Cool Coffee 6 - Mr. Chris Rinehart - Plainville Elementary School

Cool Coffee w/ Kansas Principals

***Note: There is an audio *hum* beginning just after the first minute and ending right at 10 minutes (AC unit)***

Mr. Chris Rinehart, principal of Plainville Elementary School, shares about his path to the chair, spirit day dilemmas, and Plainville's successful district operated daycare system that is now 3 years in operation. He explains how the community rallied around the concept and how it has benefitted USD 270.

Pictures and a post of "The Nest" in Plainville

Contact today's guest: Mr. Rinehart

• 00:00 Introduction and Homecoming Spirit
• 02:47 Chris Rinehart's Journey to Administration
• 09:05 Navigating COVID as a New Principal
• 12:13 The Need for District-Operated Daycare
• 20:00 Building a Community Solution: The Daycare Initiative
• 30:07 Involving High School Students in Early Childhood Education
• 35:55 Celebrating the Community and Staff of Plainville

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FULL TRANSCRIPT (approximate)

Rick Sola (00:02.414)
Welcome to Cool Coffee. We are on here today with Mr. Chris Reinhart from Plainville Elementary School, USD 270, home of the Cardinals. Chris, welcome.

Chris Rinehart (00:15.306)
Yeah, thank you very much, but I'm thankful to be here and perceive the opportunity,

Rick Sola (00:20.59)
Well, I appreciate you reaching out and being willing to do this. I still feel like we're very new in this and I was just sharing with you. Certainly I am learning a lot. I am not a professional podcaster, but we're getting through this, but been a lot of fun. And I'm excited to talk about what you had brought up earlier in a communication we had as far as a district operated daycare, but we'll get to that here in just a little bit. We are sitting here recording

on September 17th. Chris, what's got you feeling really good right now at this point in the year?

Chris Rinehart (00:59.346)
well, I tell you what, so today or this week is homecoming week for Plainville. So we've got all the Spirit Week, of course, is kicked off.

enjoying that or even though our our elementary building of course doesn't get involved in all things homecoming but it's always fun just to give the elementary kids the opportunity to do the fun things throughout the week, dress up. It worked out today where today was also fall picture day and somebody was smart and thinking they made spirit spirit dress up day was dress up day so we we all looked good today we're in our ties we had several boys walking around in bow ties and looking good looking spiffy and and everything.

So tomorrow is, I had to look, tomorrow is PJ Day. So I'm excited, I'm looking forward to PJ Day.

Rick Sola (01:47.18)
great. We are in the middle of a spirit week ourselves and we started our week with PJ Day and that's always a joy. Do you join in on this? Are you gonna be wearing PJs tomorrow?

Chris Rinehart (01:59.97)
Well, I have at times, not every single time, there has been, I will admit, there's been a time where Mr. Reinhardt has showed up in his flannel BJs. Kids are looking at me like, wait, what's going on? But yeah, I guess I'll have to wake up in the morning and see if I'm feeling it or not.

Rick Sola (02:19.338)
Yeah, it's like you're out of your uniform when you're not wearing your normal stuff. It's like being seen at the grocery store. Like what's going on? It messes with their world. My very practical issue with pajama day is I wear a radio on my belt and I don't wear a belt for pajamas. And so it really throws me off if I'm wearing pajamas because it just throws everything, my feng shui or something. I don't know.

Chris Rinehart (02:21.867)
Yeah.

Chris Rinehart (02:41.315)
You

Chris Rinehart (02:47.247)
I think the last time I did participate in PJ Day, it did have to be a day where I had to have some conversation with some kiddos and I had to kind of put on that whole professional, straightforward look, but it was kind of hard because then of course they were listening to a guy who's also dressed as PJ, so I don't really know if that conversation has really taken that bite that it really need to, because they were hearing me, but what they were seeing was a whole different. So sometimes that's the disadvantage too.

Like when you know you gotta be principal some days and sometimes that attire can make a difference a little bit.

Rick Sola (03:23.374)
It sometimes never fails that the most awkward spirit -themed day is the day you have to have a really serious principal conversation and you've got a fake mustache and a cowboy hat on or something and makes it challenging.

Chris Rinehart (03:34.01)
It adds a little different aspect to it.

Rick Sola (03:41.486)
So Chris, I've been asking guests on here about their road to the chair. You are here in your, if I remember right, your second stop in administration or is this your first stop?

