By Chris Yow
Editor
TRUSSVILLE — Alabama State Superintendent Tommy Bice and members of his staff visited Trussville City Schools Wednesday on his “Celebrate Innovation” tour. Bice was able to tour Hewitt-Trussville High School and Paine Elementary School, where he was able to see first hand the innovative ways the schools are teaching students.
Beginning with a visit to the EMT classroom where students were able to demonstrate knowledge on several different protocols a licensed EMT would perform, Bice stood with students as they talked through each station. The group was then able to see pharmacy technician students in their classroom. The final stop of the tour at the high school saw the Fire Safety students, led by the Trussville Fire Department, practice extinguishing a fire.
Bice said school systems around the state could learn from Trussville, and the way students are learning, not only from teachers but also community leaders.
“The partnerships the school has with local businesses, community and government officials. Many of the programs at the high school, they’re only able to do that because they have those partnerships in place,” Bice said. “A pharmacist comes in from her pharmacy and actually teaches classes on pre-pharmacy with kids that are about to be credentialed in pharmacy tech. They have a fire program where their fire chief actually comes in and the fire department pays for part of the salary of the person who teaches that.
“Great partnerships that you don’t see around the state.”
Also on the trip, Bice was able to visit with second grade students who are learning the basics of computer codes by programming a small robot to move along a mat with different city buildings marked along squares.
“Second graders creating computer code to control mini robots to traverse a city-scape they have built there in their classroom. It was just remarkable, and it shows us that our kids are resilient, and are extremely bright if we expect it of them and give them an opportunity to aspire to those sorts of rigorous learning goals,” Bice said.
Bice said he plans to take many of the ideas he saw in Trussville, and show the success of the system to others around the state.
“Trussville is doing great things, and people around the state need to know what you’re doing here,” he said.