For the 2023-2024 school year, principal Jeff Linden has chosen a new quote of the year to inspire students.
“Be one percent better every day is something I used when I used to coach football and wrestling to talk about every day with the team and figure out what we could do differently and how over time that could make you better,” Linden said. “I figured it would be kind of cool to bring that back with me now for students and teachers to do the same type of thing.”
His familiarity with this quote has given him a different perspective on the saying, giving it a deeper meaning.
“There has been a guy (James Clear) who has done a ton of research on the quote and written books and everything proving that it can benefit you and you will get better if you give that one percent every day,” Linden said. “When people ask me where I got it from it’s like, I’ve done this forever and this saying isn’t new to me and when I got told about this guy, I was like wow we had the same idea”.
James Clear is who originally wrote the “Be one percent better” quote in his book Atomic Habits.
“If you find something as small as it is, to get better at, you can make big changes over your life and the course of time,” Linden said. “I believe that myself and all the staff and students can get better at something every day, there’s so many different ways as humans to get better at something and I want everyone here to know they can”.
Linden is looking to improve many different things throughout the school including test scores and attendance, as the school gets Its rating from these things.
“I’m hoping to make this school a place where the staff and students especially want to be and show up to, we have to get better at the things we do like attendance,” Linden said. “We’re at a pretty okay spot already with the data I’ve looked at, but I want everyone to understand we can all make a difference and we all have an impact”.
Linden chose this quote for the school year with the message of improvement throughout the school, hoping it could inspire staff and students. Being hopeful of improvement can help motivate many.
“The quote means to me like, what am I going to wake up and do better today, what’s one little thing I could do better or even maybe improve,” Linden said. “I wake up and I’m like, how can I support my students and staff today, and make sure my school is a safe environment? You just have to try to be one percent better every day.”