Chris Rinehart (03:55.312)
Nope, this is my first, Yep, I've been a plane, yep.

Rick Sola (03:57.12)
Okay, so kind of take us through what led you to where you're at today in Plainville.

Chris Rinehart (04:03.452)
Yeah, back in 2004, I graduated from Southwestern College, got my bachelor's in elementary education in 2004. Straight out of college, my first teaching job took me to Palco, Kansas, which is just a small community just straight west of Plainville. I met my wife, and she's a Plainville grad, so we've always lived here in Plainville.

But from 2004 to 2012, I was teaching fifth grade. I was in the elementary building and just making the commute, the short commute over to Palco each day. And Palco's just a small little one -day school with eight -man football, but which was perfect for me because that was exactly where I came from. I graduated high school from South Haven and we were an eight -man football community. And so for me to get my kind of my foot in the door and just get into education,

to me that was a wonderful start and like I I felt like Palco was was just the right fit for me in terms of size. It wasn't obviously was not anything extreme and big and everything so it was a great fit for me. So then in 2012 there was an elementary positioning opening here in Plainville and

I just kind of felt like perhaps maybe I needed to try to throw my name in the hat to see where it led me. really had no really had no reason or nothing against Pauco. It was a great school, great community. I loved the kids and the teachers and everybody who worked there was a great experience. I just kind of thought maybe I would throw my name in and just see maybe if the Plainville opportunity would where it would lead. And sure enough, I did. got the I got the option to come over to Plainville and teach. There was a sixth grade classroom that I was in.

So once again, just staying in my elementary comfort zone. I taught kind of for a couple years. was sixth grade reading on language arts and did some things with fourth and fifth grade math. And somewhere around about 2015, they asked me if I would jump across the street and do some junior high in freshman science. And I jumped at that opportunity.

Chris Rinehart (06:22.14)
In fact, when I think about that, for about 2015, I think it was about 2019 or so, I kind of felt like the district was paying me to play because I got to just pull out labs and enjoy being in a science classroom and doing all kinds of fun things like that. So I really did. I enjoyed that. And then it was about that 2019. At that time, Plainville, we had

superintendent who was acting as superintendent and grade school principal and then of course we had a junior on high school principal and at that time we were we were just experiencing there was there's quite a few

needs really throughout the district behavior needs and things like that that we were experiencing and it was just it was too much for our superintendent to be superintendent and principal and trying to navigate all the all those different challenges so they knew that I had I'd gone back to school and had my building

level leadership so they knew that I kind of had that in my back pocket and it wasn't necessarily that wasn't my opportunity to jump into a principal role at that time but they asked me if I'd come over to the elementary building and kind of served in that I guess he's made that assistant.

admin role I guess and so I did that for a year and then 2020 was my I kind of look at I guess 2019 was kind of like my trial run I guess it kind of gave me a year to see if I was if I was good for the job I must have done something right because I'm 2020 the the superintendent had talked to me about she just felt like yes this was the direction that we wanted to go they wanted to

Rick Sola (07:49.869)
Thanks.

Chris Rinehart (08:03.357)
She had conversations with the board and our board agreed that it was time to go back to one superintendent and then a building principal in the junior high and high school and a building principal in our elementary building. that opportunity opened up for me and I stepped in and so that's been this is my fifth year now.

as an elementary principal. just teachers that I've been teaching with here and been colleagues with for a number of years and now here I am serving in the admin role and so far I feel like it's been great. I've really enjoyed it. been a good experience.

Rick Sola (08:46.946)
You got a dress rehearsal year ahead of that. It's perfect.

Chris Rinehart (08:49.009)
Yeah, I kind of did get that. Your long dress rehearsal, I kind of did. Yeah.

Rick Sola (08:53.294)
Yeah, that's kind of nice. So five years in, it probably feels really quick. know, so I'm actually five years into my current position as a principal where I'm at. So you started 2020, that's COVID.

Chris Rinehart (09:05.937)
That's COVID, yeah. Yeah.

Rick Sola (09:07.602)
And I can empathize. I don't know how many who are listening started in a COVID year, but really is, well, not a great year maybe to transition into a building role. How did you go about building relationships?

Chris Rinehart (09:22.935)
Well, I tell you what, that year of everything that we are navigating and going through, I guess kind of looking back, mean, that's COVID kind of forced that very thing.

