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While looking toward the new year ahead marked with fresh administrators and new lesson plans, educators and staff from across all of Pelham City Schools’ four campuses gathered at Pelham High School for the district’s annual back to school institute meeting on Monday, Aug. 5. (For the Reporter/Nicole Knight, Pelham City Schools)

By DONALD MOTTERN | Staff Writer 

PELHAM – While looking toward the new year ahead marked with fresh administrators and new lesson plans, educators and staff from across all of Pelham City Schools’ four campuses gathered at Pelham High School for the district’s annual back to school institute meeting on Monday, Aug. 5.

After a spirited welcome carried out by Pelham High School cheerleaders and the Pelham High School Band, Superintendent Chuck Ledbetter took the stage while the theme from “Superman” played over the Pelham High School Auditorium’s freshly renovated sound systems.

“There is nothing to bring up the energy in the room like a few hundred people blasting their instruments and making it sound great and exciting,” Ledbetter said. “We are excited for another school year, excited for the guests we have today, as well as all of our VIPs. We’re glad you’re back, we’re glad you’re here, some of you are new and some of you have been with us for ten years and (are) starting your 11th year now. It is going to be a great year.”

In starting the morning’s event, Ledbetter invited a number of crucial members of the PCS system up to the stage for recognitions, which included PCS Board President Angie Hester along with board members Shannon White, Bob O’Neil and Jeff Adams who were in attendance for the event.

“We have a really phenomenal board of education that cares about this school system and making it great, but also cares about making sure that they work together in doing that,” Ledbetter said. “They work together in a really unique way for a school board and we are thankful to them for what they do for us and for the leadership that they provide.”

Pelham City Council President Maurice Mercer, Councilmember Chad Leverett, Councilmember Rick Wash, State Rep. Kenneth Paschal and State Rep. Arnold Mooney were also among the short list of officials who attended the event and received direct thanks and recognition. Representatives from America’s First Federal Credit Union and the Bailey Education Group, who supplied the morning’s breakfast were also recognized among others in the community.

Pelham Mayor Gary Waters and Pelham City Manager Gretchen DiFante were also in attendance and spoke for a time on the progress that the city has witnessed over the course of the ten years that Pelham City Schools has been in place.

It was their comments that first established the theme of the day’s event, which was looking back upon the foundation that Pelham City Schools has built over its first decade of operation and how that base will support the continued growth of the system.

“My better half at the city of Pelham is Ms. Gretchen DiFante,” Waters said. “She has not been here (for all of the last ten years), but, that’s good. Given my age and how long I have lived in Pelham, I tend to look back more than I look forward, but she is always looking forward.”

DiFante, congratulating the gathered educators, relayed a list of the accomplishments seen in the city of Pelham over the past 10 years, which includes her service to the city that stood at seven years and 14 days.

That list included, the city’s construction of a library, recreation center, sand volleyball courts, pavilions, basketball courts, splashpad, new playground, the Greenway Trail project and a new fire station. She also expounded upon the city’s $12 million investment in the Pelham Civic Complex and Ice Arena and that facility’s hosting of the Birmingham Bulls which was secured in the last decade. Million-dollar investments toward the expansions and renovations to Ballantrae golf course, the Pelham Racquet Club, Pelham City Hall and Fire Stations No. 2 and 4.

Among the other highlights delivered by DiFante included the fact that Pelham had tripled the sports offered by the city, contributed $7.7 million dollars in paving restorations, incorporated 48 new events hosted by the Parks and Recreation department and having replaced nearly half of the city’s water infrastructure.

Wearing T-shirts representing each of their schools, the staffs of Pelham Oaks Elementary, Pelham Ridge Elementary, Pelham Park Middle and Pelham High School each shot off the event with a competition to cheer the loudest as each of their school’s respective administrators took the stage to uproarious applause and music fitted to each school’s appearance.

The school board then recognized two teachers in particular, Tim Cobb and DeShaun Wesley for having reached their 25th year of service within Pelham’s schools, a length of service that extends far beyond the age of the school system itself.

Ledbetter next spoke on the guiding mission of PCS and led a charge toward reaffirming those principles as the cornerstone of the system while citing them as the recipe to Pelham’s success.

“We’re not changing our mission, we’re not changing what we’re doing,” Ledbetter said. “We are going to continue to improve going down that road and continue to do it better and better as we go forward. The mission of PCS is to collaborate with parents and the community to inspire and empower students to achieve personal success. We recognize that we have a shared responsibility to educate the citizens of our community and to prepare them for the future and work together with our families, with our city and with all of those who care about the future of this place to make it what we want it to be.”

