Pesek: Summer off to a great start for District 201

I’m happy to report that our summer has gotten off to a great start!

Our varsity and junior varsity rugby teams went to the Illinois Rugby State Championships to return with their third state title. We honored our champions with a celebratory parade through the town on June 8.

This is also a bittersweet time of the year as we said goodbye to more than 1,700 graduating seniors. Many of our graduates will be going away to college this coming fall, and this year our Mustangs were accepted to more than 162 colleges and universities. Our graduates have opportunities that I couldn’t imagine possible when I began serving on the school board.

Since becoming board president, I've made it my mission to make sure each student receives the best possible education. To that end, we've taken to improving the infrastructure at our campuses. Last year we renovated the Morton Stadium at the West Campus, and this summer we have more renovations in store. The Morton East Culinary Arts Lab is already finished, and we will be working on renovating and building new science labs at both campuses, as well as a new Culinary Arts Lab at West. Soon,

Mustangs at all campuses will benefit from increased preparation time and facilities to make learning as hands on and experiential as the 21st century requires. This past academic school year was the first full year of 1:1 computing at our district. More than 381 interactive whiteboards and projectors were installed in classrooms district wide and over 2075 laptops were given to incoming freshmen.

I am very proud of all of the great things happening at Morton. I invite you to visit our schools to see the terrific work our students and staff are doing for yourself.

Jeff Pesek is president of the J. Sterling Morton District 201 Board of Education.