Chris Rinehart (09:41.595)
the constant communication that I needed to have with the teachers. I felt like I was constantly putting out little, you know, I was doing little video recordings and posting to our school social media, you know, just trying to navigate and communicate as best as I could, not only to teachers, but to the community and parents and things like that. I so it really, it just kind of forced me to build some of that, you know, and I just felt like.

Even though I, you looking back, I'm sure that there were times where I probably fell short, probably didn't, you know, and like everybody would probably say that.

They were parents that didn't agree with a lot of what we were saying or navigating, but we also felt like we were doing what was best for kids and doing what was best to keep us safe and keep school going. Thankfully, we were one of those districts where we came to school. And of course, we had kids in masks and we were doing all those things that social distance and doing all those things that we were trying to do. But we were also hearing about districts that were trying to do it all from home.

We we told ourselves that we understand that there's a balance there. We wanted kids in our doors, we wanted kids in our classrooms, but we also were very cautious of what was happening around us too. So it was a difficult time, no doubt. mean, I, you know, looking back, I just, yeah, I sure, I sure hope that we don't have to go through anything like that anytime soon again, for sure. Yeah.

Rick Sola (11:15.958)
No, no, I hope not. was certainly unique, but you mentioned developing skills. It did. It kind of forced us, I think all of us, just everybody else talking, we were forced to figure out communication in a different way or connecting in a different way. in the end, it probably sharpened our skill set in a direction that we may not have ever gone, just being forced to be a little more digital, a little more, I guess whatever the case needed.

What I remember thinking is, you we spend all this time, especially pre -COVID, it's, you know, we hear a lot about the hierarchy of needs, Maslow's hierarchy of needs, we think about kids. It was certainly a time too where it applied to our staff every bit as much. you know, think about what some of our staff needed. And you mentioned the, you know, the differing of opinions that was all over, whether it was a parent community or,

or staff or whatever, such a unique time. then of course, starting your principalship in that year just adds a whole different element to that ball game as well. probably feel like at this point, you get through anything, bring it on.

Chris Rinehart (12:25.984)
Right, right, absolutely. Yeah, yeah, I don't know. Well, and I actually, you know, I was kind of thinking back to that. I, I'm almost certain that the year, you know, COVID, that year we were coming back, my first...

first week of my first year, I showed up here at school and we had a main water break. It wasn't anything that was causing like major flooding or anything out in front of the school, but our water was shut down in our elementary building for a while. And so I'm like, okay, COVID, main water break. Like this is pretty, what a way to get things started, know? yeah, yeah.

Rick Sola (13:04.82)
Yeah.

Yeah, that's perfect.

That's just what you were hoping for at that time. you know, the absolute last thing on your mind that you want to.

Chris Rinehart (13:11.647)
It was kind of one of those things like, now wait a minute, why did I sign up for a camera?

Rick Sola (13:19.276)
Yeah. So you, the topic here, as far as you had mentioned that your district is three years into a district operated daycare and it's timely for us. have a small version of that, but we get an email about a month ahead of every of our like in -service days. And that email just came out in our district and I know it's a bit of a scramble. So I'm really interested, know, not just for the district I'm in, but you know, every school district it's

daycare and the lives of our staff, it's super relevant and it's a big thing. talk to us about Plainville and what they're doing with their district operating daycare.

Chris Rinehart (14:03.253)
Yeah, so just as you're saying, know, here in Plainville as well, were just, were seeing a lot of signs that there were some families that were struggling. In fact,

y 'all share like the comment got back to us. There was a young family here in town and the comment was, well, my husband and I just decided to stop having kids because we can't find anybody to help us out with watching them. And of course, as an elementary principal and somebody who's involved in school and where kids are there, know, main focus, I mean, that's a very scary, alarming comment, you know, like, of course, we don't want our young families to stop having kids just because there's no, you know, daycare.

So, at that time, so here, know, two or three years ago, you know, we did have some other ladies here town that were running daycares. But they started shutting down for all different reasons. One of them was just that she was one of the providers was just getting up in age and it was just time for her to retire and be done. So you're rightfully so. I she just it got to the point it was was hard. so she had she earned that opportunity to retire. So, you know, that wasn't any

anything that gets her there. we also just had, we had another daycare facility where the facilities just were starting to become more and more expensive to maintain. And so they realized that it just wasn't financially feasible for them to continue. So there was just kind of one thing after the other. started seeing our daycare starting to fall one after the other. you know, kind of at that same time,

Well, it was actually in around 2000 and I think it's like 2019. During that year, we were just simply a peer model preschool and Lisa Goering, our superintendent here, know, he really, she's the...

