Allan's Announcements

By Allan 　http://blogs.4j.lane.edu/chinn/?p=3798

Hi Everyone,

I hope you all had an enjoyable three day weekend. If you read this in time and want to flex your social justice muscle, there’s a number of Martin Luther King Jr. Day events happening Monday. See the flyer for details.

Ten items of note this week:

• PRIDE Awards Wednesday, Jan. 28th – Not this week, but next week will be the January PRIDE Awards. Teachers should pick a letter (Perseverance, Respect, Integrity, Discipline, Excellence) to honor students and fill out the PRIDE certificates located in the office. Invitations to families are also in the office. If you think families are interested, there’s a coupon for a free adult meal on the January menu. Students will receive their certificate and wrist band during their lunchtime. There is no minimum or maximum number of PRIDE recipients per class, but the general rule of thumb is 2-3. And remember, as you turn in your PRIDE nominations, be sure that you let Lori know who and why each student is being recognized so she can put their name up on the board.

• Howard Student Care Team Meetings Dates – Jennifer, DHS and I have coordinated dates for monthly Student Care Team meetings, which will be on the last Tuesday of each month in the Staff Room beginning this month:

Tuesday, January 27, 2:30-3:30
Tuesday, February 24, 2:30-3:30
Tuesday, March 31, 2:30-3:30
Tuesday, April 28, 2:30-3:30
Wednesday, May 27, 2:30-3:30

To refer a student to the team, complete the Student Care Team Referral Form (PDF or DOC) and also be sure to fill out and get a parent signature on the Authorization for Use & Disclosure of Information (PDF or DOC) which will allow us to directly share information with DHS and/or other outside agencies to help the referred students and families. Also, here is the overview that I shared in last week’s announcements. Please let me know if you have any question about the process, form or any potential students or families you’d like to refer to the team.

• PTO Meeting, Tuesday at 6:00 – The January PTO meeting will be this Tuesday, 6:00-7:00 PM in the library if any staff are able to attend. We’ve had some good turnouts at previous meetings, which has been a nice show of support for the PTO’s work. Hope to see you there!

• Construction Updates – I haven’t gotten the minutes from last week’s meeting yet, but this week’s meeting was mostly structural and engineering issues (that and dickering about who’s paying for various expenses not in the original bid documents), but the one highlight of interest to staff is that Todd Construction is bringing down a class set of vests and hard hats from their headquarters in Tualatin to class visits to the construction site. Besides wearing hard hats and vest, the only other requirements is that staff and students must have closed toed shoes (so PE days may work well for visits). If you’d like to visit the site, let me know at least a day in advance so I clear it with the David, the site superintendent, and he can make sure they are not doing anything particularly hazardous. It’s mostly just muddy holes and trenches for piping and plumbing right now, but teachers are welcome to start bringing classes.

• Safety Inspection Reschedule – One of the facilities staff conducting the safety inspection ended getting sick last Thursday, so the safety inspection has been rescheduled for this week. They didn’t give us a specific date or time yet, but please check your areas for the most common safety violations:

• Unlabeled spray bottles.
• 3 foot pathway to all of your exit doors.
• Cord covers for all power cords in walk ways.
• No power strips plugged into another power strip.

• State Report Cards – The district emailed state report cards to families last week and Howard held steady at Level 3. Our overall Academic Achievement is at a Level 4, but we got dinged on our subgroup growth, particularly in math for SPED students and to a lesser degree students in poverty and Latino students. However, our reading growth score were pretty strong with an overall score at a Level 4. Attached are the Report Card and the Report Card Detail if you want to dive into the details, but I’ll end this item with the following cartoon on standardized testing:

• NCLB draft offers 2 options for testing – I don’t typically share news around Federal Education Policy development, but I thought this one may be of interest to staff who feel there is too much testing. There is a draft bill by the Senate chairman of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, proposing changes to the No Child Left Behind law offering two options for testing. One option would retain the annual testing requirement. The other would allow states to choose annual testing or testing every three years. Here’s a short NYTimes article on the current proposals.

• New Director of Technology – Steve Menachemson is the new Director of Technology and will begin on Feb. 2nd. Steve has been with Symantec since 2008, and for the last three years has worked as a Senior Manager with Global Support Delivery. Before working with Symantec Steve worked eight years as the Vice President for TechNet Group (consulting services) in Santa Monica, California. Steve also worked two years as a project manager and senior consultant for an firm that provided hardware and software sales and technical support as well as project management services to the Santa Monica community (1998-2000). Steve will also be bringing global perspective to 4J. He began his career in Cape Town, South Africa as a project manager and senior support engineer before being advanced to a regional manager for the same company in Windhoek, Namibia.

• Asteroid to pass close to Earth this month – This is kind of geeky science news, but it’s something I bet kids would be interested in. A space rock measuring roughly a third of a mile in size will pass within 745,000 miles of Earth this month, its closet passage for “at least the next 200 years,” a NASA scientist says. The asteroid, known as 2004 BL86, will pass Earth on Jan. 26 and will be the largest object of its kind to get that close to home until 2027, astronomers say.

• Schedule of Events for the Week – See the Google Calendar for future events, but here are the events of note for the next two weeks:

January 19 (M)
No School – Martin Luther King Jr. Day

January 20 (T)
Referral Free Window Begins
8:30-12:30, LCC Dental Clinic 5 students w/Robin W.
11:15, Allan Meeting with Pacific University (Office)
2:30-3:30, IPBS Meeting (Room 7)
6:00-7:00, PTO Meeting (Library)

January 21 (W)
9:00-11:00, Allan to Construction Progress Meeting (Construction Trailer)

January 22 (H)
2:30-3:30, TLT Meeting (Room 7)

January 23 (F)
10:55-12:20, Birthday Lunches with the Principal (Room 11)
6:00, Staff Winter Party! (Mellissa’s House)

January 24 (S)
9:00-12:00, Elementary School Showcase (Ed Center)

January 26 (M)
Reading Progress Monitoring 7
School Visitation Week #1
10:00-11:00, School Choice Tour
2:30-3:30, Allan to Elementary Principals’ Meeting (Ed Center)
2:30-3:30, Site Council Meeting (Staff Room) CANCELLED

January 27 (T)
2:30-3:30, Student Care Team Meeting (Staff Room)

January 28 (W)
9:00-11:00, Allan to Construction Progress Meeting (Construction Trailer)
10:55-12:30, PRIDE Awards at Lunch (Cafeteria)
12:00-1:05, Referral Free Parties

January 29 (H)
Last Day of Referral Free Window
8:00-3:30, Allison and Allan to Learning About Learning Meeting (Chavez)
12:00-3:30, Robin and Allan to Smarter Balanced Test Administration Training (Ed Center)
2:30-3:30, PBIS Meeting (Room 21)

January 30 (F)
Grading Day – No School
9:30-10:00, Allan to Mid Year Check-In Meeting

Have a nice 4 day week, which is actually first of two for us with grading day next week.

Allan

Fun MLK/Star Trek Factoid from NPR

Martin Luther King, Jr. considered himself a Trekkie and actually convinced Nichelle Nichols (Lt. Uhura) to stay on the show when she was considering leaving the show to resume her song and dance career on Broadway. He told her that “Star Trek” was “the only show that my wife Coretta and I will allow our little children to stay up and watch.”

“Do you not understand what God has given you? … You have the first important non-traditional role, non-stereotypical role. … You cannot abdicate your position. You are changing the minds of people across the world, because for the first time, through you, we see ourselves and what can be.” Nichols remembers King saying to her.