This program brought to you in part by the Erika Lewis Endowment Fund.

(Maria Silva) Coming up on Student Spotlight, a new school year and new schools.

Take a tour with me inside the state-of-the-art South Career and Technical Academy.

Plus...

The debut of CCSD's "Destination District" podcast.

It is a student idea come to life.

We will take you behind the scenes.

(Layla Driscoll) I'm definitely gonna listen to it.

I'm definitely gonna tell everyone to listen to it, because this is such a great opportunity.

-Then... How a once-in-a-lifetime trip for this middle school teacher will help his students learn science under the sea.

(Rick Scroggie) Hopefully that excitement will pass on to the kids as they experience what I did.

-Those stories and so much more.

Student Spotlight starts right now.

[swiping sound] -Welcome to South CTA!

-One, two, ready, go!

♪♪ -Now, that is a great way to get the new season of Student Spotlight started.

Welcome.

I'm your host, Maria Silva, and we are at the Clark County School District's newest Career and Technical Academy, South CTA.

Or should I say CSI: South CTA?

Check out that elaborate crime scene behind me.

This is part of the Biomedical Science Technologies program, one of nine programs being offered at this new school.

Check it out.

♪♪ This lesson in forensics, part of the Biomedical and Sports Medicine program at South CTA.

(Enzo Corona) The thing that inspired me to go to South CTA was the fact that it was new, and also the program I was looking into was offered here.

-And so Corona... -Bumped her head on the table.

-...and his classmates, some of the more than 450 9th graders in South CTA's history making class, the class of 2029.

-We're setting the tone for our school and building the foundation as other younger students, they come into the school and look at us.

We're the leaders, and we set the example for the school.

-Heading up the Biomed and Sports Medicine program, Mr. Hamburg... (James Todd Hamburg) So our program is unique in that we have a combined program of Biomed and Sports Medicine.

All of my students have to go through the Biomed program so they get the science basis, and then they go through the Sports Medicine program so they get more of a hands-on medical basis.

So they get both combined programs as they go into college.

-...an athletic trainer who brings a wealth of knowledge to the classroom.

-Right there, you're going to come to their feet.

You might measure to the head also.

-Mr. Hamburg started his CCSD career at Northwest CTA.

-Our program at Northwest, we had kids that are pharmacists and physical therapists and athletic trainers, and I have kids in med school all over the country.

And there's a bunch of nurses, different in town, and in dental school.

So whatever field of medicine they choose, this is open for them to go through in this program.

And so it's great.

And we get to see more and more kids stay local and go through, start in high school and then finish here and actually work in the medical field here, which is huge and great for us to have.

-Mr. Hamburg also happens to have another cool job and is the only NFL employee working in the school district.

-He's a concussion spotter, which I thought was really cool, and that he has experience within the field that he's teaching as well.

So when he comes in here and he gives us the information and how it works, it gives us a better understanding of how, like, the career in sports medicine could work.

-Enzo even wants to follow in Mr. Hamburg's footsteps and wants to be an athletic trainer.

-A lot of the other questions you have, I promise we're gonna address as we go through this next month.

Okay?

Are you guys ready for the next group?

-Yep.

-All right.

Let's go.

-CSI: South CTA.

-Principal Thomas will join us a little later to tell us more about the other wonderful programs being offered here at South CTA.

Also coming up later in our first "News Break," we will let you know about some of the district's other new campuses.

Well, from the newest schools to some of the longest tenured CCSD employees.

This was the first-ever event honoring employees who have been with CCSD for 40 or more years.

Superintendent Jhone Ebert was there to congratulate the honorees.

CCSD Engagement Unit Executive Director Denise Diaz shares why it is so important to honor these committed employees and celebrate these milestones.

(Denise Diaz) They are there in the trenches, working so hard every day with passion, commitment, and with grace, because it's not easy.

Teaching is not an easy job.

Being a school support professional is not an easy job, and it takes all of us.

So it's not just the classroom teacher; it is everybody in the entire building that works hard to make sure that our students are successful and our families have a place where they feel a sense of belonging.

-Congratulations to all of the honorees.

Well, it was at this special event where we met the longest tenured CCSD employee, a speech pathologist who's been with the district for, listen to this, 50 years.

