Archive for March 18, 2024

March 18th, 2024

March 18, 2024

Our EME Focus

Tier 1 Instruction
Belonging
Define what it means to be an Art Focused School

Thoughts of the Week

Honor the Absent: Show Your Integrity

I have been rereading a book I read over 20 years ago recently, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. In the book, Stephen Covey states, “one of the most important ways to manifest integrity is to be loyal to those who are not present. In doing so, we build the trust of those who are present. When you defend those who are absent, you retain the trust of those present.” In this we honor the absent!

One of the most important decisions we make in the workplace is whether or not we hold each other’s name as sacred, or as something we can trash whenever we desire. In a funny sort of way, we are everyone’s name. In other words, as soon as one person’s name is not sacred, then no one’s name is sacred. If we hear one person’s name being dishonored in the workplace, then we know that can easily happen to us as well.

Communicating ‘you matter’ is how we want to talk about people when they are present. Honoring the Absent is how we want to talk about people when they are not present.

When we Honor the Absent, we build trust with people who are present. When we Dishonor the Absent, we violate trust with people who are present. Why would that happen? Because if I have the reputation of dishonoring others, people who are present think I will dishonor them when they are not present. Relationships require trust. If we are serious about developing relationships, we have to be serious about maintaining and building trust. It’s as easy as A, B, C.

A) Be a Problem Solver, Not a Problem Namer – Look for solutions, don’t look to blame.

B) Say, “I hear you” or “OK” when someone is Dishonoring the Absent. This lets you acknowledge what someone has said without dumping more fuel on the fire. When you don’t add fuel to the fire you build trust and bring positive energy to the entire culture.

C) Try the Two out of Three Rule. Next time you want to bad-mouth someone, consider doing only two of the three things listed below:

Say someone’s name, instead leave the name out.
Say something negative, instead say something positive about the person.
Say it to someone else, instead tell your dog rather than your neighbor.

The Coming Week

Monday
- 5 minute stand up meeting 7:15
- Core Effectiveness Meeting with Lori (Grades 1, 2, 5)
- Carrie Shorthouse’s Birthday!
Tuesday
- Office Staff Meeting 10:00-10:30
- Fire Drill 1:30 (Time Change)
Wednesday
- Jenn Kandra’s Birthday!
- Office Admin Meeting 9:00-9:30
- Art Workshop 9:30-10:30
- EA Meeting 1:00-1:30
- SIW Teacher Prep (Conference Scheduling for Siblings)
- Admin PD Perseverance Hall
- 5th Grade Performance 5:00
Thursday
- PLC’s 2:30-3:15
Friday
- Kindergarten Forest Field Trip
- SpEd Meeting 2:15-3:15

UPCOMING DATES:

March 25-29 Spring Break!
April 1 Care Teams Meeting 2:20-3:15
April 2 Dexter’s Birthday!
April 2 Safety Team Meeting 7:00-7:30
April 2 Office Staff Meeting 10:00-10:30
April 2 SBAC Training 2:30-3:15
April 3 Noah’s Birthday!
April 3 Office Admin Meeting 9:00-9:30
April 3 SIW Conference Prep Time
April 4 Educator Job Fair 1:00-6:00
April 4 1st week of MTSS Rotations 2:30-3:15
April 5 SpEd Meeting 2:15-3:15
April 8 Staff Meeting 2:30-3:15
April 9 Office Staff Meeting 10:00-10:30
April 9 ICCL Meeting 2:15-3:15
April 10 Conferences 8:00-8:00
April 10 Admin PD 3:00-5:00
April 11 Conferences 8:00-8:00
April 12 No School
April 13 Emily McLarty’s Birthday!
April 16 Travis Hanson’s Birthday!
April 16 Office Staff Meeting 10:00-10:30
April 16 ICCL Admin Meeting 3:00-5:00
April 17 Office Admin Meeting 9:00-9:30
April 17 EA Meeting 1:00-1:30
April 17 SIW Collaborative Problem Solving #2 – Mary and Natalie 1:00-2:30
April 17 2nd Grade Performance 5:00
April 18 MTSS Rotations 2:30-3:15
April 19 SpEd Meeting 2:15-3:15
April 23 Fire Drill 8:00
April 23 Office Staff Meeting 10:00-10:30
April 23 Miss Nelson (Presentation) Mountain View High School 12:15-12:45
April 23 Care Teams Meeting 2:20-3:15
April 23 Elementary Admin Meeting 3:00-5:00
April 24 Spring Picture Day
April 24 Office Admin Meeting 9:00-9:30
April 24 SIW ED Network
April 25 MTSS Rotations 2:30-3:15
April 25 Beginning Admin Meeting 5:00-7:00
April 26 SpEd Meeting 2:15-3:15
April 29-May 3 MCT Jack in the Beanstalk
April 29 Committee Meetings 2:30-3:15
April 30 Office Staff Meeting 10:00-10:30
May 1 Office Admin Meeting 9:00-9:30
May 1 SIW Jump Start New EL Program 1:00-2:30
May 2 MTSS Rotations 2:30-3:15
May 3 SpEd Meeting 2:15-3:15