Chris Rinehart (16:03.587)
She's the force behind all of this really, to give credit where credit is due. She obviously was just starting to look at what we were experiencing within our school and our preschool, what the community was experiencing with younger kiddos and daycares and things like that. She really felt like it was time for us to open up our preschool, just have open enrollment. And so we did that. And so we went from a preschool classroom that just had, I think we had 15. And then that next year we went to open enrollment.

we went up to 24 and then the following year after that we are up in the 48 -49 range and we've been we've been consistently pushing that 50 number here pretty consistently every year every year since then and so

That definitely was huge. We've got graphs and things that we've showed our board and we've showed them what our preschool numbers have done. The line just rockets straight up. It's pretty amazing. we, again, going back to the daycare, our community was in need. Lisa Gehring, again, she right away started making phone calls. She started reaching out to people that she knew here in our community.

would be kind of a game changer, a force, some really good resources that we could go out to and start talking to about what we could do. I think one of the key things that she did right off from the very get -go was of the daycares that were currently still operating in our town, she met with those ladies and they kind of had a cheese and cracker night and they just, you know, she came right up and just said, we are not at all trying to be in competition. We're not trying to pull business away from those current providers.

We just simply want to be help, help be a solution in this.

Chris Rinehart (17:55.585)
challenge that we're facing. so, we write from the very get -go, I that message was, again, we don't wanna pull business or pull kids away from, we just wanna help. And so I think that was a very important piece to it as well. And the other thing was, we talked about right from the get -go is we did not want to...

We didn't want to jump into this and do it by passing a bond. We didn't want to throw more.

know, stress on our taxpayers, of course, we definitely didn't want to go start knocking door to door and asking for donations. Mrs. Garing, right from the very get -go, started tapping into and looking out to all the different grain possibilities that were out there. And so that's the other key thing about our daycare is that not only is it run by our school, but it's in working order right now. And because we've done it all, everything from build the facility,

supplies that we have for it, it's all been grant funded. And so it's amazing what we've been able to accomplish and what we have out there just by grants. And it hasn't come to any extra costs or anything for anybody of our taxpayers or anything. So, but yeah, we're, now we're, so we have a fully licensed group daycare here on our school campus.

and we are actually in the process of building another one out at our Rooks County Hospital.

Chris Rinehart (19:30.08)
And even though that is out there north of town and on their campus, it is still falling under our what we call call them the nest because we're the Cardinals, of course. So we have like nest one and we'll have nest two out at the hospital. And so that's it's their building, it's their facilities. But we as a school, we we're in a team effort with it with the hospital to say, you you guys build the facility, we will provide you will provide the providers will take care of the people.

and all that thing. So we'll have here after a while, we'll have another one out at the hospital. And then actually, we built another building out there by our daycare and it served as our preschool classroom last year. But because like I mentioned, because of our preschool numbers have grown so much and so drastically, we basically outgrew that facility within a year. So we had to, we brought our preschool back into our main elementary building, which was a whole challenge of itself.

We relocated basically all the elementary classrooms and we brought in our preschool kiddos now are in our main building. now we have a currently right now we have an empty building, but we are working on license getting the licensure for that. And so we will have two more daycares. So we potentially will have up to 36 because we can we will have a license up to 12 per daycare. We'll have a the goal is that we'll eventually have spots for 36 more kids.

here on campus plus an additional another 12 at the hospital. So just with the work we've done, we potentially could have 48 spots for daycare services for our family. So it's pretty amazing, yeah.

Rick Sola (21:12.392)
Yeah, what a great service. I love you mentioned just recognizing the need and I'm curious. you go to the established daycare providers already in the community. Was there any pushback or concern or was that a major challenge or?

Chris Rinehart (21:30.009)
No, it really wasn't because they, the other providers, the ones that were hanging on and trying to, you again, they were.

