Diario Camino del Río

Week of March 7

 

Hello El Camino del Río Staff,

This week is Classified Employees’ Week and I wanted to take this opportunity to acknowledge all of the hard work our classified folks do to help keep our school running. There are actually more classified staff on staff than licensed staff here at El Camino del Río, so it’s pretty clear that our school would grind to a halt without all of your work and efforts supporting students and staff. You all are the best and as a thank you, look for some fun things to happen in our building this week. Surprises ahead!

Here are some items of note:

• Classified Staffing Update – ESS department let principals know they will have individual hours and job assignments for SPED staff later this week. They tolds us the FTE but did not match the staff to the numbers. We received 0.6 FTE certified and 4.5 hours classified. I’ll let SPED folks know as soon as I have that information. For Title 1 and building funded Educational Assistants , I wanted to let you know I don’t expect to reduce anyone’s hours, but I’m still working out some Educational Assistant scenarios that will vary depending on the licensed staffing plan. At this point, I just wanted Title 1 and building funded Educational Assistants to know that no one will be losing hours. For kitchen and custodial staff there are no updates for next year at this point.  Come to the optional staffing meeting on Tuesday if you would like to discuss further.

• UO Doctoral Student Teacher Survey – If there are teachers who’d like to be entered into a drawing to win an Amazon gift card, a UO doctoral student sent principals a link to a 15 minute survey to forward to teachers about improving classroom practices. They said email addresses (for the drawing) and survey responses will be kept separate. Prizes range from $20.00 to $100.00 and forty-one people will be randomly selected to win. March 15th is the deadline if you’d like to participate.

• Carrying it Forward (formerly Taking it Up) Seminar Opportunity – I wanted to remind everyone about this opportunity and also make sure everyone knows this is open to both classified and licensed staff. Subs are provided. 4J’s Carrying it Forward seminar will be Thursday & Friday April 7th & 8th. The intention of the seminar is to build a greater understanding of issues of race, racism, and dominant culture and give us a common language and experience from which to build capacity for deeper, more authentic conversations about race across the district. Several staff are already planning to attend. I see this as a school wide expectation so if you do not get trained this year, I will ask you to get trained next year. See the linked email for more details. The deadline to register is Wednesday, March 30th.

• FAMILY RESOURCE: Family Check-Up – I’ve shared this before, but I received an email with an updated flyer for the UO’s Family Check-Up program. This program was developed by the UO to provide brief, family-centered interventions that identify strengths and weaknesses in family functioning and help participants become motivated to make positive changes. The program is for members of Trillium Community Health Plan (AKA Oregon Health Plan). Families can earn $150 (provided in gift cards) by attending three appointments, which take place over a four- to five-week period. Feel free to share this resource with any families who you think might benefit.

• FAMILY RESOURCE: Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) Program – This is a program that DHS shared in the Student Care Team Meeting. This is a paid on-the-job program where people can become a CNA1 or CNA2. Feel free to share the linked flyer.

• Care Team Referrals – Related to the above, the Student Care Team will be meeting the week after spring break, which means referrals to the team are due Friday next week. The Care Team can help with a wide variety of stations. DHS can also provide us with updates for any reports we’ve made. Linked here is the 4J Release Form (PDF or DOC) if you can obtain a parent or guardian signature, but you can also refer “hypothetical” student or family situations. Let me know if you have any questions about potential referrals, but if it’s a situation that’s on your mind, it’s probably a worth referring to the team.

• District Admin Updates – Brooke Wagner has been selected as the new Director of Elementary, replacing Sara Green when she retires at the end of the school year. Brooke taught at South and Churchill and was at Kelly as the assistant principal from 2002–2007. Since 2007, Brooke has been a principal in Springfield, first at Briggs Middle School and more recently Thurston Elementary School.

BJ Blake has accepted the position of secondary education director, replacing Randy Bernstein when he retires at the end of the school year. The was appointed to this position. BJ started her education career as an elementary teacher, then as a Churchill assistant principal in 2000, to six years as principal of Meadowlark/Buena Vista Elementary School, to five years as principal of Spencer Butte Middle School, to her return to Churchill as principal in 2014.

One other district level vacancy that has yet to be filled is the Director of Technology. The first round of interviews were not successful and they are re-posting the position. Kim Ketterer is currently the interim Director of Technology, though she too is retiring at the end of this school year.

• Teaching Women’s History With Perspectives – March may be officially designated as Women’s History Month, but you can celebrate the contributions of women all year round with readings, tasks and strategies from Perspectives for Diverse America. This webinar will explore texts and activities that allow you to go beyond “famous firsts” and teach about women from a variety of disciplines, cultures and backgrounds. You will also learn how these tools can help students connect the past to the present and even the future. Registration on the site is required.

