Our Story and Our Focus

History of Jessie Wowk

Jessie Wowk (1894-1993) and her family emigrated from the Ukraine with her parents in 1906. They purchased a farm on Steveston Highway. Jessie was also known as a humanitarian, and during the Depression she gave generously to those standing in the bread lines.  She is only the second woman in Richmond after Kate McNeely to have had a school named after her: Jessie Wowk Elementary School, which opened in 1992.

Who are we?

Welcome to Jessie Wowk.  We are a vibrant community of learners, staff and families striving to inspire curiosity, celebrate learning and promote social responsibility. Together we honour caring for self, others, and this place.  It is within this climate of respect and understanding that our students are motivated to explore, follow their passions, and express their learning in a variety of ways. Our new Library Learning Commons and Outdoor Learning Area both provide redesigned spaces for students to develop ideas and work collaboratively.  As well, these spaces provide students with opportunities to explore the world around them by engaging in a variety of materials and technology and deepens their understanding of what lies beyond the doors of Jessie Wowk.    

We are the Wowk Timberwolves and beginning in September 2017, our motto is Wowk CARES.

• Caring
• Accountable
• Respectful
• Encouraging
• Safe

This year we are continuing to look at how to support our students in their social / emotional learning and think about all that we can do as a staff to maintain a safe and caring learning community and provide our students with rich learning experiences. We know that all of us, our staff, students and families, have gone through a lot for the past couple of years and the pandemic has brought us to really think about how we can be resilient and be there for one another despite the challenges. For this reason, this year we continued to put our previous focus, “How does noticing, naming and nurturing the core competencies enhance our students’ understanding of their own learning?” on hold for the time being.  

For this school year of 2021 - 2022, we continued on with our School Focus of:

Where do you find happiness in yourself and in your learning at school?

This question relates mainly to the Personal and Social Competency especially in the area of Personal Awareness and Responsibility and the Well-Being Facet. 

Personal and Social Competency

Personal and social competency is the set of abilities that relate to students’ identity in the world, both as individuals and as members of their community and society. Personal and social competency encompasses the abilities students need to thrive as individuals, to understand and care about themselves and others, and to find and achieve their purposes in the world.

Personal Awareness & Responsibility

Personal Awareness and Responsibility involves understanding the connections between personal and social behaviour and well-being; it encourages people to make constructive and ethical decisions and act on them.

Well Being

Students who are personally aware and responsible recognize the factors that affect their holistic wellness and take increasing responsibility for caring for themselves. They recognize their personal responsibility for their happiness and have strategies that help them find peace in challenging situations.

Thoughts on Where to Next

While we did continue with our focus on Finding Happiness in Our Learning at School, we have begun to have more dialogue around where we may want to go next year with our focus. We have developed and administered more scanning questions in response to some of our staff's wonders and observations of what we are seeing with our learners, and we have begun to look at the data. In the fall of 2022, we will be looking in greater detail at what our students are telling us and embarking on some learning and developing an action plan in response. Our school focus will reflect where we are looking to go next to help all of our learners meet their true potential in all areas of their learning.