Updates from Downtown

Do Now:

New! Who and When are you taking the CPI training: Please let us know HERE

Reminders:

TLC Update: March 6^th Elementary TLC Update
Culture of Care: Check out the Wellness Activities for Families!

New Notes:

From Jenny White:

The Wayfinder highlight this week is Restorative Circles. In the TLC update there was a highlight on Restorative Practices so below are additional collections that will give you resources for your community connection time.
Facilitate restorative circles that encourage dialogue, empathy, and understanding. This collection of lessons and activities can be used to provide a platform for conflict resolution, healing, and strengthening relationships within the classroom community.
Directions on how to find the Restorative Circles in Wayfinder.
Direct Links to Wayfinder’s Collection
Kindergarten
1st – 2nd
3rd – 5th

From Scott in IT:

Your giant Stanley Cup may be costing your school money!

We have been issuing teacher computers to all certified staff since 2006. Eighteen years ago. In each of those eighteen years, our breakage has been relatively flat. That is, until January of this year. For the first half of the school year, we had 4 teacher laptops turned in for non-warrantied damage. Since January 2024 we have already received 18! Eight of which the user reported that a (water) spill was the source of the damage.

Your school or facility will now be responsible for the cost of any computer repair or replacement caused by damage or negligence. Any money going toward repair is less money going toward necessary technology updates or innovation.

Now, we can’t officially link the cause of this uptick to the popularity of Stanley sippy cups that seems to have occurred at exactly the same time. However, it is quite a coincidence! Please help us and your school by keeping any beverage on a separate surface away from your computer.

From The Communications Department: Please make sure you share this message with families prior to spring break. We want to make sure our families have the resources for care during break when we are not available to support.

CPR/First Aid Training: Do it!

The district offers free CPR/First Aid training to all employees. The majority of the training is online with a 20 minute in-person skills check-off by one of our district instructors. Instructions on how to sign up for the class are below.

How to Register for CPR/First Aid Training/Renewal Course for BLS Staff in UKG

Go to UKG
My Info (drop down menu, 3 stacked lines upper left side, above your initials)
My Career
My Learning
Access Learning (upper right side)
Training (top menu bar)
Courses
First Aid (on right side)
Click on First Aid Link
Click on green Enroll Now button

Please contact Michelle Spetic if you have any issues signing up.

Erin’s Law: Child Abuse Prevention Month (April) is upon us. This is a friendly reminder that you need to let April Jorgenson know when you plan to teach your Erin’s Law lessons. As of today, she has received zero, nada, zilch, from anyone about the dates. Thanks for checking in with her.