(Cynthia Valencia-Kimball) I was 12 years old.

My whole family sat and watched The Miracle Worker with Patty Duke.

Annie Sullivan was her therapist.

And I thought, I love what Annie Sullivan did, and I can do that.

-For Cynthia Valencia-Kimball, that childhood dream came true in August of 1973.

-I wasn't really nervous, because I could hardly wait to meet these elementary school children.

I had four schools.

And I just remember, my dream is coming true and I can hardly wait to do this and I hope I get complicated, challenging cases, because I know I can do it.

-In the 51 years she's been a speech pathologist with CCSD, Ms. Valencia-Kimball has been an essential member of the department, making history along the way.

-I spoke Spanish and English.

I speak Spanish and English, and I-- so I was their first bilingual diagnostician, and I loved it.

At Helen J. Stewart School, I was one of the innovators of using sign language.

-She's even produced educational videos with a little help from KLVX Channel 10, now Vegas PBS.

-Do you hear what I hear?

-This is the program I produced, and you are about to see the tympanoscope.

This is the nurse at Helen J. Stewart.

We found the tympanoscope.

It tests the child's hearing in 10 seconds.

And we get valid results, and we can get it on both sides in 20 seconds.

And it's-- We needed that.

It was a definite necessity in the school district.

-When Ms. Valencia-Kimball started with CCSD, there were only 23 speech pathologists.

Today, there are nearly 400.

-We work with special kids, and special kids have great personalities.

And we work with kids who have fluency issues, which would be stuttering.

We work with kids who have articulation errors, usually R and L or S with a lisp, which would be a frontal lisp.

You have to get your tongue in the middle and curl it back to say "Rrrr."

Students, when you have a speech problem, when you have any kind of a delay, get into Special Education.

Parents get your kids in Special Education because we have the skills and the tools to get your kid to communicate.

-There is no doubt Ms. Valencia-Kimball is passionate about what she does and has made a difference in the lives of thousands of students.

As for her retirement plans... -I'm not ready to retire.

I love my job.

I've loved it since I started, and I have learned more every year.

-Ms. Valencia-Kimball, by the way, comes from a family of educators.

Not only was her mom a professor at USC, but two of her children are also teachers with the Clark County School District.

Ms. Kimball is an 8th grade teacher at Cannon Middle School, and Mr. Kimball teaches at Cimarron High School.

Love that they are all part of our CCSD family.

Reaching staff, parents, students, and people like you and me is the goal behind a new CCSD podcast.

And the idea came from a group of students.

Well, back in May, the superintendent's Student Advisory Council presented to the Board of Trustees.

(Ramon Moreno) Yeah, I think a podcast would be a really good idea, because me, personally, I got a lot on my plate.

I'm taking 10 classes this semester alone.

So I would really love to get that opportunity to share not only my story, but also my lessons and experiences with handling that level of classes at CSN High School, because there's three campuses, but we're not exactly given the opportunity to talk to each other a lot.

I'm sure we all have our own lessons, not only share within our own circle, but I'd also like to branch out to other high schools.

So I really love the idea of a podcast.

-Fast forward to the new school year, and we were invited to listen in on the first-ever taping of the new "Destination District" podcast.

(Jeremy Helal) Can I get a mic check real quick?

-My name is Layla Driscoll.

I go to Rancho High School, and I was on the first CCSD podcast.

So the original idea was to start with, like, a newspaper newsletter thing, and then that kind of got a little complicated, because there's already technically like versions of that, like the emails, weekly emails.

So we kind of came together as a group and decided a podcast would be a good idea.

-Hi, my name is Selinalei Hamilton, and I was on the first CCSD podcast.

I think that there's a lot of disconnect in the Clark County School District because it is so huge.

And I think having a podcast is definitely a good way to make sure that our parents can be involved in their kids' lives, and kids can have a way to involve their parents and just build that bridge between the district and our families.

-Podcasts are-- they're getting pretty popular nowadays, so it's a very, like, modernized version, I guess, of like a newsletter.

It's very accessible, because people can just listen to it on the radio, on the way to school, like whenever they want.

(Jhone Ebert) If you know anything about me, you know how important student voice is.

