Tulare County Office of Education

CHARACTER COUNTS! for tomorrow's leaders

The following guest commentary was printed in the Visalia Times-Delta on October 17, 2009 during National CHARACTER COUNTS! week, October 18-24. The piece was written by Kelley Petty, Coordinator of the CHARACTER COUNTS! program operated by the Tulare County Office of Education.

Kelley Petty, CHARACTER COUNTS! Coordinator

Kelley Petty, CHARACTER COUNTS! Coordinator

Website, database, spreadsheet and computer - this year CHARACTER COUNTS! Week in Tulare County entered the technology-driven era. No longer do we have thousands of paper nominations sent to us by fax or mail delivery. The use of databases and spreadsheets has allowed us to efficiently track what appears to be another record-breaking year of nearly 9,000 "Kids of Character" nominations. These nominations, chronicled by the Visalia Times-Delta, reveal a range of commendable behaviors - ranging from preschool children learning how to share and take turns to teenagers devoting hours of community service to enhance the world.

We would like to thank teachers and other nominators throughout the county for their patience during our transition to the new technology. Just as the Six Pillars prepare us for life's glitches, they enabled us to recover from our technological glitches and keep all these acts of good character intact.

We celebrate these acts during CHARACTER COUNTS! Week October 18-24. A special thanks to the Visalia Times-Delta for their commitment to sharing "Kids of Character" stories throughout the week. Their community support for character education demonstrated in the profile articles and on-line pillar recognition of the many well-deserving students is an exemplary model for communities throughout the nation.

The goal of CHARACTER COUNTS! is intentional and purposeful, and it is no accident that the program's strategies support families and faith communities. We depend on CHARACTER COUNTS! to provide the common framework and language that define the essence of good character: Trustworthiness, Respect, Responsibility, Fairness, Caring and Citizenship. These Six Pillars of Character are important to all of us as educators, parents and community members who care about the character of the people who will marry our children and lead our country.

As you read about this year's "Kids of Character," the hard work, the challenges and the sacrifices they make to walk the walk of moral conduct, be ever mindful they have become the role models who inspire all of us to continue the lifelong personal and community effort we have embraced as a county since 1996.

As we enter the last "Kid of Character" nomination into our database another successful week of recognitions ends. Over the next month "Kids of Character" recipients will receive their Tulare County CHARACTER COUNTS! T-shirt, certificate, and pencil. When you see a young person in your community wearing a white t-shirt with the colorful six pillar words, take a minute to thank them for their act of good character. Our charge as adults is to mentor a new generation of youth driven by desire to become better people and embrace the responsibility of leadership.

The responsibility of leadership does not come easily; a person must be willing to lead not only when it is easy and popular, but when it is difficult and unpopular. Dr. Robert A. Jarvik who invented the first artificial heart said, "Leaders are visionaries with an underdeveloped sense of fear and no concept of the odds against them. They make the impossible happen."

We've no doubt the youth of Tulare County will make the impossible happen. Our job as adults is to make sure they do it with character.

View the list of the 2009 Kids of Character.

The Kids of Character list requires Adobe Acrobat Reader to view and print. You may download the freeware version by clicking on the Adobe icon to the right.

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