Important Dates

March 20: Admin PD at Perseverance Hall at Bend High 3:00-4:30
March 24: Excellence in Education Nominees are due!
April: Naglieri testing & SBAC for ELA
April 2: Elementary Horizontal at Lava Ridge with Lava and High Lakes sharing, 3:00-5:00
April 4: Central Oregon Job Fair
May: SBAC for Math and Science
May 30: School Counselor Celebration in board room 8-9:30

And finally…

As we gear up to have one more week until Spring Break, take some time to focus on some Healthy Happiness! Share the love (and calendar) with your staff too.

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March 11th, 2024

March 11, 2024

Our EME Focus

Tier 1 Instruction
Belonging
Define what it means to be an Art Focused School

Thoughts of the Week

The Best Way to Spot an Idiot — Look for the Person Who is Cruel

If you want to be successful in this world, you have to develop your own idiot detection system. The best way to spot an idiot — look for the person who is cruel. Let me explain. When we see someone who doesn’t look like us or sound like us, or act like us or love like us or live like us, the first thought that crosses almost everyone’s brain is rooted in either fear or judgment or both. That’s evolution. We survived as a species by being suspicious of things that we aren’t familiar with. In order to be kind we have to shut down that animal instinct and force our brain to travel a different pathway. Empathy and compassion are evolved states of being. They require the mental capacity to step past our most primal urges. This may be a surprising assessment because somewhere along the way, in the last few years, our society has come to believe that weaponized cruelty is part of some well thought out masterplan. Cruelty is seen by some as an adroit cudgel to gain power. Empathy and kindness are considered weak. Many important people look at the vulnerable only as rungs on a ladder to the top. I’m here to tell you that when someone’s path through this world is marked with acts of cruelty, they have failed the first test of an advanced society. They never forced their animal brain to evolve past its first instinct. They never forged new mental pathways to overcome their own instinctual fears and so their thinking and problem solving will lack the imagination and creativity that the kindest people have in spades. Over my many years in politics and business, I have found one thing to be universally true: The kindest person in the room is often the smartest.”
Governor J.B. Pritzker

Never let anybody make you feel less than… You don’t just have worth, you are worthy! Stay away from idiots!

The Coming Week

Monday
- Staff Meeting 2:15-3:15
Tuesday
- Core Effectiveness Meeting with Lori (Grades K, 4, 3)
- Office Staff Meeting 10:00-10:30
- Care Team Meeting 2:30-3:15
- Ben out for interviews 1:00-6:00
Wednesday
- Office Admin Meeting 9:00-9:30
- Art Workshop 9:30-10:30
- SIW Art Training #3 1:00-2:30
Thursday
- Coaching Support with Lori – all day by sign up
- PLC’s 2:30-3:15
- Family Game Night 5:30-6:30
Friday
- SpEd Meeting 2:15-3:15

UPCOMING DATES:

March 18 Core Effectiveness Meeting with Lori (Grades 1, 2, 5)
March 18 Carrie Shorthouse’s Birthday!
March 19 Office Staff Meeting 10:00-10:30
March 19 Fire Drill 1:00
March 20 Jenn Kandra’s Birthday!
March 20 Office Admin Meeting 9:00-9:30
March 20 Art Workshop 9:30-10:30
March 20 EA Meeting 1:00-1:30
March 20 SIW Teacher Prep
March 20 Admin PD Perseverance Hall
March 20 5th Grade Performance
March 21 PLC’s 2:30-3:15
March 22 Kindergarten Forest Field Trip
March 22 SpEd Meeting 2:15-3:15

Updates from Downtown

Reminders:

End of Year Schedule: Now 6/5 will be an building discretion SIW and 6/12 will be a teacher-directed SIW.

New Notes:

From Jenny White:

Wayfinder Activities of the week are focused on commitment and growth mindset. Kindergarten: Intro to Growth Mindset. 1^st – 2^nd: Drawing, Dancing, Dialogue. 3^rd – 5^th: Intro to Goal Setting

TLC Update: March 6^th Elementary TLC Update which includes:

Restorative practices lessons from Wayfinder
Movement moments
Storyline Design course information

From Jennifer Hauth- StudentSafe Raptor Training: We have recently expanded our partnership with Raptor Visitor Management System to include one of their new products called StudentSafe. StudentSafe is platform to enter, collaborate, and track data round NSSI (non suicidal self injury), suicidal ideation (suicide risk screens). Eventually, we will use this platform for behavioral safety (threat) assessments for school teams as well. Stay tuned for more information this summer from Eric Powell.

