for the 125 new teachers that went through our New Teacher Induction a couple of weeks ago. You have chosen an amazing place to work with a healthy and supportive culture. It is up to all of us to keep it that way and to constantly improve on it. Two of the ways in which we do that are unique to Union:
We are the only school district in the state of Oklahoma that has its own self-funded health insurance plan for our employees and we are the only district that has its own Early Retirement Incentive Program.
This was a flat funding year from the state legislature. In addition to no new money from the state, federal funds from ESSER ended as well. I want to take a moment to thank everyone from Finance, Federal Programs, Human Resources, and Teaching and Learning who worked so diligently this spring to ensure that we were able to keep valuable personnel on staff and ensure that losing those ESSSER funds would not create a shortfall.
We continue to battle against vouchers and tax rebates given to parents for the purpose of paying private school tuition. According to the Oklahoma Tax Commission, a third of the families receiving tax vouchers for private education earn more than $150,000 a year. This is not right. Public money should go to public schools. Pro-voucher bills are brought to the floor every year by Oklahoma legislators. That is why it is so important for all of us to be educated, insightful voters. As we know, elections have consequences.
One of my primary responsibilities as your superintendent is to advocate for the work we do in public education and at Union Public Schools. We must push back against the false narrative that public education is somehow failing in this country, when the truth is the exact opposite. Public education has been and continues to be the cornerstone of our democracy. We know that education is THE pathway out of poverty. A strong system of public schools that serves all students and the communities in which they live is the key to a thriving local and state economy. We must also push back against the false narrative that words like “diversity” and “equity” are somehow harmful. The truth is that Union’s strength lies in our diversity. We are preparing students for success in a pluralistic society and to ignore that reality is to do them, and us, a disservice.
You see, it is not our job to sift talent, it is our job to identify it, to nurture it, and to cultivate it. It is our job to show kids (and adults) their undiscovered talents and give them the opportunities to turn those talents into greatness. One of the teachers in the upcoming documentary about Community Schools said something in an interview that I could not wait to repeat to you. She said, “We do not have an achievement gap, we have an opportunity gap.” How profound. And what all of us do every day is stand in that gap for our kids and find ways to bridge it, to ensure that all 15000 Union students are offered the very best opportunities:
Opportunities for learning and for engagement. Opportunities for athletics, and fine arts. Opportunities for competition, and service. Opportunities for greatness. Because, you see, we can’t afford to be anything less than great. Which of our students are we going to look at and say, I’m sorry, but you get a mediocre teacher this year…..I’m sorry but you get a mediocre bus driver, or administrator, or nurse, or reading specialist. We cannot afford to allow that to happen. For all of us to deal in hope for the future, we must look at every one of our students and be able to say, “You have a great bus driver this year! You have great child nutrition workers this year! You have an amazing operations department, you have an amazing group of administrators, and most of all—You have great teachers! We must be able to say this to our students because they are worth nothing less than greatness.
We introduced this speech with me singing (or attempting to sing) “You’re the inspiration” Nothing could be more true. As we begin this 24-25 school year, please know that all of you are an inspiration to our students and our families, every day. It is you who are truly building Hope for the future!
God bless you and have an incredible school year!