They were trying to do what they could for families. know, they were, you know, again, that's what we've learned in this world since we've jumped into daycare order. You know, we've learned that, you know, just because we're licensed for 12, we can still provide services for more than that because, you know, we might have a kiddo that only needs to be watched in the mornings. And when that kid maybe gets picked up by a parent and that opens up a spot where another kiddo can come in, you know, so there's some flexibility in there where, you know, you can actually provide services for more than just 12, but you just

have more than 12 you know in your facility at a time. So they were they were trying to do all that they were trying to you know move kids and shuffle kids and say I can take this one if you can take this one and they understood that it did you know with us coming in and joining them it was going to be nothing more than just help it was not at all they did not have any pushback they were in fact they were kind of coming with open arms saying yes take as many as you know you can have as many as you can and you're still not going to impact our

numbers so they were they were okay with that for sure.

Rick Sola (22:40.876)
love that. Anytime you can involve the community and in this case for such a important reason, you know, anytime the community is involved and at the table and part of the solution, it only strengthens our schools in my opinion, it makes us stronger. you know, the saying it takes a village to raise a kid and our schools are part of that village. And you said no bond money, no taxes, was grants.

Chris Rinehart (22:53.264)
Yeah.

Right.

Chris Rinehart (23:01.574)
Great.

Chris Rinehart (23:07.512)
Yeah.

Yes, in fact, have, I went to in our, we have our conference room, our boardroom here at the school and it's actually really neat. have these old chalkboards still from, it's an old classroom and it's in a part of the building that's our oldest age part of the building, but it still has some of the old black chalkboards in there. But what we've done is we've turned them into like some neat decorative signage, you know, that just has different things about the school, has our board members names on it and different things.

But one of the sections is a area where we're tracking our grant money. And over the time now, this isn't just this year, this is over a course of, I think, maybe about three or four years. And it's not just specifically with the daycare, it's with a number of other projects that we've got going on. But I would say a good chunk of it is tied into this daycare project. we're up, I made a note, we're at, make sure to look at my notes, yeah, we're at,

$2 .4 million in grants that we that we're utilizing here in our district. So just and again, I say that you know Lisa Gary our soup. mean she she has just done a phenomenal job with with doing that and you know, of course it there's all kinds of paperwork and there's all kinds of you know tracking that you know when you get involved in some of these grants there's always that that work that comes along, you know back behind there, but she understands the importance of you know, just how critical this

that this money can be when we're trying to put some things in place. we definitely learned the importance and the, gosh, just how much you can do when you got grant opportunities out there. So yeah.

Rick Sola (24:43.822)
That's incredible.

Rick Sola (24:53.518)
So you're year three in and I'm sure you've worked through some speed bumps along the way. there anything along the way that, I don't know, if someone was trying to replicate it in their district or just some considerations that you feel like, yeah, this was a hurdle that we struggled with or we now know to anticipate. Anything that you would share?

Chris Rinehart (25:13.831)
Yeah, yeah, you know, we especially in that first year and that was again it goes back to the message of.

what we're sharing with our families and we share with our board is that by no means did we want this to be something that, this is not a moneymaker. We're not trying to make a huge profit on daycare. We're just simply trying to provide a service. And that was something, again, we were very confident about. We communicated that, that our goal at Vichmont is just simply to break even. And if we end up in the green a little bit, great, but we also know there's gonna be

months, we're probably not. And then we experienced that. I right off the very get -go. Like I said, the grant money helped us get our building up. It helped us get our driveways put in. It helped us get our playgrounds and things like that in place. we came to that point, it's like, we need a refrigerator. We need pots and pans. We need Tupperware. We need a microwave. mean, we're furnishing a house, right? So there was just some of those expenses like that where we did.

We went to our board and we said, we realize we need X amount of dollars. And thankfully our board, they understood. mean, they were willing to help us with that. So that was one of the things, our first month or two, we did, we operated in the red.

We've also, each month, of course, we're tracking and we're watching and we have. We've had some months where like, we broke even, we met our goal or we're actually in the green. So there will be those times where...

