The staff and students have started the 2010 – 2011 school year with a special focus. Stephen R. Covey an author and leader in the field of helping individuals and groups develop leadership skills wrote a book called "The Leader in Me" to help students in schools across North America become moreindependent, successful and confident leaders in their school work, but more importantly their daily lives. As a staff, we have used the principles of "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" to help develop our school Mission Statement, Goals and Improvement Plan.

The exciting part of this project is it has helped our school community have a central focus and common terminology that is used by staff with each other and our students. Each month, we focus on one of the 7 Habits and integrate the theme into our morning announcements, daily curriculum, hallway bulletin boards and staff meetings. Shortly, each student will be provided with their own personal “Data Binder” that will contain their yearly personal goals and a variety of data sheets to track their academic achievement and successes as a member of the St. Ann, Hamilton Catholic Community.

Included on the back of this letter is a list of the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and a brief explanation of each one. Please take the time to read them and discuss with your child how these habits are being used in the classroom and school. You are invited to visit the following website to get more information regarding the schools using the 7 Habits and comments from staff, students and parents/guardians: http://theleaderinme.org/

Sincerely,
P. Kislinsky
Principal