Braille Center Gets Grant

t Continued From Page 1 McKinley students meet best-selling author

In a day and age where technology and social media dominate high school students’ lives, having students attend an author event is important. Senior Heaven Metcalf said she read Stamped by Jason Reynolds. She said her biggest takeaway from his presentation was when he said, “Don’t be ashamed of where you came from and be yourself.” Sophomore Christina Moyers- Chavez said, “Jason Reynolds’ speaking impacted me, he told me the background behind his books and he said things that made me cry. I read A Long Way Down and When I was the Greatest.” Sophomore Evelyn Moorhead- Kramer said Reynolds’ speaking “affected me in the way he talks about his books and what he went through. I made a connection.” Moorehead-Kramer has also read A Long Way Down and When I was the Greatest. Sophomore Gage Slinger said, “It was interesting to see how he impacted people. I read When I was the Greatest.” Senior Serenity Powell said she has read Long Way Down and is currently reading When I was the Greatest. She said her biggest takeaway from Reynolds is “Once you accept who you are, learn to appreciate your gifts and you do not try to copy other people, you truly begin to succeed. Reynolds tried to be like Queen Latifah and write like her, but that wasn’t who he is. The minute he started writing his way he experienced his work and began to create bestsellers.” Powell opened and introduced Jason Reynolds. She is in McKinley’s Project Lit. She said, “It was honestly amazing, like I got to talk to him before I introduced him. It gave me a little bit of comfort and took a weight off my shoulders. It also was nice because I got another opportunity to do public speaking and really put myself out there as a public speaker.” Sophomore Emoni Davis said she thought it was important that “Reynolds was not always like he is now and he was from the hood. He can be a role model for many.” Maybe it is time you pick up a Jason Reynolds book and open up a new door. #PUPSREAD Serenity Powell, a senior at McKinley Senior High School, had the honor of introducing best-selling author Jason Reynolds when he spoke at the Palace on Feb. 24.

New Local Braille Production Center Grant Awarded

Great news from the Office of Student Services

By Chastity Trumpower The Canton City School District is very fortunate to have two teachers that are specially trained and certified to teach students with visual impairments. Kellie Kochan and LeeAnn Devore have both participated in highly specialized training to learn specific strategies Cindy Clapper and Kellie Kochan with the new and techniques to Braille equipment. serve our students BEST Grant to establish a Local who have visual impairments. Braille Production Center! We have students in the district This grant provides equipment, with varying levels of visual im- software, training, and technical pairments from slight vision loss assistance to our staff in order to to significant or complete loss of produce more reading materials in sight. Some of our students that Braille in our buildings to support have low vision or who are blind our students! We are so excited use Braille. Braille is a system of to have this opportunity and can’t raised dots that can be read by wait to see how this new equipstudents who can’t access written ment and training will increase the print due to their visual impair- number of student materials we are ments. We are very excited to able to produce in our own buildshare that Kellie Kochan recently ings for our students that need applied for and received a grant braille materials! from the AT&AEM Center and the