Chris Rinehart (26:56.904)
it may seem scary like, are we losing money? But to me, it's not a money thing. We're providing a service for our families, our kids, and like I said, we're still in process of trying to get these other three daycares up and running. We've had a waiting list of, last I knew it was somewhere around 42 or 43 kids. So we know the need is there. And that's the thing is,

I think the other, to me the cool thing about it is last year I got a preschool teacher and last year she had a little one who was

out there in our daycare. She was coming to work being a preschool teacher. She just simply went right across the alley and took her kid to the daycare and walked right over and was a teacher. during the day she had her opportunities when her kids were off to specials something. She just simply could go over to the daycare and check in on her little one, feed her, do all things like that and get right back to the classroom. to me it's when you can provide those opportunities also for your families, your community,

And of course we've got a number of young teachers too that hopefully we can just say, hey, when that time comes and you've got that little one, we've got a spot for you here.

Rick Sola (28:19.832)
Yeah, that's a good point. That's almost a recruiting tool. mean, you know, I mean, that's a great service. It's it's serving a need in the community and it's but it's also it's a perk for being in the district and working in Plainfield. That's awesome. Is there any opportunity or maybe it's already happening with students, the old high school students being involved and helping out or being a part of it?

Chris Rinehart (28:23.806)
Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Rinehart (28:32.797)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Chris Rinehart (28:42.037)
you

Yes, yes. again, just, just, it just to me, I mean, wait, when we've got this, we got this going. I will admit when, when Mrs. Gary came to me and just said, her thing is I've got an idea. When, when she says like, I got an idea, it's like, okay, buckle up, here we go. We're about ready to step into it. So when she came to me and said, I have an idea, we're getting into the daycare business. I was kind of like, okay. And I will admit, and I've told her this, I said, you know, I'm not so sure I was sold right at the very get go.

I was kind of like, what are we doing? But, you know, sometimes I've learned it's just best just to not ask the questions, just, you know, run with it, right? But, you know, I can, with all the confidence I have, I can so much see the benefit because, you know, we've got kids I know that are going to that daycare and...

That's their education. They're socializing. They're getting books read to them. They're learning social skills with kids. so here I've got eight -month -old or nine -month -olds out there that are crawling around and doing all these things. But they're doing school. And I just think that there's such a huge benefit for those kids that they're going to go through our daycare system. They'll eventually make it into our preschool, our classrooms, kindergarten, and so forth. And even now, we're still talking about at some point, some day in the future,

future, we're going to have a high school graduate walk across our stage that was a daycare kiddo. And so I don't know who that person will be or when that year will come, but we're just knowing that we're excited for that day to come that eventually we will see that. that's exciting to think about that. But I guess I'm saying that. I don't know if I can remember what your question was. You have to tell me what was. Yeah.

Rick Sola (30:31.796)
just whether high school students had a, or even middle school maybe, high school students, maybe even those who are considering a career in child, either education or whatever, but if they had an opportunity to be a part of it.

Chris Rinehart (30:38.517)
Yep.

Chris Rinehart (30:44.329)
Yeah. Yeah, so there it is. That's the reason I know where I was going down that road. So not only that, no wonder if I'm seeing the, just I'm a firm believer in it. I'm loving what I'm seeing with these little kiddos. But we also have, across in our high school, we have the CTE class and it's the...

Rick Sola (30:51.288)
Hahaha.

Chris Rinehart (31:09.1)
We have an education class and so we have a teacher who, and I think in our last couple years we've been around up in the 20s, so it'll be about 20 kids in the high school that will.

They go through this course and they're just kind of getting those first basic fundamentals of what it means to be in a classroom, be a teacher. And so we have high school kids that will come across and again they're just right across the street. walk over. have that class is from one o 'clock to 1 .50 and we have some kiddos that, you know, we have a lot of those kiddos that are coming in the elementary building and stepping into our elementary classrooms and observing and getting and do some things with kids that we have.

that go right over there to our daycare and actually are, you know, we've gone through the process to get them through their orientation and do the things we need to do so that they are, you know, they're out there in our daycare and providing a service out there and getting their experience doing that. So again, that's just another element where again, here we have not only provided a service for our little ones, we are also bringing in our high school kids and giving them that opportunity to see what that's like. And actually our two,

have a daycare director and then we have two daycare providers and both of those daycare providers are former high school graduates and honestly they're just those kids that this is, I feel like this is probably what they'd be doing. They would be back living in Plainville, they would probably be having a...

tried to run daycares or maybe out of their homes. just, they're those kids that just, they love kids, they love little ones and now here they are. We've provided in their facility and you they've gone off and you know got some college credits and some you know I think maybe even like they got their associate's degree and some things but they've come back. They're now working for us at the school district. They're our main providers and they're phenomenal. They're just great and this is you know kind of looking back they were former students that I had back when I was still in the class.

