THE WEEKLY LION UPDATE

What an amazing start to the 2024/2025 school year. I can't thank our staff enough for getting this year started with such positivity!! Our custodial staff worked all summer not just cleaning and waxing, but really changing some things! We have no more maroon benches or trash can. Everything got a facelift this summer and was all painted red and black!! Thank you Leading Edge for making the teacher signs hanging above all the classroom doors. Thank you Cain signs for the vinyl wraps outside and inside as well as a new sign in our entry! So many community businesses owned and operated by RCHS Alumni that take great pride in our school and our community! We have a few new staff members that I will introduce as the weeks go by. There were so many great things happening this first week that I have probably left a few things out. We are on the rise at RCHS and only getting better every day!! Have a great weekend and IT'S ALMOST MONDAY!!!

RCHS is in its second year of offering the Indiana College Core. This is a block of 30 college credits that are guaranteed to transfer to ANY Indiana Public college. Ivy Tech is our main partner at RCHS and we are lucky to have Chris Bottomley, Ivy Tech K-14 Advisor, here every Monday. He meets with students to help determine the classes they need to take to receive the Indiana College Core. We had 20 students graduate with the ICC last year, we are excited to see how many the class of 2025 will have!

The Purdue Center for Regional Development put out a post last week with the top 3 counties with the highest public school graduation rate. Rush County and Rushville Consolidated High School had the SECOND HIGHEST GRADUATION RATE IN THE STATE last year at 96.6%!!!!!!

Clubs are a very important part of the High School experience. We offer a wide variety of clubs that range from service to just plain old fun! We had a club call out this week to give all students a chance to see what is offered and have them sign up for ones they may be interested in. I thought it was great that two of our service clubs Student Council and key Club drew a lot of interest. Our kids want to serve the school and the community and do what they can to make RCHS and Rush County a great place!!

Kelley McDermott - Shout out to Mr. Cox, Mr. Haney, and Mr. Marlatt for their help as I transitioned from the Business Dept. back "home" to Social Studies.

Kelley McDermott - Shout out to the Special Education department and Mrs. Cain for all of their work in providing teachers with IEP's, 504's, and Health Concern documents. I appreciate having that information asap.

Diana Shook - Shout out to our new students, Wyatt, Noble, and Harley. They are doing a great job.

Melissa Winkler - Shout out to Beth Jarman for the extra hours she has put in the past 2 weeks to make sure the kid's physicals are in Final Forms.

Melissa Winkler - Shout out to Kerry Brown for figuring out the transportation schedule for athletics.

Bryan Hummel - Shout out to Jennifer Teague for being one of, if not the most inclusive teacher.

Students also recommended this shout out. They appreciate her efforts.

Warren Cook - Shout out to Holly Wagner for the effort and dedication she has put into Rushville Ag Education and Rushville FFA! You will definitely be missed but what an honor for you to serve as the Deputy Director of the Indiana FFA!!

Hannah Lemmons - Shout out to Cassia Sherwood and Bryan Hummel for taking care of my classes when I was out for an appointment.

Sami DeLey - Shout out to Toni Schultz and Joni Fenimore. I was nervous coming into our all staff meetings before school started, as I didn't know anyone while also going through a lot of changes in the ag department. Both of them have taken me under their wings and have been constantly checking up on me since, which I appreciate more than they will ever know. I couldn't be more thankful for how they (as well as the entire staff) have treated the newbie ag teacher!

Brittney Corum - Shout out to my great staff for returning to class this year: Brandi Manghelli, Nikki Sams, and Diane Shook, I really appreciate you all coming back and supporting and working with our students.

Joni Fenimore - Shout out to Jenni Philpot and Liz Meek for making sure that my Algebra 2 students got registered in their MathXL class. They know that I am dangerously knowledgeable about the technology and they definitely have my back!

Joni Fenimore - Shout out to Lisa Wagner for helping welcome Libby Adams to our department and assisting her with all of the new information at the beginning of the year in a new building!

