KTB Innovative Solutions

Happy 250th Birthday, America. 🇺🇸 Our children are watching.

Fifty years from now, at America’s Tricentennial, they will tell the story of who we chose to be. Let’s give them something to be proud of.

“The credit belongs to the man (or woman) who is actually in the arena.” — Theodore Roosevelt

“If there is no struggle, there is no progress.” — Frederick Douglass

“The only title higher than president is citizen.” — Jimmy Carter

“The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.” — Eleanor Roosevelt

Happy Independence Day. Here’s to leaving the next generation an America something really proud to celebrate from the next 50 years 🎇

Grateful to Suzy Koontz, CEO of Math & Movement, and Dr. Kirby Schoephoerster, Ed.D., Senior Program Director of the National Math Foundation, for trusting me to serve as the outside program evaluator for Math & Movement’s implementation using the data across five states and seven school districts.

I concluded the program evaluation by sharing the evaluation findings. It was incredibly rewarding to apply what I learned through the University of Rochester to evaluate the effectiveness of instruction for children.

Thank you both for your openness, collaboration, and commitment to student learning!

Thank you Dr. Nahoko Kawakyu O'Connor for teaching me this process. As an educational leader this is a game changer!

University of Rochester
University Of Rochester - Warner School Of Education
Math & Movement

*note-completed this work as a doctoral student not a paid consultant.

Mission Before Self: Dear School Leaders…BE A DANDELION As school leaders, protect your marigolds AND BE A DANDELION.

Frederick Douglass Family Initiatives extends our heartfelt congratulations to Dr. Katie Trepanier on earning her Ed.D. from the University of Rochester!

We are especially grateful for Dr. Trepanier’s leadership and dedication to the Anna Murray Douglass Fellow Program, including the upcoming field trip and student showcase taking place in Rochester on May 21. Through her work, students and educators are engaging with the life, legacy, and enduring impact of Anna Murray Douglass and the Douglass family story.

Dr. Trepanier’s commitment to education, public history, and community engagement reflects the very spirit of this important work, and we are proud to celebrate this incredible achievement with her.

Congratulations, Dr. Trepanier. Well earned and well deserved!

Holding School, Holding Home Rochester Women and the Ongoing Work of Liberation - Frederick Douglass Family Initiatives Text by George Cassidy Payne Photography by Rob Daniels Five local educational leaders and mothers show how care, strategy, and family life intersect to shape Rochester-area schools. “It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.” — Frederick Douglass At Flower City School ....

There are moments in education when you can feel something important taking root. This project based learning showcase was one of those moments.

Watching the Anna Murray Douglass Fellowship go from vision to fruition alongside exceptional educators, students, families, and community leaders was incredibly powerful. The student projects were nothing short of extraordinary. Whether it was a 5th grader from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. School No. 9, 8th grader from Sodus or a student enrolled in Advanced Placement courses at LeRoy Senior High School, every student entered the room as an expert, sharing their learning, voice, and perspective with pride. The beauty of the day was watching students learn from one another about our Rochester history along with our sheroes and heros across schools, backgrounds, and experiences.

A heartfelt thank you to the incredible teacher leaders who brought the magic: Nicolle Bradley, Angie Polino-Ferris, and Danielle Lia. Your commitment to students and willingness to build something meaningful together made all the difference.

Special gratitude to Norm Strothers, Ruth Anderson, and AME Zion Church for hosting us, teaching us, and creating such a welcoming and memorable experience.

Thank you to Kenneth B. Morris Jr., Dr. Rebekka Boysen-Taylor, Frederick Douglass Family Initiatives, and Rochester Area Community Foundation for bringing us together this past October to begin this important work.

This is what education can look like when history, community, student voice, and passionate educators come together with purpose. The future feels hopeful!

🇮🇹🎓☘️
I think about them often.
The ones who came before me.
The ones whose lives were harder than mine, whose dreams were smaller only because the world made them so.

My grandmother Carolina “Caroline” came from Italy with only a fourth grade education, married by sixteen, her hands roughened by work, gardening, sacrifice, survival.

She could not always read the words on the page being that English was her second language but she could read people, weather, grief, hunger, strength, faith.

She was the fiercest person I have ever known.
Nothing frightened her.

And my father, Carl, Irish-American boy from Dewey Ave, who carried quiet struggles he rarely named aloud.

He never graduated from high school, yet he sent me to the very school he once walked through himself, across town and out of my element, hoping I would finish what he could not.

He used to tell me, “You can be anything you want to be and more because you can read and write.”

This doctorate degree may have my name on it, but it belongs to all of us.

To the immigrant girl with a fourth grade education.

To the boy who left school too soon.

To every sacrifice they swallowed quietly so the next generation could stand taller.

I wonder what they would think now.

And then I look at my daughter, Caroline who is named for them both carrying the strength of Italy and the stubborn hope of Rochester inside her tiny hands.

She is the continuation of all of it. Proof that love travels forward. Proof that struggle can become opportunity.

This journey was never only about earning a title.

It was about honoring the people who came before me
AND widening the doorway for the people and kids I serve in schools who come after me.

Strength,
Perseverance
and Impact that spreads.

Dear Fellow School Leaders,



https://kathleenbtrepanier.substack.com/p/mission-before-self-dear-school-leadersbe?r=3cd7t1&utm_medium=ios&fbclid=IwZnRzaARSUJVleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAo2NjI4NTY4Mzc5AAEeSV8iYF8DBICfzP_5KhAGmNsotQgQeiDrwiHBa8ycnH5Y-PwD7hOgkRquX_E_aem_8bIlRTsYDp_TQjYum-D_IA&utm_id=97758_v0_s00_e223_tv0&triedRedirect=true

University of Rochester
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools

Mission Before Self: Dear School Leaders…BE A DANDELION As school leaders, protect your marigolds AND BE A DANDELION.