Dr. Carter presented Faye Johnson with the Tireless Award during Tuesday night’s Board of Education meeting.  

Last Tuesday, the Thomasville City School Board of Education presented awards to students and staff during their regular work session and board meeting. 

The meeting began with Board Chair Kejar Butler introducing the Adopt-A-School efforts of Board Member Karen Kelso. 

“So each board member adopted a school, and I believe we’ve all been out to our schools once or twice, but Karen Kelso went to Thomasville High School and worked with Mr. Beaty to have this great idea,” Butler said. “Because our main job was to go in there and meet with the students and really focus on literacy, she went in there with a vision to have a writing contest.”

Kelso spoke in regard to the THS Writing Contest held in her Adopt-A-School efforts and the role Brian Beaty, principal of THS, played in the idea of having a writing contest. 

“I am excited and just to keep the records straight, this was Mr. Beaty’s idea,” Kelso said. “So, I took Mr. Beaty’s idea and his vision and I went to the students and fortunately they helped me figure out where to go from there.”

With over 87 entries and an essay topic of “Where do I see myself in 5 years?”, she said that she was amazed by the participation and the thought put into the essays.

“I am very excited to tell you that we have 87 entries and I read every single one of them,” she said. “So, it was a lot of fun and very insightful. It was tough coming up with the four winners. I didn’t have any seniors, but I did have a really good showing from all the other classes.”

Beaty presented awards to the four winners chosen from the writing contest participants, including  eleventh grader Jenyla Johnson, tenth grader Ja’Lyria Johnson, and ninth graders Kamari Brown and Kimora Johnson. Each were presented with a certificate and a gift card to Walmart. 

Kelso later said that she was surprised by how much thought and consideration the students had given their future, perhaps before the essay’s question had even been broached. 

“I was really surprised at how many students actually have given some thought about the future,” she said. “It appeared to me that they had thought about this prior to being asked this essay question. It appeared, from what I read, that many of them have thought about it and they thought about the details that are associated with it. Not all of them but a lot of them.”

Following the recognition of student winners, Dr. Shauwan Carter introduced the Tireless Award and how it recognized the efforts of staff members willing to go beyond what is asked of them. 

“This is a tradition that I wanted to make sure that we kept in place,” Carter said. “The Tireless Award recognizes those amongst us that go above and beyond the call of duty.”

In recognizing the two recipients of the award, Bryant added that the spirit of excellence and going beyond was the foundation of a functioning organization. 

“We ask a lot, we have high expectations, and I think that’s what any functioning organization looks for,” Bryant said. 

Faye Johnson, student services specialist and grant writer, and Wellington Longley, warehouse specialist of Scott Elementary School, both received the 2022-2023 Tireless Awards.

“These awards are for those employees that go above and beyond,” Bryant said. 

Additionally, there was recognition of the TCS Finance department and School Bookkeepers of their completion of UGA’s Carl Vinson Institute of Government School Financial Accounting Personnel Certificate Program and approval on agreements for telecommunication services in 2023, board meeting dates for 2023 and appointment of BOE Attorneys for 2023, amongst other business.