Reflecting on the system’s past and the advice delivered to him by former PCS Superintendent Scott Coefield, Ledbetter also honed in on the call that all educators in Pelham make sure that every child receives the help and attention that they need.

“The Pelham Way is something that is real, but it is also something we don’t try to put boundaries on,” Ledbetter said. “The Pelham family is a real thing and it is special. Those are the things we are going to continue to grow and build on going forward. We are big enough to offer everything a kid could need and we’re small enough to still have a small town—small family—atmosphere where kids don’t get lost. There are not a lot of school systems that fall into that category.”

Ledbetter then passed the stage to Coefield, who served as the district’s superintendent for its first eight years.

“I just want everyone here to know what kind of difference you make,” Coefield said. “You should never forget that. If you ever come close, let me remind you that every night, in every home—when families gather around the table or TV—they are not talking about the superintendent, the mayor, their banker or their insurance salesman. They’re talking about you and the work that you do. What other job can you have where every night you are the topic of conversation? There comes a great level of responsibility with that.”

Coefield then welcomed another face from the days of PCS’ origins by introducing Rick Rhoades, former Pelham High School football coach and the first PCS board president, to the stage as the keynote speaker.

“Coach Rhoades is the reason that I came to Pelham,” Coefield said. “I remember navigating the beginning of this school system, which in our first year or two was really kind of chaotic. There were a lot of things that we had to get ironed out and coach Rhoades’ leadership, his calmness, his ability to talk through things—I’ll never forget his help through those first years. I really can’t think of anyone for Pelham that was more the right person at the right time. He is always that person who has gone above and beyond and that is why he has been so successful in his life, career and with his family. That’s the reason he was so successful for Pelham.”

Rhoades, who still holds the record for being the most successful football coach in Pelham’s history, now lives in Colorado and spoke in length on the origins of the Pelham city school system and the work that went in to the foundation of the district.

“It’s really great to be here,” Rhoades said. “Pelham has been and always will be the place that really is our home. It is so very special to us for all of the reasons we have seen today. It is really great to be back with you.”

Rhoades began by describing the first days of organizing the school system, which included stories related to inspecting the school buildings, procuring land deals, constructing new facilities, selling old ones and modernizing old systems to the best of their abilities. He also spoke on the initial issues of raising awareness for school attendance in the district and raising public approval for PCS in general.

“We started by having a series of meetings with people throughout the community,” Rhoades said. “We found that although there was support for a city school system, there were also concerns about whether it could be done. Financially there were questions and there were also questions about the geography.”

Despite those challenges, Rhoades also spoke on his firm belief that the decisions made to pursue the school system were made at the right time and for the right reasons.

“It was a very exciting time,” Rhoades said. “I think for the city, there was actually no way for our schools or the city development to move forward and to keep up with this very competitive area without the formation of the city school system. It just could not have happened in my opinion. I think Pelham, quite frankly, would have died a slow death without this having happened.”

Rhoades further detailed the importance and significance of the construction of Pelham’s culture and the foundation of the Pelham Way in the first months and years of its existence.

“With one notable exception, (the original school board) all had one thing in common—none of us had ever done any of this before,” Rhoades said. “To start a new school board for a new school system was a very daunting task but we got together and decided that although we were inexperienced, that we weren’t strangers to hard work.”

Over the course of his presentation, Rhoades covered how the system’s stability was achieved through this hard work and the implementation of Pelham’s one-cent sales tax. He further described the timeline of the system’s rapid growth and how PCS had changed from having schools with failing interiors and a head office located in the basement of city hall to a system that now features two extensively renovated schools along with its own administrative building and two brand new school campus facilities.

“We threw everything we had into this endeavor and (made sure) that everything that we did was based on the best interests of our children, the teachers and the community that we serve,” Rhoades said. “We were going to be above politics, we weren’t going to be interested in finger pointing or name calling, we were going to get the job done and do what school systems were supposed to do.”

During his comments, Rhoades also delivered a summation on the core of his teaching philosophy and what he continues to believe makes Pelham great.

“The most important job that there is in the world is developing our young people and giving them a chance to have a tremendous life,” Rhoades said. For all of us who came to Pelham, we came for the job, but we stayed for the people. Pelham is about people and that is the core of what we call the Pelham Way.”

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