Character is key component

FORT RECOVERY — Certain aspects beyond academics have always been important in Fort Recovery classrooms.
The school system’s own “about our district” web page emphasizes a family-oriented atmosphere, strong community and responsibility.
So the planned implementation of the Focus 3 initiative is not so much to change anything, but rather to reinforce those values.
Second-year superintendent Justin Firks brought the idea to Fort Recovery Shcool Board in September and hopes to roll out the program district-wide in fall 2017.
“We’re very good, but we want to take it to an elite level,” said Firks. “And we think that this program, implemented from kindergarten all the way up with adults and students, has a tremendous impact to not only improve academic skills but behavioral skills, job skills and skills in life after high school here.”
Firks heard about Ohio State University football coach Urban Meyer’s book, “Above the Line: Lessons in Leadership and Life from a Championship Season,” and had already read most of it when he received an email about a seminar scheduled in Columbus, Ohio, with Focus 3 father-and-son team Tim and Brian Kight to discuss those same principles.
He attended, walked away with page after page of notes and spent the car ride home thinking about how the ideas could be implemented in a school setting.
Since then, he and the rest of the Fort Recovery administrative team have read and discussed the book, visited Hilliard City Schools where the program has already been implemented and plan to attend a training session with the Kights in January.
The goal is to then bring the Kights to Fort Recovery to train the school system’s entire staff, perhaps during summer in-service.
Boiled down to the basics, Focus 3 and “Above the Line” focus on what they call “The R Factor” an “event” plus “response” equals “outcome” equation. The theory is that the “R,” response, is the only part that is under the individual’s control and that the effectiveness of that response can be maximized by using a six-step process — press pause, get your mind right, step up, adjust/adapt, make a difference and build a skill. It refers to intentional behaviors as being “above the line” while impulsive behaviors are below.
Firks said he sees the program being implemented at all grade levels, as well as for staff, through a variety of school activities. (He noted that in Hilliard a teacher had modified the words from the song “The Wheels on the Bus” to teach the concepts.)
The goal goes back to the school system’s goal of graduating well-rounded students.
“I think schools sometimes get away from that balance,” said Firks. “We’ve been so geared toward state tests and state standards and curriculum. And don’t get me wrong, that’s very, very important …
“But I think there’s another component of character education and creating young men and young women that are good employees … and good moms and dads.”