At Bowmar Elementary School, students are learning more than what’s being taught in the textbooks.

Since Bowmar Elementary has become a Leader in Me school, students have learned skills they need to be successful based on Steven Covey’s book, “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.”

Bowmar Elementary Principal Tammy Burris said Leadership Day, which was held April 9, was a way to show community leaders what the Leader in Me program has done for the school.

“This community has invested in us,” she said. “We want to show them we’ve been good stewards of their money, and we want to showcase what we’ve been able to do with their investment.”

After two years of implementing the seven habits, Bowmar Elementary achieved Lighthouse School status in May 2014.

“We’re a Lighthouse School,” she said. “We’re the first Lighthouse School in the state of Mississippi, and part of that means that you’re going to be a lighthouse for other schools, for the community and for the state.”

Tondia Ferracci, a STEM lab teacher, said Bowmar is full of leaders whether they speak or contribute in other ways such as service and behind-the-scenes work.

“(Leadership Day) gives the students the opportunity to showcase what they do every day,” she said. “They’ve taken ownership in their school, and they’re proud to show that off.”

Ferracci said the point of Leadership Day isn’t to sell the seven habits, it’s to show how the seven habits are implemented in the students’ lives.

Taylor Chewning, a sixth grader, said the seven habits were introduced at Bowmar when she was in the fourth grade.

“In fifth grade we got to where we knew them because we had trees posted in our room, so you could visualize them,” she said. “We read the book ‘The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Teens.’ Now they just come naturally.”

The book “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Teens” was written by Sean Covey, Stephen Covey’s son.

Chewning said she uses all of the habits in daily activities ranging from doing homework to getting along with her peers.

“The habit I probably use the most in school is Be Proactive,” she said. “You have to be in charge of you.”

Chewning said it’s important for community leaders to come in and see what the students are doing with Leader in Me.

“It’s a great way for the community to get involved in Leader in Me and maybe develop it in their own lives,” she said.

T.J. Johnson, a fifth grader, served as an official leader for Leadership Day.

“I was the one who took them places,” he said. “See, in our school we have a whole lot of places and we have things the students do. I took them places, and the students would tell them why we have this and why we have that.”

Johnson said he likes Leadership Day because it gives the students an opportunity to show leaders around the state what the students do at school every day.

“We’re like a leader to them, and they’ve got to follow in our footsteps,” he said.

Fifth-grader Francis Thames told community members about the Bazaar, a fifth and sixth grade GATES service-learning project.

“We make products to sell, and we raise money for different causes,” she said. “Last year we raised money for Afton Wallace who has stage-4 cancer. She was a former Bowmar Bear, and her brother and sister still go here.”

Thames said the project taught the students what entrepreneurship means.

“(The community members) thought we were very helpful and we used all of the seven habits, and they were very proud of what we did,” she said.

Kindergartener Heer Patel said she showed the community members her leadership binder, which includes her mission statement, goals, roles and contributions.

“We help every month with the same job,” she said of her role. “Right now I’m recess helper. We bring hurt people to the office.”

Patel said she achieved her goal of reaching 100 accelerated reader points, and her contributions included bringing in recycling goods and pennies for the penny harvest.

MaryKatherine Archer, a fifth grader, helped present a preview of Bowmar’s upcoming musical “Fame” in which she will play the role of Miss Sherman, the English teacher .

“We did one of the first scenes where we introduce everybody,” she said.

Bowmar students will be presenting “Fame” May 7 and 9.

“We did that because we’ve never done a musical,” she said. “We’ve done Friday assemblies, but we’ve never done something to this extent.”