Chris Rinehart (33:10.152)
and now here they are, they're daycare providers and doing a wonderful job.

Rick Sola (33:16.566)
And it's so neat to see when high school kids step into a classroom for the first time and they're kind of an authority figure and there, you see them kind of light up in a different way. They're being looked at as, as a teacher. And that's, that's, that's so cool. You know, I'm just thinking, I mean, there's so many areas that this project is, is tackling in a positive way. It's, was intended as a service for the community, but what a community builder all around. mean, it's.

Chris Rinehart (33:29.643)
Yeah, yep, yep.

Chris Rinehart (33:43.188)
Yeah. Yeah.

Rick Sola (33:44.947)
Everything you've described is it's enhancing the community. sounds like

Chris Rinehart (33:49.402)
I really do. You know, I don't know if I can necessarily...

pinpoint and say it's the exact reason, but at the same time, I just can't help but think that it's got to be more than coincidence that, know, since we've kind of got this up and running, there's clearly some other factors that I know that are happening around us, our enrollment as a whole in the district, you know, has been growing. And, you there's a number of school districts in our area that, you know, that's unfortunately, that's not what they are saying. know, they're unfortunately, they're experiencing declining enrollments.

and you know we I hate that you know because I just feel like we're we're all stronger when you know all the communities are strong when the schools are strong and everything you know so I hate that these other schools are are experiencing that but that you know we I think that's again across many areas of the state but you know for us thankfully we're just in a different boat we're we're seeing increasing enrollment

and we're seeing it a lot happening in our early childhood classrooms. Our preschool numbers are, like I said, we've got 51 preschool kiddos. We run an AM, we have two preschool teachers, and we run an AM class in the morning with three -year -olds, and an afternoon four -year -old class in the afternoon, five days a week.

And so those preschool numbers are climbing, our kindergarten classrooms have been increasing, and we're seeing more kids come up through the school system in those younger ages. so.

Chris Rinehart (35:24.847)
I just said, I just, I'm with you. I agree. think it's just been, it's been something that's definitely caught the attention. And you know, again, if anybody who's listening to this or if they have the opportunity to make their way, if they're driving through Plainville and they're heading north or south on 183, our facility is right there off the highway. And here just recently we had some new signage put up where we've got like, gosh, I think there may be somewhere about eight or nine little, they look like little baby infant cardinals.

and we've got the big red letters that say the NAS. I mean if you're heading down 183 and you're going right through Plainville you can't miss it. It definitely gets your attention and it just looks so sharp. It looks nice, yeah.

Rick Sola (35:55.918)
Ha

Rick Sola (36:06.69)
Yeah, no, that's great. That's really exciting. And you kind of alluded to it, but I would imagine this would generate some interest in possibly either some surrounding districts or districts even across the state. I'll have your contact information in our show notes if anyone wants to reach out. no, that's really great. I appreciate you sharing all that. Daycare or the need for daycare impacts every single one of our districts. Big, small, medium, rural, urban, wherever.

Chris Rinehart (36:32.249)
Yeah.

Rick Sola (36:36.434)
big piece and man a lot of celebration it sounds like out of there and it was fun to hear about that.

Chris Rinehart (36:43.245)
Yeah, yeah, I, when I sometimes I introduce myself, I don't say I'm a pre K6 or I'm a K6. I say I'm a Bertha, I'm a Bertha grade six principal now. I don't know who my, I have to go back and look and see who actually my true, youngest student is out there. She's a little way. Yeah.

Rick Sola (36:56.174)
That's awesome.

Rick Sola (37:01.43)
Yeah, that's so cool. I'm gonna, I've got just a little bit left here. I'm gonna ask him and kind of maybe put you on the spot, but I'm asking you a question that you answered before. Last year, you filled out a survey for us for KPA and you were featured. You actually gave the answer. said, the question was the movie's being made about your life. Who is playing you? You didn't say any particular person, but you just said anyone who has a stunt double who can ride a bike with their tires on fire.

The shirt is on fire. The seat is on fire. Everything is on fire. So my question to you, do still feel like everything is on fire?

