December, 2006
Hi L ife
Vol. 81/Issue 3
2305 East Main League City, Texas 77573
Creek is losing a dedicated staff member Tori Wycoff
As students leave Creek for winter break, everyone is thinking of holidays and being out of school for two weeks, but when classes resume, there will be a big difference here. Mrs. Pat Dovidio, the school registrar, is retiring this December and Creek will not be the same without her. Mrs. Dovidio has worked at Creek for twenty years and knows this school better than anyone. She works on students’ transcripts, she keeps all the records, and she calculates class rank and grade point averages by hand. By the time a student graduates from Creek, Mrs. Dovidio would have checked and re-checked their GPA multiple times. She cannot rest unless she knows that the records are perfect. This is a huge task for one person to take on, but Mrs. Dovidio does it every day and enjoys it. She arrives at school at 4:00 a.m. and stays late in the afternoon to get everything done. “I love Creek and I love my job!”, said Mrs. Dovidio. Mrs. Dovidio wakes up at three every morning and when she gets to school, she makes coffee for the faculty. She also buys the supplies and even cleans Mrs. Collins’ coffee cup. When asked about leaving Creek, Mrs. Dovidio responded, “It’s going to be hard to leave here- I have a lot of friends that I will miss very much. I will think of them every morning when I drink
my coffee!” After retiring, Mrs. Dovidio plans to head to Florida to look for another job. This is not surprising coming from such a dedicated woman that remains so busy all of the time. Mrs. Dovidio has affected many lives here at Creek and has made many lifelong
friendships. Mrs. Radicioni, the school’s receptionist, has worked with Mrs. Dovidio for eighteen years. Mrs. Radicioni describes Mrs. Dovidio as a dependable hard worker who also happens to be her best friend. “I will miss Mrs. Dovidio from the top of my head to the bottom of my toes,” says Mrs. Radicioni.
Another person that Mrs. Dovidio has greatly impacted is Mr. Judd, also known as Copy Man. They have worked together for twenty years and he describes Mrs. Dovidio as “my bestest friend in the whole world- I’ll miss her!” From the counseling center’s perspective, losing Mrs. Dovidio is a huge setback. She works so hard to make sure that the senior’s transcripts get to every college on time and that will be something that will be greatly missed. Mrs. McNaughton said about Mrs. Dovidio, “She will be missed greatly. Her depth of information from experiences is amazing. No one will be able to fill her shoes, no matter how good they are.” Mrs. Dovidio leaving will greatly impact Creek in a way that is unimaginable. We are losing the cornerstone of Creek and she will be greatly missed by everyone that has crossed her path. Dr. Fred Hayes described Mrs. Dovidio perfectly when he said, “She is the heart and soul of Clear Creek High School.” Mrs. Dovidio will be very difficult to replace and the entire school should thank her for all she does. Creek would not be what it is today without her and we all hope that she has a wonderful time in Florida.
Photo by Alyssa Solomon
CCISD approves new courses for 2008 Tori Wycoff
The board of trustees for Clear Creek Independent School District recently approved a new list of courses to be offered at the four high schools in the 2007-2008 school year. These courses will be outlined in the new course catalog that will be distributed to students in January. Tina Farrell, the Associate Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction, said in the December 7 issue of The Citizen, “By Spring Break, we should have a good idea of which courses made and which ones didn’t have enough students enrolled to make a class, which will allow us to make any necessary staffing additions.”
The state has also passed new guidelines that require all students to complete four years of math and science in high school. To meet this standard, all four CCISD high schools will be offering conceptual physics beginning next year. Some courses will be available at all high schools including Fashion Marketing, Hospitality Services, and Introduction to Veterinary Technology. New courses at Creek include Computer Integrated Manufacturing Engineering and Business Marketing Programming, which will also be offered at Clear Lake. Clear Lake will offer Aerospace Engineering and American Sign
Language 4 and Clear Brook will hold Civil Engineering classes. Since Clear Springs opens next year, Introduction to Culinary Arts and Introduction to Transportation Services will be offered there. When students complete the Transportation Service Careers program at Clear Springs, they will graduate with a National Automotive Technician Education Foundation certificate. This will allow the students to go straight into the automotive field upon graduation. Some new advanced classes will also be introduced such as English Leadership Gifted and Talented that will be offered at all campuses. Clear Creek will have
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a Gifted and Talented Global Political Science class, while Lake will expand their foreign language department to include Pre-AP French 1, 2 and 3. All of the new courses will be offered to all high school students in the district, even ones that are not at a student’s school, which means that students will be responsible for providing their own transportation to the other campuses that offer the courses they wish to take. Due to the board’s approval of these new courses, the educational experience at all of the CCISD high schools will widen and students will be able to learn subjects that are on a much wider spectrum. Creek welcomes wrestling into the athletic program and is off to a great start. Read more about this sport on page 15.
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Photo by Andy Holcomb
Mrs. Jameson, the HiLife advisor, wrote her first guest editorial in her 26 years of teaching at Clear Creek. Read what she had to say on page 3.
The recent pit bull attacks have caused people to question the breed. Find out why dogs attack on page 12.
Photo by Micah Wesley
Photo by www.realpitbull.com
Clear Creek HiLife