From Staff Reports

LANCASTER—Going beyond the scope of herjob description, Lancaster ISD Truancy Coordina-tor Dona Mitchell is always thinking of new waysto positively impact and serve district students.

Most recently, Mitchell applied for the MetroTexAssociation of Realtors Charitable Trust Public Ed-ucation Grant to help support the district’s anti-tru-ancy initiative.

“My goal is to identify issues and address themby bringing in resources and building partnershipsin the community to help our students,” Mitchellsaid. “When I started communicating with the cam-puses, I found that there was a need to provide ad-ditional campus support and I was overwhelmed

after hearing about our teachers’ sacrifices and ef-forts towards keeping our students in school.”

Mitchell heard that teachers on different cam-puses throughout the district were spending theirpersonal time and money washing school clothesfor students in need. After learning that teacherswere selflessly doing these acts to help build self-confidence and prevent truancy, Mitchell appliedfor the Education Grant through MetroTex with thehopes of funding the purchase of campus washersand dryers to support the teachers’ efforts.

“Whenever you can make a difference in thelives of youth, you have done a good deed,”Mitchell said. “The washer and dryer initiative hasbrought the community, school and students closerand I am thankful to MetroTex for awarding Lan-

caster ISD.” The Public Education Grants from the MetroTex

Association of Realtors Charitable Trust allow themembers of the organization to give back to thecommunity. The grants are managed by the Metro-Tex Public Education Committee which receivesand reviews grant applications from public schoolsin North Texas. The organization awards severalgrants up to $3,000 to fund tangible student-drivenprojects that benefit the entire student body.

This past fall, Mitchell applied for the grant onbehalf of Lancaster ISD, which was one of five areaschool districts awarded.

“The grant application we received from DonaMitchell was a unique and creative solution to aproblem that we did not know existed,” MetroTex

Association of Realtors President Linda Calicuttsaid. “We were proud to see her idea in action andwe are excited to play a part in helping LancasterISD students.”

Due to the grant and Dona Mitchell’s anti-tru-ancy initiative, four Lancaster ISD campuses nowhave a new washer and dryer for teachers to utilizeat any time throughout the day. Mitchell believesthat this is a major step in truancy prevention andwill help teachers continue to remove barriers andfulfill the needs of students.

“This initiative defines and addresses one majorreason why students may choose not to go toschool,” Mitchell said. “I feel great knowing thatwe opened the door for more resources to help re-move a barrier and encourage student success.”

Volume 30 • Issue No. 81 $1.00 PER ISSUEwww.focusdailynews.comSunday, May 27, 2018

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New Anti-Truancy InitiativeRemoves Success Barriers

BSW High Schools Win Major Theater Awards68

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Lancaster ISD Truancy Coordinator Dona Mitchell.

By JO ANN HOLTFocus Daily News

DALLAS—Grand Prairie Fine Arts Academyand Mansfield High School went home with majorhonors from the Seventh Annual Dallas SummerMusicals High School Musical Theatre AwardsMay 17. Darnell Robinson won Best SupportingActor and Isabelle Artista won Best Supporting Ac-tress awards for their performances in “Heathers.”Mansfield High School’s student orchestra wonBest Orchestra for their production, “Hunchback ofNotre Dame.”

Mansfield HS Band Director William Ludlowsaid, “All the students in the orchestra were ex-tremely happy to hear that we had won this year’soutstanding student orchestra. We could not attend

the award ceremony as we had rehearsal thatevening. The orchestra was made up of about 20high school student musicians, some of which weredoubling on multiple instruments. Besides the 20high school students we had one adult piano playerand one adult as the conductor. The students wouldrehearse the music after school and then put it to-gether with the actors and dancers on stage. Themusic was very challenging, and at times seemedslightly out of our reach. Though the task in frontof then was daunting, the students kept perseveringand were determined to make the most out of thischallenging score,” Ludlow said. “We are very for-tunate to have a very collaborative and team-ori-ented fine arts program at Mansfield high school.The choir, band, and theater students and directorsall work well together. All the students worked very

hard on this very challenging music, and we wereall satisfied with the end product.”

Mansfield High School’s production also re-ceived honorable mention for Best Musical for“Hunchback of Notre Dame.” Several MansfieldHS students also received honorable mentions fortheir performances: Simon Fleming-Wood receivedhonorable mention, featured actor award, andLogan Corley received honorable mention for sup-porting actor. Mansfield HS also received honor-able mention for their ensemble/chorus; direction;and lighting design.

Mansfield High School’s Head Theatre DirectorAltraniecia Starr said, “Each year we always lookforward to some special event. Some wait for thesuper bowl or basketball playoffs, but I wait for theTony’s. For the last 4 years I have had the pleasure

of attending my own type of Tony’s. In fact DallasSummer Musicals High School Musical TheatreAwards has been better than the Tony’s for me. Allfine arts educators get to see their dreams, hardwork, and students following their dreams on stage.Whether the students go home with awards or not,goals and dreams have been accomplished, and see-ing that each time I feel as if I have won my TonyAward.”

Timberview High School also received honorablemention for direction and lighting design for theirproduction of “James and the Giant Peach.” GrandPrairie Fine Arts Academy received honorablemention for direction for “Heathers,” and Waxa-hachie High School student Jack Hankamer re-ceived honorable mention, featured actor, for hisperformance in “The Mystery of Edwin Drood.”

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