On February 28^th, all School Counselors, Nurses, School Psychs and Student Success Clinician/Coordinators were trained in the new platform and will be using this tool for all Suicide Risk Screens and NSSI going forward. School risk screening teams will enter these screens into this system moving forward and we will all be able to better collaborate and track student safety concerns in buildings going forward. You may have already received an alert in your inbox from a risk screen that has been completed in the last 10 days by one of your staff. The emails alerts will come from StudentSafe.

From Julie: Regarding….clarification on disposal of Wonders Materials….Information went out a couple of weeks ago communicating to teachers to go ahead and send home Wonders leveled readers. I strongly recommend teachers keep the leveled readers as additional reading materials in your classroom libraries. Additionally, I recommend keeping all of your Wonders and Wonderworks decodable readers as these are great resources!! Communication regarding anthologies will be communicated after Spring Break.

From Dr. Cook: Potential opportunity for fifth grade students in the area of science and space!

Important Dates

March: Prep for Naglieri
March 20: Admin PD at Perseverance Hall at Bend High 3:00-4:30
March 25-29: Spring Break
April: Naglieri testing & SBAC for ELA
April 2: Elementary Horizontal at Lava Ridge with Lava and High Lakes sharing!
April 4: Central Oregon Job Fair
May: SBAC for Math and Science

And finally…

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March 4th, 2024

March 4, 2024

Our EME Focus

Tier 1 Instruction
Belonging
Define what it means to be an Art Focused School

Thoughts of the Week

Start with the Why

The goal was ambitious, public interest was high, experts were eager to contribute, and money was readily available. Armed with every ingredient for success, Samuel Langley set out, in the early 1900s, to be the first man to fly an airplane. Highly regarded, he was a senior officer at the Smithsonian Institution, a mathematical Professor, who also had worked at Harvard and his friends included some of the most powerful men in government and business; including Andrew Carnegie and Alexander Graham Bell. Langley was given $50,000 from the war department to fund his project. A tremendous amount of money for the time. He pulled together the best minds of the day, a veritable dream team of talent and know-how. Langley and his team used the finest materials and the press followed him everywhere. People all over the country were riveted to the story, waiting to read that he had achieved his goal. With the team he had gathered, and ample resources, his success was guaranteed. Or was it? A few hundred miles away, Wilbur and Orville Wright were working on their own flying machine. Their passion to fly was so intense that it inspired the enthusiasm and commitment of a dedicated group of people in their hometown of Dayton, Ohio. There was no funding for the venture, no government grants, and no high level connections. As a matter of fact, not a single member of the team had an advanced degree or even a college education, including Wilbur or Orville. But the team banded together in a humble bicycle shop and made their vision real. On December 17th, 1903, a small group witnessed a man take flight for the first time in history. How did the Wright brothers succeed where a better equipped, better funded, better educated team could not? It wasn’t luck. Both the Wright brothers and Langley were highly motivated, and both had a strong work ethic and keen scientific minds. They were pursuing exactly the same goal, but only the Wright brothers were able to inspire those around them and truly leave their team to develop a technology that would change the world. Only the Wright brothers started with why.