You know, we need to communicate in many different ways.

And so adding the podcast, if that's going to reach our students who are our most important customers, then bring it on.

-We got asked why the podcast, we got asked what our schools specifically do to help us like support our college and career readiness, as well as some of the goals that SSAC will have for this year.

-And I think it's really cool that she wants to hear student voices and make the students heard.

And I really appreciate that.

-Oh, my gosh!

I've never done a podcast before.

And so this is a first, and it was wonderful.

The setup was great.

Our students were amazing, and it's exciting.

I can't wait to do more.

-That is amazing.

Students weren't the only guests, by the way, on this first podcast.

The superintendent invited school principals and others to talk about areas of academic focus, from pre-K to workforce or college pathways.

You can listen to the new "Destination District" podcast by going to the district's website at ccsd.net or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Now let's head to Sig Rogich Middle School for our first "News Break."

-Hi.

I'm Kroy from Sig Rogich Middle School.

-And I'm Lucy.

And we're here with your first "News Break."

-The new school year means seven brand new campuses for the CCSD students.

That includes the new South CTA and seven replacement schools.

Replacement schools are schools that have been rebuilt and on the same site as the existing school.

The building includes flexible learning spaces, enhanced safety and security measures, and a bunch of new technology.

What a great way to start the new school year!

-And there are other new schools on the way.

Over the summer, district leaders held groundbreaking for Wengert Elementary School as well as Helen M. Smith Elementary School.

Those schools will also be replacement schools, new buildings on the same site as the original school.

Both schools are expected to open in August of 2026.

-When we come back, we're going to be talking about a districtwide competition we won three years in a row, and we're going for a four-peat.

-We'll have more on that in a bit, but now let's send it back to Maria.

-Thank you so much, and great job.

We will see you later in the show.

And while it is not a completely new campus, district leaders also celebrated the reopening of Lundy Elementary School on Mount Charleston.

The school had been closed for two years due to damage caused by tropical storm Hilary.

Trustees voted to allocate $7.8 million to repair and renovate the building, which reopened just in time for the new school year.

Well, September is National Suicide Prevention Awareness Month.

Mental health is a big focus in our schools.

There is a program where students help students, called Hope Squad.

We went to Coronado High School to learn how this squad helps build a positive school culture.

(Quinn Hyde) I think we're dealing with probably one of the most competitive times ever to be a kid.

♪♪ In my freshman year, somebody passed away of suicide.

And that really hit me hard because I didn't know them, but I sat right next to her.

And it really like, it really struck a chord with me.

(Matt Poleski) The mission of Hope Squad is to make sure that we never have another student take their own life.

♪♪ (Taylor Stevenson) So what is Hope Squad?

So all of you guys are gonna be Hope Squad mentors.

Hope Squad mentors are trained peers who recognize the warning signs of suicide, who offer support, and also who directs students to the right person for help.

(Kayla Woods) I think that a lot of students are often very scared to talk to adults.

They think they're getting their friends in trouble if their friend comes to them like, Hey, I'm struggling, but don't tell anyone.

That's why we have peer-to-peer suicide groups.

Today we were doing activity stations centered around mental health topics like gratitude and self-care and community outreach.

-Hope Squad actually offers like a bunch of services.

Like we have one meeting a month or two meetings a month where we actually review different mental health strategies.

So we actually are super prepared to, like, deal with whatever comes to us and to connect our peers to what they need.

-So I get to talk them through like, Hey, we're here just as listeners, and if you need to, we have 9-8-8, our National Suicide Hotline.

We have SafeVoice, which you can go to at any time.

-The biggest thing we're trying to do is cultivate the culture where it's safe to come and talk to one another, that we can communicate about mental health on campus peer-to-peer, with adults, with people off campus in the community.

We're building that connection of promoting mental health and mental well being.

-We are Hope Squad!

-What a wonderful resource.

And we want to remind you about another resource, SafeVoice.

SafeVoice is available 24 hours a day to students and parents.

You can provide an anonymous tip about anything from students at risk of hurting themselves to bullying to violence.

Download the app, call the hotline, or report online at safevoicenv.org.