• LEL This Friday, March 11:

This Friday there will be school wide observations in our school. This program is called LAL. (Learning about Learning in Elementary.- (LEL) It is a district wide observation protocol started in 2009.  The elementary schools have their own Learning about Learning Network called LEL. The focus of LEL is to study the learner. Observers are teachers and principals from 4 elementary schools, Cesar Chavez, Buena Vista, McCornack, and us!  The observers will have a specific learning focus in the classrooms. They will be looking for student engagement behaviors in math and language behaviors.  They will look to see what kind of sheltering strategies are used in the classroom to lower the affective filter. The schedule is in draft form right now but will be communicated to teachers this week for feedback. Here is the draft we have so far:

Team/Time	10:15-10:35`	10:35-10:55	10:55-11:15	11:45-12:10	12:10-1;00-	1:00-1:20	1:20-1:40
Team A	Brougher 4th	Torres 5th	Reckers 3rd	Jones 2nd	Lunch	1st Flores	Hellman Kinder
Team B	Murphy 4th	Reckers 3rd	Torres 5th			1st Skoubo	Bucklew Kinder
Team C	Piper 3rd	Brougher 4th	Screen 5th			Hellman Kinder	1st Flores
TeamD	Screen 5th	Murphy 4th	Piper 3rd			Bucklew Kinder	1st Skoubo

Because of the learning focus, you may have to modify your schedule to teach math at a different time of day but I tried to plan it around our master schedule where I believe our math times are in the day.

• Friday, March 18th is ALICE Training  –ALICE (Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, Evacuate) This training will be happening at Willagillespie Elementary,1125 Willagillespie Rd, Eugene, OR 97401 on March 18th. We will begin at 8:30. It will be about 5 hours of training with a half hour lunch. Alice is a district required training that all 4J schools must complete.  It helps get schools well prepared for circumstances that many schools have faced and uses a proactive approach. If you are squeamish about doing emergency simulations please contact me.  I have been working closely with Randi Bowers-Payne to ensure that all staff feel safe in this training. ALL STAFF need to attend CLASSIFIED and CERTIFIED: EA’s, custodians, cooks, secretaries included. Real emergencies require a team response from everyone.

• Monday, March 28 Academy Day-  Monday, March 28th is an academy day with our last follow up from Lisa Meyers on AIMS4S3.  We will be intensely focused on the AIMS4S3 compendium and teachers are expected to bring a complete S3 Compendium to share with the staff. All licensed staff should plan on attending. Classified EA’s are also required to attend this session. Reflection on compendium work will also be a big part of this session. The Session will begin at 8:00 AM and end at 1:30. Lunch will be around 12:00.

•AIMS4S3 Planning  time is available!- Please remember that all classroom teachers have planning time available to design and plan S3 units and create compendiums  Teachers asked for these hours.  I can provide up to 4 hours extended contract to teachers to do this professional development.  Please email me with specific times you plan to do it.  Some teams have decided to work on a weekend and get paid for their time.  This IS an option.  ATTENTION 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th grade teams: Please send me a date you plan to do this by Friday, March 11.

A Calendar of Some Upcoming Events

March 7 (M)
Classified Employees Week
Women in History Week
9:00- Joel in Informal Observation
10:15- Joel accompanies student in Artist in Residence
11:40- Joel in informal observation.

March 8 (T)
International Women’s Day
7:30-  Joel in mid term goal meeting.
2:55-3:40,  Optional Staff Meeting- Staffing discussion. (Library)
PLT Cancelled
6:00-7:00, Parent Group Meeting

March 9 (W)

1:45-2:45, Teacher Collaboration Hour- Math PLC Time
4:00-5:00, North Region Principals’ Meeting (Kelly MS)

March 10 (H)

2:45-3:45, Mod Squad
3:00-4:00, Furniture Meeting (Library)

March 11 (F)

8:30-3:30,- LEL at El Camino del Río!  Observations  and teacher learning in classrooms throughout the day. (See the proposed schedule in the blog.)

March 12 (S)
9:00, Regional OBOB Competition (North Eugene HS)

March 13 (SU)
Daylight Savings Time (Spring Forward)

March 14 (M)

2:30-5:00, Joel at Elementary Principal’s Meeting (Parr Room)

March 15 (T)

9:00-10:30, Joel at Immersion Principals Task Force Meeting (Mozart Room)
11:00-12:00- Joel at LTD Community Outreach Meeting (Downtown LTD Atrium Building)
2:55-4:45, Staff Meeting, Professional Development- Staffing Decision Day, and Technology PD

March 16 (W)

1:45-2:45, Teacher Collaboration Hour- Math PLC Time

Joel submits staffing by 4:00 PM.

March 17 (Th)

3:45-5:15, Kindergarten Teacher Monthly Meeting@Camas Ridge

March 18 (F)

8:30-1:00, ALICE Training at Willagillespie Elementary

March 19-27 Spring Break

March 28 (M)

8:00-1:30, Academy Day AIMS4S3 Training
2:30-5:00, Joel at Elementary Principals’ Meeting: Parr Room

March 29 (T)

School Resumes
8:45-9:45, Cafecito in FRC Focus is on:
Increasing bilingual parent leadership, community outreach.
3:00-4:00, Site Council Meeting (Conference Room)

Have a good week, everyone!

Joel

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