Excerpt from Start with Why

The Coming Week

Monday
- Bike Safety 3/4-3/15
- Quick meeting about protected Minutes 2:30-?
Tuesday
- Emma Keeton’s Birthday!
- Safety Meeting 7:00-7:30
- Office Staff Meeting 10:00-10:30
- ICCL Team Meeting 2:30-3:15
Wednesday
- Read Across America
- Office Admin Meeting 9:00-9:30
- SIW – Collaborative Problem Solving Mary and Natalie 1:00-2:20
Thursday
- PLC’s 2:30-3:15
- BAM Meeting 5:00-7:00
Friday
- SpEd Meeting 2:15-3:15

UPCOMING DATES:

March 11 Staff Meeting 2:15-3:15
March 12 Core Effectiveness Meeting with Lori (Grades 1, 5, 2)
March 12 Office Staff Meeting 10:00-10:30
March 12 Care Team Meeting 2:30-3:15
March 13 Office Admin Meeting 9:00-9:30
March 13 Art Workshop 9:30-10:30
March 13 SIW Art Training #3 1:00-2:30
March 14 Coaching Support with Lori
March 14 PLC’s 2:30-3:15
March 14 Family Game Night 5:30-6:30
March 15 SpEd Meeting 2:15-3:15
March 18 Core Effectiveness Meeting with Lori (Grades K, 4, 3)
March 18 Carrie Shorthouse’s Birthday!
March 19 Office Staff Meeting 10:00-10:30
March 19 Fire Drill 1:00
March 20 Jenn Kandra’s Birthday!
March 20 Office Admin Meeting 9:00-9:30
March 20 Art Workshop 9:30-10:30
March 20 EA Meeting 1:00-1:30
March 20 SIW Teacher Prep
March 20 Admin PD Perseverance Hall
March 20 5th Grade Performance
March 21 PLC’s 2:30-3:15
March 22 Kindergarten Forest Field Trip
March 22 SpEd Meeting 2:15-3:15
March 24-29 Spring Break!

Updates from Downtown

Reminders:

Wonders Reading Materials At this time, we need to hold on to all TE’s and Anthologies. You should start sending home leveled readers after the close of a unit with your students.
February 21^st Elementary TLC Update

New Notes:

From Jennifer Hauth:

From Lora Nordquist: Here are two important items pertaining to the adjustment of the end of they year schedule.

Revised SIW Schedule. Because the week of June 10^th is now a full week, Wednesday, 6/12, will be an SIW. This changes the designation of our June SIW’s. Wednesday, 6/5, will now be a building discretion day; Wednesday, 6/12, will be a teacher-directed work day.
End of Year Activities. With the last two days of school being pushed to the week of June 17^th, the district’s expectation is that end-of-the-year celebrations (5^th grade or 8^th grade promotions, field days, etc.) be scheduled during these last two days. Additionally, the high school exam schedules should carry over to the 17^th, at least, or the 18^th. Full speed ahead with learning!

From Nurse Tami Pike: On February 8, 2024,A 90-day state of emergency was declared by the Deschutes County Commissioners for the escalating fentanyl crisis in Central Oregon. As a response, all schools are being equipped with the following kits. Please follow the directions below for placement. If you have any questions, please reach out to your school nurse.

Overdose Emergency Kits. BLS received several Overdose Emergency Kits through OHA’s Save Lives Oregon Initiative. Each kit contains: Administration instructions, 4 boxes of naloxone, 2 CPR face shields, and 1 emergency box for storage. Each middle and high school received two kits and elementary schools received one kit.

Overdose Emergency Kit Location. Ideally, the Overdose Emergency Kit box should be mounted on a wall next to an AED cabinet so that it is easily accessible. However, this may not be feasible for your school site. Please consult with your school nurse about where the best location would be for these Overdose Emergency Kits. AED cabinets still contain 2 doses of naloxone.

Overdose Emergency Kit Location and Expiration Date Information. Once the location of the Overdose Emergency Kits have been identified, the school nurse will add the locations and the naloxone expiration dates to our district AED Master Spreadsheet.

From Tammy and Lisa:

Important Dates

March 20: Admin PD at Perseverance Hall at Bend High 3:00-4:30
March 25-29: Spring Break—enter in UKG which days you will be taking as non-contract

And finally…

Are you having a bad day? Call: 707-8-PEPTOC. You won’t regret it! Really—do it!

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