2008 Woodie Awards
Talawanda, Miami partner up to serve students
Issue date: 11/2/07 Section: Campus
MU promotes healthy habits for high schoolers
By Ellen Winternheimer
For The Miami Student
Miami University students and Talawanda High School teachers will team up next semester to help promote active, healthy lifestyles in the freshman class at the high school.
The program, called the Well-Being Way (WBW), is a two-year program created with help from a $125,000 grant awarded to Miami's Partnership Office through Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield Foundation.
Starting spring semester 2008, Talawanda's freshman class of approximately 250 students will participate in the WBW program during their 40 minutes enrichment period every Wednesday morning. Each Miami student taking capstones in the kinesiology and health departments will be assigned to work with a teacher to teach one of the 18
enrichment classes.
"The students will explore how they feel and adopt healthy habits that will support them in achieving their goals," said Marianne Marconi, director of guidance for the Talawanda School District.
Marconi said the high school's goal was to make this transition socially and academically easier by adopting healthy decisions and learning to deal with feelings in healthy ways.
"Healthy students are healthy learners," Marconi said. "When they are making good decisions and have adopted healthy habits they learn better. We are trying to eliminate barriers that prohibit them from achieving their goals."
According to Jay Kimiecik, who teaches the capstone class connected to the program, college students are the best group to mentor these ninth graders.
"College students are interested in their own self development and well-being and they are close enough in age to the ninth graders to create a great connection," Kimiecik said.
Kimiecik said he recruited college students for this program through various places on campus.
"I went to the Athletic Department, the Honors and Scholars Program, Adopt-a-School and leadership organizations looking for college students to participate in this program," he said.
After the two-year grant period is over, Marconi said the high school would like to embed this program into the enrichment program every year.
"We will measure the success of the program by looking at results from the pre- and post- survey the ninth graders take and make adjustments to the program that are needed," Marconi said.
According to Marconi, the Well-Being Way program has not been highly advertised to the students at the high school yet, but students will soon hear about it through their current advisory classes.
MUTV program raises awareness of local issues
By Ida Lieszkovszky
For The Miami Student
A new television show, Eye on Partnership, has been developed by the Miami University Partnership Office in conjunction with Talawanda schools to raise awareness of local educational and well-being issues.
The show is in an interview format and is hosted by Miami's Jay Kimiecik, associate director of the Partnership Office. It has been running for two months and can be seen on MUTV as well as Talawanda School District Channel 24.
According to Holli Morrish, coordinator of development and community relations at Talawanda, the show has been running weeknights at 7 p.m. but they may change this in the future depending on number of guests and availability.
"We chose an interview format because it allows me to explore one topic with one person in depth and keeps it very focused on one person and the topic he or she is an expert in," Kimiecik said. "I just like
asking questions."
Kimiecik brings experience to the show, having formerly co-hosted a radio show, Fit Talk on WMUB.
Kimiecik says this new show is intentionally loosely structured, to allow him to dig deeper into certain issues that he feels have an impact on the community.
"(The show's main focus) is on the strong connection between education and well-being, living a meaningful and purposeful life," Kimiecik said.
The Partnership Office, established in 2005, concentrates on branching out into the community and establishing relationships between Miami and local health, social and educational services. Although the idea for such a television show has been tossed around for quite some time, it wasn't until some members of the Partnership Office attended an Education in Journalism and the Public Good convention in 2006 that the idea was put in motion and became a reality.
"It is the result of a long process of thinking about the idea of taking things we're doing into the public," said Tom Poetter, director of the Partnership Office.
According to Morrish, Talawanda staff also helps in the planning of the program, and Poetter said they hope to eventually include Talawanda journalism students as well.
"The (Talawanda staff) are really excited that we have one more opportunity to share our partnership activities and especially ongoing projects with Miami students," Morrish said. "We're just really excited to be a part of this."
Kimiecik said guests are not limited in any way and may even include Miami students in the future.
"There are all kinds of cool people out there that are doing amazing things that no one ever really hears about," Kimiecik said.
The first interview was with Poetter, followed by Jean Eagle, the director of curriculum, intervention and partnership for Talawanda. The two laid the foundation for what Kimiecik hopes will be a long running series on partnership activities. Up next is Don Gloeckner, an instructional leader in mathematics at Talawanda who is very active in the Miami-Talawanda partnership.
"We hope that this show introduces some of the work we're doing," Poetter said. "We want the partnership to have a positive impact in the community."
Kimiecik added that everyone in the community could learn something from the show.
The show is currently run out of Gaskill Hall with Jay Kimiecik as the host and Craig Rouse, supervisor of video production at Miami, as the producer of the show with additional support from both Talawanda and Miami.
Both Kimiecik and Poetter agreed that feedback so far has been positive.
"When you decide to take on something like this it's scary because you are putting yourself out there," Poetter said. "(But) people have seen it, and they like it."
Kimiecik says the plan is to incite both interest and education.
