Amity Creek FYI- As many of you may have heard by now, Amity Creek will be undergoing a major renovation beginning this summer thanks to our past bond. The enormous scope of the project will take longer than the summer. The official completion date is set for mid- December, 2020, with move in after the winter break. This means Amity Creek will need to be relocated for the fall of 20-21 school year. After exploring many potential sites it has been decided that the best option will be for Amity to start the year at N. Star in their open wing. Andy, Kevin and I are working closely with folks to iron out all of the details and think we will be able to make this go as smoothly as possible. Thanks to Andy and Kevin for all of their work on logistics and positive communication. We’re excited for the new and improved facility that Amity will get to move into next January. Let me know if you have any questions.
Calendars- The 2020-2021 school calendars are complete. I’ve linked a Bend area and SC and a MHS/ Skyline High School. As an aside, Andrea Wilson completes the calendars. If you think about it and feel so compelled, it would be great if a few people reached out and thanked her for her work on them. It takes an unbelievable amount of time, coordination, checking, double checking, cross referencing, etc. to get these done and she does an amazing job.
Staffing Timeline- This will obviously be a different year for hiring than any we have experienced in recent memory. With the influx of SIA dollars, hiring throughout the state will most likely be fast and furious. Our hope is to have staffing allocations to principals by the week of March 13. This will hopefully give you time to get your staffing plans completed and approved so that hiring can begin as soon as possible thereafter. We will once again post district generic primary and intermediate positions in Bend and S. County and these should be up in time for you to interview and hire quickly. Positions not falling into the generic category will need to be posted after staffing plans are complete and approved. Obviously more info to come, but I wanted to give you a potential timeline as March will be here before we know it.
United Way from Lora- At our December leadership meeting, I asked each school to take just a few minutes to make a plug for United Way contributions. One possible strategy is to make this push alongside your FAN advocate, because we can all target our donations. Currently, we have fewer than 40 staff members who have committed to payroll deductions, down from 65 last year at this time. I am hoping each of you will try to make a pitch to staff if you haven’t done so already. This year’s campaign ends at the end of January.
Excellence and Equity- As you are aware, BLS completed a large number (more than 30) of listening sessions in our district/community that resulted in an Excellence and Equity Report. At our next Horizontal, we’ll be participating in an exercise that digs into this report’s findings. Following are some things I’d like for you to have completed prior to our meeting: 1. Read the final Excellence and Equity Report. 2. Identify two or three passages that “stand out” in some way (e.g. you strongly agree or disagree with the content, or have questions, or want to expand on what you’ve read.) 3. Bring a copy (electronic or paper) of this Report to our Horizontal. 4. Have a way to capture some of your thoughts (paper or electronic) from our discussion. Here is an overview of the process that we will use, as well as Common Agreements, and the protocol we’ll use. Doing the reading ahead of time will allow us to get into discussion much sooner.
Chronic Absenteeism- If your school is working on chronic absenteeism, you might be interested in this great ESD sponsored PD opportunity with Jessica Sprick. I attended one of her trainings last year and it was excellent. You can register here.
Lice- Every year the topic of lice creeps up on us and someone gets the itch to make it an issue. Please be sure you have the lice procedure handy and are following its guidelines so the bug doesn’t spread at your school. It’s really hard to get rid of once it’s taken root.
Hope your weekend is a good one. While MLK day means a three day weekend for most, I hope that we can take some time to remember the man we honor and what he stood for.