https://blogs.4j.lane.edu/chinn/?p=4716
Hi Everyone,
Ten items of note this week:
• Conferences Info – This week will be a short one with students, but some long days and nights with families. I’ve heard from a couple teachers, but let me know if you’d like me to sit in on any conferences or if you’d even like me to walk by to make sure things are going fine. Three conference items of note:
• PTO Dinners – The PTO will be providing dinner for staff each night. Monday night will be a variety of soups and salads. Tuesday will be a build-your-own taco/potato bar.
• Classified Staff Work Schedule – This week is a regular work week for classified staff. Most licensed staff will not be in the building Wednesday, so this is a good day to use comp time if classified staff have any coming. If you are using comp time this day, please send me an email or let me know in person. If you are working this day, please connect with your cooperating teachers to see how you can helpful this day.
• CAP Parent Survey – Lastly, as part of our Comprehensive Achievement Plan process, we have a parent survey that needs to be completed. Since we don’t have a great return rate on our traditional paper/pencil and SurveyMonkey Title 1 Surveys, we’ll try something different if downtown can get me the Spanish version by Monday. I’ll set up laptops outside classrooms for parents to complete the survey (kind of like we did last year for eScrip sign-up) along with posted direction. I’ll send an email to families encouraging them to complete it here at school or complete it at home. If we don’t get the Spanish survey in time, I’ll plan to go with our traditional survey methods. And if you’re curious about the survey or happen to be a Howard parent yourself, here’s a link to the survey in English.
• New Laminator – A new laminator has arrived to replace out old one. Please review the short version of the operating instructions. If you knew how to operate the previous machine, this one is essentially the same. However, three important items of note:
• DO NOT use the machine if you have not been shown how to use it.
• DO NOT have student teachers use the machine.
• DO NOT have volunteers use the machine.The main reason the old machine stopped working was from untrained people jamming and damaging the machine.
• United Way Pledge Forms Due Dec. 3rd – The United Way drive kicked off at last week’s staff meeting. United Way is a great program that directly benefits our students in many ways. Please consider donating a small amount this year. United Way is the largest community support network in Lane County and makes a huge difference in many lives. If you choose to participate, forms are due to the office by December 3rd. Also, remember that you can even donate directly to your own school, grade level or classroom through EEF on the form, which may be a good thing to do since the “Educator Expenses Tax Deduction” was cut by the feds, but a donations through the United Way is still tax deductible.
• PTO Updates – There was a small group of the regulars at last week’s PTO Meeting, but here are a few items of note:
• Movie Night, Jan 22 – The PTO is planning a Movie Night on Friday, January 22nd at 6:00PM. They’re thinking they’ll show “Inside Out” or “Minions.”
• Internet Safety Class – They’re also looking into offering parents an internet safety class. This would be either at a future PTO meeting or maybe paired with a movie night.
• Ongoing Fundraisers – Lastly, they want to again advertise the various passive fundraisers to support Howard, which are Smile Amazon (a small percentage of certain items purchased on Amazon to back to the building), Fred Meyer (link your Fred Meyer card to Howard and we get a percentage of all purchases minus gas), Red Robin (link your Red Robin Rewards card to give Howard a percentage of what you spend at Red Robin), Target (link your Target credit card to give Howard a percentage of all purchases), and one the PTO is looking into is a donation program through the Bottle Drop recycling centers.
• 2015 Winter Holiday Resources Spanish & English – Last week I shared the 2015 Winter Holiday Resources flyer, which has information on food boxes, meals sites, holiday gift programs and holiday celebrations. DHS has given us a translated version of the documents, so it is now available in both Spanish and English or all in one document.
• New Building Updates – Attached are the minutes from the last Owner/Architect/General Contractor (OAC) Meeting and below are a few items of note:
• Construction Schedule Updates – Todd Construction and Facilities staff are now haggling over meeting the scheduled August 14th deadline. August 14th is the completion date (parking lots and all) and Todd is pushing on the district to speed up the asbestos abatement schedule, shorten the school year, and complaining about the number of change orders. District staff are not wanting to pay extra to speed up the abatement process, are pushing on Todd Construction to have more people work 6-7 day weeks and work overtime, for Todd to push on their subcontracts to meet deadlines, and are asking why 4J is only now hearing about these concerns. The schedule will work and be on time if everything goes as planned, but that’s not how pattern for most construction projects. Our Project Manager said there’s always a race to the finish line with every construction projects, but the main debate here seems to be whether the goal of August 14th is a reasonable completion date. The worst case scenario is that we don’t have a finished parking lot and the adjacent softball field by this date, but the building itself will be ready in plenty of time.