"Some people are beginning to tune in because they see two familiar faces but get interested and hopefully learn something as well," Kimiecik said.
By Ellen Winternheimer
For The Miami Student
Miami University students and Talawanda High School teachers will team up next semester to help promote active, healthy lifestyles in the freshman class at the high school.
The program, called the Well-Being Way (WBW), is a two-year program created with help from a $125,000 grant awarded to Miami's Partnership Office through Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield Foundation.
Starting spring semester 2008, Talawanda's freshman class of approximately 250 students will participate in the WBW program during their 40 minutes enrichment period every Wednesday morning. Each Miami student taking capstones in the kinesiology and health departments will be assigned to work with a teacher to teach one of the 18
enrichment classes.
"The students will explore how they feel and adopt healthy habits that will support them in achieving their goals," said Marianne Marconi, director of guidance for the Talawanda School District.
Marconi said the high school's goal was to make this transition socially and academically easier by adopting healthy decisions and learning to deal with feelings in healthy ways.
"Healthy students are healthy learners," Marconi said. "When they are making good decisions and have adopted healthy habits they learn better. We are trying to eliminate barriers that prohibit them from achieving their goals."
According to Jay Kimiecik, who teaches the capstone class connected to the program, college students are the best group to mentor these ninth graders.
"College students are interested in their own self development and well-being and they are close enough in age to the ninth graders to create a great connection," Kimiecik said.
Kimiecik said he recruited college students for this program through various places on campus.
"I went to the Athletic Department, the Honors and Scholars Program, Adopt-a-School and leadership organizations looking for college students to participate in this program," he said.
After the two-year grant period is over, Marconi said the high school would like to embed this program into the enrichment program every year.
"We will measure the success of the program by looking at results from the pre- and post- survey the ninth graders take and make adjustments to the program that are needed," Marconi said.
According to Marconi, the Well-Being Way program has not been highly advertised to the students at the high school yet, but students will soon hear about it through their current advisory classes.
MUTV program raises awareness of local issues
By Ida Lieszkovszky
For The Miami Student
A new television show, Eye on Partnership, has been developed by the Miami University Partnership Office in conjunction with Talawanda schools to raise awareness of local educational and well-being issues.
The show is in an interview format and is hosted by Miami's Jay Kimiecik, associate director of the Partnership Office. It has been running for two months and can be seen on MUTV as well as Talawanda School District Channel 24.
According to Holli Morrish, coordinator of development and community relations at Talawanda, the show has been running weeknights at 7 p.m. but they may change this in the future depending on number of guests and availability.
"We chose an interview format because it allows me to explore one topic with one person in depth and keeps it very focused on one person and the topic he or she is an expert in," Kimiecik said. "I just like
asking questions."
Kimiecik brings experience to the show, having formerly co-hosted a radio show, Fit Talk on WMUB.
Kimiecik says this new show is intentionally loosely structured, to allow him to dig deeper into certain issues that he feels have an impact on the community.
"(The show's main focus) is on the strong connection between education and well-being, living a meaningful and purposeful life," Kimiecik said.
The Partnership Office, established in 2005, concentrates on branching out into the community and establishing relationships between Miami and local health, social and educational services. Although the idea for such a television show has been tossed around for quite some time, it wasn't until some members of the Partnership Office attended an Education in Journalism and the Public Good convention in 2006 that the idea was put in motion and became a reality.
"It is the result of a long process of thinking about the idea of taking things we're doing into the public," said Tom Poetter, director of the Partnership Office.
According to Morrish, Talawanda staff also helps in the planning of the program, and Poetter said they hope to eventually include Talawanda journalism students as well.
"The (Talawanda staff) are really excited that we have one more opportunity to share our partnership activities and especially ongoing projects with Miami students," Morrish said. "We're just really excited to be a part of this."
Kimiecik said guests are not limited in any way and may even include Miami students in the future.
"There are all kinds of cool people out there that are doing amazing things that no one ever really hears about," Kimiecik said.
The first interview was with Poetter, followed by Jean Eagle, the director of curriculum, intervention and partnership for Talawanda. The two laid the foundation for what Kimiecik hopes will be a long running series on partnership activities. Up next is Don Gloeckner, an instructional leader in mathematics at Talawanda who is very active in the Miami-Talawanda partnership.
"We hope that this show introduces some of the work we're doing," Poetter said. "We want the partnership to have a positive impact in the community."
Kimiecik added that everyone in the community could learn something from the show.
The show is currently run out of Gaskill Hall with Jay Kimiecik as the host and Craig Rouse, supervisor of video production at Miami, as the producer of the show with additional support from both Talawanda and Miami.
Both Kimiecik and Poetter agreed that feedback so far has been positive.
"When you decide to take on something like this it's scary because you are putting yourself out there," Poetter said. "(But) people have seen it, and they like it."
Kimiecik says the plan is to incite both interest and education.
"Some people are beginning to tune in because they see two familiar faces but get interested and hopefully learn something as well," Kimiecik said.
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