The mental health of students is important, and so is the overall physical health of our CCSD students, which is why the Family Support Center offers students free medical, dental, and eye care services.

(Cindy Flores) Any service, the idea is to remove any health barriers from our families so if we can avoid them missing multiple days of school by coming here and getting those medical needs taken care of, then that's kind of the goal of the center.

-Former teacher and now Family Support Center Director Cindy Flores knows firsthand why the services being offered at the UNLV Health Pediatric Family Support Center Clinic are so very important.

-I know what it was like to not have insurance, to be that kind of kid that only went to the dentist when your tooth hurt, but not regular visits.

So anything that we can do to have these services available for our families to prevent any health issues, it makes us all happy on the team.

-The clinic, located right next to CCSD's Family Support Center on Maryland Parkway and Oakey, offers its services free of charge to CCSD students, ages 3 to 21.

The only thing that they will not provide is, of course, anything that's considered an emergency, in which families, you know, are told to call 911, go to your local hospital.

Other than that, sick visits, they can, you know, your child has a stomach ache, a headache, or maybe your child needs a sports physical or vaccines for school.

And the fact that we can have a full-blown clinic here with a lab and everything just allows us to provide the services that we know our families were asking for.

And whatever services they don't offer there, we try to provide them in a different way through other partnerships that we have.

-One of those partnerships is with the Ronald McDonald Care Mobile, which makes a stop at the Family Support Center once a month offering free dental services.

-So they can help with cavities, just general x-rays, cleanings.

Orthodontics is one of the only things that they won't do.

But anything that you can do when you go to see your typical dentist, whether it's an issue that you're already having or just preventative care, they can take care of.

-Healthy smiles and healthy eyes thanks to a partnership with Eye Care 4 Kids.

-They do offer services for adults as well.

So for adults, there is a $50 fee; but for students, it is free of cost.

So they will do the actual exam on site, and then they will provide a pair of glasses.

So the families will do the exam, and they will receive a phone call letting them know when they can pick up the glasses.

Everything that we offer here is free of charge for our CCSD students, so there's never a reason for a family to feel they can't come.

It is open to any CCSD family.

-You do have to make an appointment to receive these medical services.

For more information, head to familysc.ccsd.net.

A reminder that all CCSD students also have access to an online doctor through Hazel Health.

This is thanks to a partnership with the school district.

It is free for all students with or without insurance.

Now let's head back to Sig Rogich Middle School for our second "News Break."

-Hi.

I'm Lilly from Sig Rogich Middle School.

-And I'm Nate, and we're back with your second "News Break."

-For the third year in a row, our school is the winners of the Superintendent's Cup.

-The Superintendent's Cup is a friendly competition for middle schools that looks at athletics, student activities, and academics.

Schools that win the most points throughout the year win the cup, and we're going for four.

We work hard every day.

And did you know that we're a five-star school?

-Our school is named after Mr. Sig Rogich, and we appreciate him and love him very much.

He is a very successful political and corporate advisor in Nevada.

He's even worked with President George W. Bush.

Mr. Rogich is involved in many important organizations in our community.

We are very lucky to have him as our namesake for our school.

-Our mascot is a Rough Rider, and there's nothing like Rough Rider country.

-Thanks for visiting our school.

We're gonna send it right back to Maria.

-Thank you, and congratulations on the Superintendent's Cup and all of your wonderful achievements.

All right.

Check this room out and these cool machines and this awesome robot right here.

Now, this is all part of the Advanced Manufacturing Technologies program here at South CTA.

And joining us now to tell us all about this new school and all of the amazing programs, come on in, Principal Thomas.

-Thank you.

-I've had the honor of touring your school.

You gave me a tour.

Tell me, what do you want our viewers to know about South CTA?

(Pate Thomas) We're just excited to be the next new magnet school in CCSD.

In the current technical academies, there is other career technical academies around the valley, but we're excited to open up this one, especially in the area that we're in right now.

We really worked with the City of Henderson and Clark County to make sure that we have programs that are going to make sure kids have jobs upon leaving high school.

-Nine programs.

We've already featured your Biomedical and Sports Medicine.

We're here.

Tell us about this program.

-This program is actually the Advanced Manufacturing program.

