Hempstead ISD: Why celebrating students is so important for this superintendent

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When Hempstead ISD Superintendent Herbert O’Neil walks through a school with his tripod, students flock to him to find out which of their classmates he’s going to visit. The resulting videos, which O’Neil records on his iPhone and places in the rural Texas district’s newsletter, represent a key piece of the superintendent’s nationally recognized communications philosophy.

“We wanted to make that the cornerstone of what we do in Hempstead—so we spend a lot of time celebrating students,” O’Neil explains. ” When students achieve or do great things, I go right to them.”

O’Neil, who took the helm of the high-poverty district in 2022, was recently named a “Superintendent to Watch” by the National School Public Relations Association for his effort to keep staff, students and the community informed via the district’s website, social media, short videos, newsletters and other channels.

“If people know what’s happening that cuts down on misunderstandings and confusion,” he says. “I learned that early on as a young principal that …  we want to communicate early, we want to communicate often and we want to a have a good place where people can find the information that they need about our school district that’s relevant to their children.”

Communicating early means having an “ongoing conversation” with community members and letting them know about decisions as soon as they are made. Communicating often means, among other things, having the school board participate in recognizing students and staff. Hempstead ISD names a student of the month for each grade, pre-K through 12th.

“We want our board room filled with people there to celebrate students with us,” he adds.

Hempstead ISD’s ‘power in progress’

“If you’re not moving forward, then I believe you’re going backward,” is how O’Neil sums up the vision-casting he and his team are doing this summer. “We talk about progress in everything that we do—progress in our leadership, progress in our state testing and our instruction, and progress in our events and the things that our students are involved in.”

O’Neil and his team will dig deeper into instructional data to track more closely the students who are excelling and those who have fallen behind. Data is yet another avenue to celebrate the district. “Whenever there is progress, we celebrate that because as you empower people, they work harder, they’re more creative, they feel more value and they feel more ownership in the process,” he points out. “It is our hope that that will trickle down to ensure that student achievement.”

Hempstead ISD is also making progress financially. Last year, O’Neil and his team convinced local voters to approve a bond that will fund a new early childhood center renovations to the district’s athletic facilities and safety upgrades.

“If you have strong schools, you build strong communities,” he concludes. “And when you transform schools, you transform communities.”

Matt Zalaznick
Matt Zalaznick
Matt Zalaznick is the managing editor of District Administration and a life-long journalist. Prior to writing for District Administration he worked in daily news all over the country, from the NYC suburbs to the Rocky Mountains, Silicon Valley and the U.S. Virgin Islands. He's also in a band.

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