Kiwanis ‘lady’ BUGS students to improve

Not all students can make straight A’s. But Knoxville, Tennessee’s “BUG Lady” knows all students can try to do their best.

When grades improve, Kiwanians recognize achievement.

Unlike honor rolls that recognize only top academic performers, Kiwanis International’s Bring Up Grades (BUG) program recognizes children in grades 3-5 who bring up one or more grades during the six-week grading period, without letting any of their other grades slip.

In Knoxville, Tennessee, Rocky Hill School students have been bringing up grades for the past two years, urged to higher achievement by the “BUG Lady,” aka Knoxville Kiwanian Leslie Grossman Frederick.

Leslie reads to her son’s class each week and distributes BUG awards with other Kiwanians and the school principal. The BUG program, she says, encourages students to grow into service-minded young adults.

The principal enjoys distributing the awards, because students see him as a supporter rather than as a disciplinarian. Even teachers who were reluctant to implement BUG have jumped on the bandwagon.

“One of the teachers who didn’t want the added ‘work’ frantically asked me if I had blank award certificates with me,” Leslie remembers. “She said she didn’t think the children had noticed BUG, but one of her worst-attitude students came up to her, excited that he was going to get a BUG award.

“The next day I brought the materials to her. She wrote up the award certificates and said that particular boy was the proudest of her four award-winning students. His attitude improved through the end of school. She is now one of the biggest supporters of BUG.”