• Proposed Removal of Parking in Front of West Wing – Related to the above, we’re being asked to let Todd Construction install part of the new sidewalk in front of our building along the west wing over winter break. However, doing this would mean losing the 20 parking spots (minus the handicap parking). They would be able to add more parking in the west parking lot by putting gravel over the grassy drainage areas, but I’m thinking doing this now would work. It would certainly be inconvenient for staff, but more concerning is it would be a safety issue for students since it would force more students to cross the street and greatly increase the distance student shave to travel to the entrance of the building. Let me know if any of you disagree, but I’m planning to tell Facilities and Todd “NO” on this one.
• Fiber Line Installation – Over Winter Break (Dec 22 – Jan 2) Facilities staff will be pulling in the new network fiber feed to the new Howard building. This feed is from the MDF Room in Kelly MS to the new Howard MDF Room. During this work there will interruptions to the network systems, but hopefully you all will be away from school during this time enjoying your well deserved break.
• ID Badges for New School – Facilities is designing the staff ID badges for our new school. They did one mock-up which I liked except for the font choice for our names. It seemed a bit too Comic Sans for my liking and I think something closer to the font in our logo, like the Impact font, would look better. Attached are a few different fonts I t think might look better. Feel free to let me know what you think.
• Google Expeditions – If you missed it in the TLT minutes, TLT discussed Google Expeditions, which is a kind of a virtual reality field trip to Mars, the bottom of the ocean, the moon and other remote locations you’d never actually be able to take your class. If at least six classes are interested in this activity, schools can sign up for Google to potentially come out and host this event. Everyone on TLT was interested, so I’ve signed up our school, but we can certainly add more classes if Google says they’ll come to our school. Here’s an article about one school that did it and it sure looks like a pretty exciting opportunity.
• District Admin Updates – Two updates were sent out to principals this week:
• Early College & Career Options (ECCO) High School – Stephanie Cannon will continue as interim principal of ECCO on a part-time basis (three days a week) and Scott Mayers will round out the FTE (two days a week) to assist with Alternative Education placements, in addition to his current role at North Eugene. Kim Finch will assume the CTE coordinator responsibilities for 4J in addition to her current responsibilities. These personnel changes were made as a result of Brad New’s resignation from his position at Eugene School District 4J to pursue other professional and personal opportunities.
• Change in Instruction Department Structure – Beginning next month, the district’s Chief of Staff, Dr. Charis McGaughy, will assume leadership of the Instruction Department and oversight of its four divisions—elementary education, secondary education, education support services, and research and planning. Pending board approval, there may also be a change in position title. The office of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion also will move into the Instruction Department. The new organizational structure will facilitate alignment and coordination between the instructional divisions.
If you’ll allow me to play my old-timer card, this seems very similar to when Tom Henry oversaw the Instruction Department as deputy superintendent, which was a structure I thought worked very well.
• Report: Media stereotypes dissuade girls from computer science – This article reports young girls are negatively influenced by the stereotypes portrayed on television and in films, according to a report from Google with surveys by Gallup. Also, only 7% of students said black and Hispanic characters are represented “most of the time” in these roles on screen. A Google official said everyone benefits from efforts to increase diversity in business and entertainment.
• 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:
November 23 (M)
4:00-8:00, Conferences
5:00, PTO Provided Dinner (Staff Room)November 24 (T)
8:00AM – 8:00PM, Conferences – No Students
10:00-11:00, Allan to 4J Visual Communication Infographic Meeting (Library)
4:15-5:05, Allan on Conference Call Regarding Parent Survey Pilot (Office)November 25 (W)
Conferences Comp. Day – No Students
Regular Work Day for Classified StaffNovember 26 (H)
Thanksgiving Holiday – No SchoolNovember 27 (F)
Thanksgiving Holiday – No SchoolNovember 30 (M)
2:30-3:30, Site Council Meeting (Staff Room)December 1 (T)
8:30-9:30, Allan Meeting w/Gretta Sagnola (Office)
2:30-3:30, Optional 2nd Semester Schedule Meeting (Library)December 2 (W)
Wacky Wednesday – Crazy Sock Day!
Picture Retake Day
9:00-11:00, Allan to OAC Meeting (Construction Trailer)
1:05-2:05, Allan to IEP Meeting (Room 10)
2:30, Student Care Team Meeting (Staff Room)December 3 (H)
United Way Pledge Forms Due
2:30-3:30, Taking It Up Meeting (Staff Room)December 4 (F)
1:00-2:30, Allan to Super Boundary Meeting with Sara and Joel (Office)December 5 (S)
9:00-4:00, PTO Holiday Bazaar (Gym)
Have a good week, everyone, and an even better holiday weekend!
Allan