Liz Meek - Shout out to Tony Augsburger for updating the bus traffic only signs

Liz Meek - Shout out to Hannah Augsburger for bring The Den to life

Liz Meek - Shout out to Krystal Parmelee for her hard work in helping track student attendance

Nan Scanlan - Shout out to Megan Davis, Amber Long, Linda Drake, and Karen Schneider for getting the Resource Room off to a great start and the help they provide in covering the classes we need to cover.

Nan Scanlan - Shout out to Christin Nicholls, Cassia Sherwood, Tara Brown, Brittney Corum, and Pam Schroeder for their hard work in getting the accommodations out for their students and getting the case conference started.

Nan Scanlan - Shout out to Natalie Hornsby and Jan Thoman enough for their hard work and patience in getting our students' schedules fit their needs.

Warren Cook - Shout out to our Special Education Department! Nana Scanlan, Christin Nichols, Cassia Sherwood, Pam Schroeder Tara Brown, Brittney Corum, Amber Long, Megan Davis, Linda Drake, and Karen Schneider. It takes an special people to do what this group does every day and you will not find better people in this position than any of them!!!

Warren Cook - Shout out to our entire staff for such a great start to this school year!

Beth Williams - Shout out to Zach Hoeing, who has to feel like he's caught in a tsunami but he's handling it with his usual calm demeanor

Brad Lawler - Shout out to our amazing Guidance Counselors!!!! The first week is always crazy and they have done an awesome job of letting all of us know the changes they are making!!!!

Libby Adams - shout out to the math department for being so awesome and welcoming.

Blair Orme - Shout out to Mrs. Wagner for her service to RCHS and the FFA

A huge shout out goes to Riley Hoeing. Mrs. Hoeing used her great artistic talents and painted the headings on all of our new information boards. We now have dedicated areas to hang flyers and all information in each class hallway. Thank you Mrs. Hoeing for donating your time to make these areas look amazing!!

The Science Department has really kicked off the year in a very positive way!! We have a veteran staff in this department and they hit the ground running. It was great to see all of the great things going on in each room. Our enrolment in our Science programs has raised significantly from last year!! Great job from Ms. Edwards, Mr. Lawler, Mrs. Rinard, and Mrs. Durand!!!!

We are off to a great starting our EMS program! Our new instructor Bill Hufford has the classroom set up and is ready for a great year. Thank you Leslie Shaul and the Rush to Work Training Center for providing us the space to run this program!!

Our music department is the best around!!! I do question the guest director from this week. I asked them to play something good for me. They went on and played something GREAT!!!! Made my day!!

The state says if a student should be in school 96% of the scheduled days or better. If not they are considered chronically absent. Our goal this year is to reach the 96% mark as an entire school. We have made many changes in how we track our students and the days they miss.

Holly Wagner will be serving as the Deputy Director of Indiana FFA beginning August 19th. She will work with the Indiana FFA staff to provide leadership to the more than 14,000 FFA members and support to the state's agricultural education instructors and FFA advisors. Holly says that "working with the Rushville FFA members and becoming part of this community has been a true honor and joy. It is difficult to leave a place I love so much, but I am excited to take on this new leadership position and work for the members, teachers, and supporters of Indiana FFA." Even though we are devastated to lose such an amazing instructor, we know this is an incredible opportunity and she is very deserving of this role. Please help us congratulate Holly on this achievement. She will make an even bigger impact and the state FFA office has gained a phenomenal person in their department.

Youth theater is a great way to combine the arts with logic and boost self esteem! While I'm not directing this play, I am on the board of directors for Rushville Regional Theatre and will have a bit of involvement. RCHS Alumna Carrie Wilson Billman is directing, and she is fantastic with kids! With your help, I hope we can reach students who need a creative outlet, need a group of friends to call their own, and just like to have fun!

Thank you!

Hannah Lemmons

We have added all of our sports to the Activities Calendar this year. Click the button below to see all of the events that are happening at RCHS!!

Want to know what is going on at RCHS? Watch our daily LIVE episodes of Lion's Live where students produce and stream to YouTube a daily show that features what is going on at RCHS! You can access our channel by hitting the button below and then click on SUBSCRIBE to be notified when we GO LIVE!

Once again we have our radio station up and running. Listen 24 hours a day to a radio station put together and produced by students at RCHS!!! Just click the button below and start listening!