We're really excited for this one because Haas is actually moving down the street from us, so we're really excited to create those partnerships with the community, as well as Tesla, to give students opportunities to really do a lot of cool things once they leave us and get those skills here now, so they're very successful upon leaving.

-And like I said, cool robots over here.

Tell me about the other programs that you have.

-Some of the other programs that we have is Entertainment Sports Marketing.

We're excited to be that City of Las Vegas Entertainment Sports Marketing.

Another one is teaching and training, your Education and Leadership, so preparing those next generation of teachers to actually take our classrooms over and do cool things with the students of the next generation.

-You even have a playground here?

-We do.

We have a kindergarten.

We're excited.

That should start next year, and we're excited to have some littles here to work with bigger kids.

-Another thing that's really unique about your school is the fact that it's all 9th graders.

-Yes.

We were one of the first schools to open with only a 9th grade class, which we're really excited about, because it's really giving us time to get to meet every kid and build those relationships with them and build out great programs for the future students to come here.

-Another unique program, your music program.

-We are, we actually are one of the only CTAs that have a really great music program.

We got an excellent teacher from an elementary school that's done amazing things at their elementary school that really just wants to level it up here at the high school.

We're excited to have him.

-You have wonderful teachers that, of course, you're already started recruiting for the next class.

Where can we get more information?

-We have.

You can visit our website at southcta.net.

All of our new information for next year is already up there, so please check it out.

-Thanks again.

And you have a wonderful school.

A middle school teacher is home from an adventure of a lifetime, sailing thousands of miles aboard a research vessel to the Galapagos Islands.

Thanks to his trip, his students can now use real-world data to learn about science under the sea.

-All right.

And so after looking at all this data, then I get to tie it in with what I did.

-For 30 years, Bob Miller Middle School teacher Rick Scroggie has taught students about science.

This summer, he lived it.

-I was on a research vessel, and we sailed from San Diego down to the Galapagos Islands.

It's about a 3,200-mile trip.

And so we were doing some research.

We were also working with other teachers and some professors to learn a little bit more about the geology of the area.

And this was a great chance to mix my job with my passion of traveling.

-The crew sailed right over an underwater volcano that recently erupted, deploying sensors to measure if it was still active.

-To actually be right there and as the things were being deployed, we could see the data coming up on the computer screens instantaneously.

And sure enough, boom, there it was.

And it was, it was breathtaking just to be involved with something like that.

-But not every thrill was planned.

Days before heading home, a massive earthquake in Russia triggered tsunami warnings for the Galapagos.

-They were predicting someplace between 3- and 5-meter high wave coming into the Galapagos, which would have inundated the coastline, would have taken out the airport.

And so they had a pretty major scare.

-Mr. Scroggie and his crew found higher ground, and, thankfully, the waves weren't as large as anticipated.

-Knowing that something that big could have been coming, it was pretty intimidating.

-From sunsets at sea to stargazing at the equator, Mr. Scroggie says the trip was invigorating and a good reminder of why he loves to teach students science.

-Kids hear all the time about science.

They hear about things that have been discovered, but it's not personal to them frequently; whereas, by actually seeing video of me deploying things and seeing the data coming in, all those types of things make it a little more real for them and hopefully will increase engagement and excitement of the lessons and the ideas we're talking.

-What an incredible experience for both Mr. Scroggie and his 6th and 7th grade students.

-Did you watch the game?

-Yeah, I watched all of them.

-Before we go, we want to give a shout-out to the Summerlin South All-Stars who won the US championship and competed in the Little League World Series.

There was a big parade held in their honor as they returned home.

All of Southern Nevada was rooting them on, and we are so proud of all they accomplished.

(Meghan Mossler) The schools have been really supportive.

They even put the games on the TV in the lunch room.

And they were broadcasting it, and all their friends were getting messages from everybody.

And that really made them feel special.

-Congratulations to the entire team.

Well, that does it for this first episode of Student Spotlight.

A big thank-you to South CTA for hosting us for this episode.

What a beautiful campus.

And thank you for watching.

A reminder that you can always catch episodes of Student Spotlight on the Vegas PBS website or YouTube page.

We are so excited for this brand new school year.

Can't wait to see you next month.

♪♪