Chris Rinehart (37:31.128)
You

Chris Rinehart (37:37.2)
I kind of forgot that that was my answer, but yeah, now that you're on me, that's right. And yes, I do kind of feel like everything's a little bit on fire, yeah, for sure. So yeah, I don't know. I don't know who would, whatever actor, I have no idea who would play me, but it would have to be a stunt actor or whatever you call him. Yeah.

Rick Sola (38:04.19)
Yeah, that's perfect. think we all can relate and we have been definitely had those moments and any given day for sure, but just in general, I can empathize. Hey, the last thing, you've done a lot of talking about Plainville, but I'd to give you just a chance to brag on your people, your staff, your school, your community in the closing here.

Chris Rinehart (38:10.369)
You

Chris Rinehart (38:17.262)
Yeah.

Chris Rinehart (38:30.648)
Yeah, gosh, could go on and on. The teachers we have here at Plainville across the board, truly are. I know principals say I got the best, but I'm just going to go out and say like I got the best. I really do. They are just, you know...

Chris Rinehart (38:53.123)
Not to necessarily go deep in all the details, but just here in Plainville, again, said we've got a lot of good things that we're bragging about and we'd love to share it with our daycare and our school and stuff. But here, unfortunately, in the town of Plainville, we've experienced some loss. We've had some deaths in our community and some deaths that have hit close to home here at school. And it was a different start for the school year. And we were just really trying to navigate

you know, just the hurt and just some strong emotions there. And, you know, I just, and so...

amazed and just so blessed at just the teachers that we have, how they they've come back and they knew the importance of what it what it meant to be strong for kids. They knew what it meant to be strong for each other. They picked up where some of that slack needed to be picked up. And, you know, really, I could not, I could not ask for just a better group. They've they've been so just understanding of just the what we've had to navigate and go through. But, you know, that's just the thing is we I just feel like we've got such as a strong

collaborative group where you know we we have those meetings and we talk about the things that we feel are doing well the things that we feel like we need to address and we get down to business and we go to work on those and

I really do enjoy getting up and coming to work every day and knowing that this is the group that I get to spend my day with. I've shared that with them a number of times and a number of different ways. Sometimes we go through hard things, but we know when we're going to work and we know we got the team that we got, it makes it easier. So they're just a great group. we've got some teachers here that...

Chris Rinehart (40:42.451)
Gosh, I mean, they've been here for 30 plus years under their belts and they've all been here at Plainville. So that's just kind of shown that this has been a good place to stay. We don't have a lot of turnover in our buildings each year. Thankfully, we may have to bring on one or two here and there, but that's mainly because we've been adding, not because we've been losing people or sending people out the door. We've been having to grow with the needs of our enrollment. those have been more our...

recent interviews not because we're we need to keep bringing people in for replacement so just a great great district I love it here so

Rick Sola (41:21.152)
Well, those are some great words for your people. I'm sorry to hear about the challenges in the start, but it's amazing when those really hard situations hit and they hit every school. Your people come together. I've not been to your school, but I would imagine, and I guess.

Chris Rinehart (41:33.574)
Yeah, yep.

Yep, yep.

Rick Sola (41:46.21)
congratulate you on your leadership through the challenges, through the good, the bad and everything. I'm sure they appreciate that. And just some really nice words about your people. And it was really great hearing about Plainville today and all that's going on out there. It sounds like a great place. And I appreciate you taking all this time after, I'm sure a busy day where I don't know how many fires you had going on yet, but you probably had had several and to take some time out here. I appreciate that.

Chris Rinehart (42:07.237)
You

Chris Rinehart (42:11.108)
Yep.

Chris Rinehart (42:14.547)
No, yeah, absolutely. I greatly appreciate. Thank you very much. It is wonderful to talk about, share about. Hopefully, maybe somebody else will hear this and it'll kind of spark them to maybe start thinking about for them and their communities. know, absolutely, I'm more than happy to spend time to talk to whoever maybe wants to reach out to me or whatever and talk about that. It's great. But thank you, Rick, for everything you're doing too with this cool coffee. It really has been fun to listen in on the other principals that have joined in and done it. So, yeah, I really think it's great.

Rick Sola (42:43.512)
Yeah, well, it's been good and I think I'm gonna see you here Friday for our KPA meeting, but otherwise, Chris, we'll sign off and again, I appreciate you and we'll see you here real soon.

Chris Rinehart (42:50.344)
Yep, yep.

Chris Rinehart (42:57.47)
Thank you very much, Rick, I appreciate it.