want to take this opportunity to welcome you to the start of the 2009-10 school year.
For those of you who are new to Dufferin-Peel, I hope you feel welcome and know that you are part of a board that is a recognized leader in Catholic education in this province. To our returning faculty and staff members, welcome back. I look forward to working with all of you over the coming year, as we meet the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.
Please know that we value our faculty and staff and firmly believe that it is our people who have consistently enabled us to provide our community with a tradition of excellence in Catholic education for more than four decades.
For us, a tradition of excellence is much more than mere words. It is a promise that each of us must strive to deliver in all we do. No matter what our role is within this organization, we each have a common mission; we are all ambassadors for Catholic education. Catholic education has endured and evolved through challenging times for more than 140 years throughout this province. Catholic education is driven today, as it has been for nearly a century and a half, by the faith, commitment and dedication of men and women, religious and lay people, parents and guardians ... people like you and I.
As we start a new school year, we continue our celebration of our 40th anniversary as a consolidated school board and we do indeed have much to celebrate. Our EQAO test scores continue to improve, we opened two new secondary schools today in Brampton, our Homework Policy has been translated into 12 languages to help parents in our diverse community. We continue to develop an inclusive curriculum that will engage students in different ways, allowing them to see various cultures and their influence in our society.
We continue to ensure that Catholic education is the cornerstone of our work and of the educational environment we strive to achieve and we continue to do all we can to make Dufferin-Peel the Catholic board of choice for our province’s best Catholic teachers and support staff.
There is much more I can say, but I simply wanted to welcome you to a new and exciting year ahead. You are here for a reason...you are among the best of your craft, your trade and your profession and we are blessed to have you as part of our family and our team.
Theodore Roosevelt once said, "Far and away the best prize that life offers is the chance to work hard at work worth doing." I believe that this is our blessing each and every day.
May God bless you in your work this year and thank you for your commitment to Catholic education.
John B. Kostoff
Director of Education