To Do:

• Enjoy conferences next week. I hope that you are able to make some nice connections (you and/or your staff) with parents. They will be coming to hear how much you enjoy building relationships with their child, and this is a great opportunity to communicate that. (Also enjoy your day next Friday!)

This and that:

• With our first MAC survey behind us, we’d like to encourage folks who haven’t already done so, to move to springtime MAC trainings. What this means for this year is that you will hold a building MAC training in or around May, 2019, which would allow everyone to be trained for a full 12 months, getting us through our MAC survey days for next year. This would also relieve the pressure of trying to train nearly 1400 staff every fall prior to our first MAC day. Also, please be an example for others in your building by completing the MAC survey on the days it is scheduled, or soon thereafter.
• This week you will be asked to read and reflect on the Jennifer Gonzalez’s second question to ask yourself when working with unmotivated learners: How much choice do your students really have? At the end of this section of her article, Jennifer provides a small sampling of ways in which you might provide learners choice – without lowering expectations for learning. I wonder how this list might look for you in the context of leading adult learners?
• I now have access to your building’s Oregon Report Card… but know that this information is embargoed until Nov. 15… meaning it is not public and cannot be shared. If you are interested in seeing your 2017-18 Report Card, please let me know.

Reminders:

• The Gallup Student Poll closes this coming Wednesday, Oct. 24.

To Do:

• Now is the time to begin thinking about your own SLGGs.  This will be one thing we touch bases on when I come see you in November and/or December. Let me know if you have any questions regarding this.

This and that:

• Your final SIF/Alt Fund carryover amounts are now available.  If you look under the SIF tab at the bottom of your building’s Staffing Plan page (in Google Docs), you will find that your carryover has been added and is ready to be allocated.
• As you are fully aware, the change in start times for next year has been communicated to the public. If you would like to follow-up with a reminder in a newsletter or other publication you may send to parents, here are a couple of graphics that you could use: Spanish / English.
• Last week you read an introduction of the article 5 Questions to Ask Yourself About Your Unmotivated Students, by author Jennifer Gonzalez (Cult of Pedagogy, Feb. 20, 2016). This week you will dive deeper into Question #1: How is your relationships with your students, really? (As a reminder, after explaining more about the question, Jennifer provides you with her self-rating for this question and follows with some resources/ideas to help you improve.)
• Passing this opportunity along for Julianne.  I attended one of these trainings a few years ago as a “player” and while it was intense, it was also very worthwhile: Please make time to join Bend Police and Bend Fire professionals, in partnership with 9-1-1 and other first responding agencies to crisis situations, for an active threat training on November 13, 14, 15 or 19 at Elk Meadow Elementary School from 7-10 p.m. nightly.We are looking for approximately 40 “players” for each night’s training. Participants will see first-hand how emergency personnel respond to active threats in schools in several live scenarios throughout the evening. Participants will implement procedures they’ve learned during their own school trainings as controlled scenarios play out in front of them.RSVP https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/SMG9LKKYou are welcome to share this invitation with staff members. Further information regarding this training will be emailed to participants in early November.
• This is info that Skip shared out via email on Thursday afternoon.  If I were to distill it for middle schools, the following departments have required meetings: health, math, science, computer science and ELL. Let me know if you have any other questions…The link below has the list of the District SIW opportunities this Fall.  Please find the session(s) that pertains to you. As you will see, not everyone has a training to attend but many do.  If your content area isn’t scheduled for a district activity/meeting/training on these days, feel free to initiate a collaboration with teachers in other high schools or middle schools.  (ie:  music teachers, drama, and art teachers).Currently we will not have teachers sign up for sessions using Performance Matters (the new PD Place).  However, there will be sign-in sheets at the sessions and your attendance will be entered into Performance Matters afterwards for PDU tracking.

   

  https://docs.google.com/document/d/1hK8zPbTDoEEbFV2BGg169cl9cNqt7QAeqsG_uf4R4jM/edit

Reminders:

• We will be meeting as a Horizontal group on Monday (10/15) at SVMS.  We will begin at 3:15. Here is the agenda.
• I’m sure you don’t need a reminder on this… but I’ll put it out there anyway. The contract between BLS and BEA notes that 4 SIW dates “…will be allocated for individual teacher work time for preparation and planning…” One of these dates should be Oct. 24 – the date of our first conferences. Another obvious one is the Wednesday of our spring conferences. Please be sure you set aside two additional SIW times (e.g. prior to end of term grading) this school year, for a total of four SIWs.

To Do:

• As you know, any student who opts out of taking SBAC this spring will be considered a “does not meet” for reporting purposes. One question we are trying to answer, and creating possible solutions for, is “Why are parents opting their child out of testing?”  If you have heard any parents provide you with their reasoning, would you please send me a quick email with bullet points (vs. paragraphs) as to what you are being told? Thanks in advance!

This and that:

• Beginning this week, I am going to break down an article from Cult of Pedagogy (Feb. 20, 2016), 5 Questions to Ask Yourself About Your Unmotivated Students, by author Jennifer Gonzalez. As a teacher I never worked in a school that didn’t provide the opportunity to educate a handful (or more) of unmotivated students. As an administrator there was always one or more unmotivated (to change, to try new things, etc.) educators. With this in mind, I found this article to be a good point of reflection into my own practice. (I am not trying to subtle communicate that one or more of you is “unmotivated” – because you aren’t!) Each week I am going to share one of the questions Jennifer advocates we ask ourselves regarding unmotivated learners, as well as her reflection of how she would rate herself as a teacher, and some suggestions for how to improve. Today, however, I am going to provide you with an overview of the 5 Questions to Ask Yourself and the caution to not blame others for the unmotivated youth.
• Here are links to documents shared this week that you may need to refer back to later this year: BLS ALO Options, SPED Discipline Flowchart, supporting SPED students with challenging behavior flowchart, and SPED Discipline Procedures.
• Also shared this week was our district’s Equity Policy.

Reminders:

• Please make sure your staff are wearing the district-issued ID badge (and not ID created from a different source). If a new district ID badge is needed, our HR office can provide that. Please give them a call if you have a question about how to get a new one/replacement badge.
• If you haven’t already, please make sure your staff is aware of the start time change for next year. Here is the Start Time Executive Summary that Shay referenced at our Leadership meeting this past Monday if you’d like to have some additional details. (Please don’t share this document with staff until after the district provides a press release to the media at the school board meeting this Tuesday night.) As you can guess, the reactions from staff first hearing about his has been mixed… just like the 60/40% (60% in favor) input we received via survey from staff last spring indicated. Because you will very likely have folks with strong feelings for and against this change within your building, think about how you will respond to follow-up conversations with your staff.
• MAC survey day is next Thursday, Oct. 11.
• Misty Groom is conducting a STAS training on Friday, Oct. 12, beginning at 1:00 at the HDESD.  Please email Misty if you or someone in your building is wanting to attend.

To Do:

• Please add “Move Up Day” to your calendar for Tuesday, May 21, 2019. Gary is double-checking with the elementary principal’s regarding this date, but let’s plan on this being the day unless you hear otherwise from me.
• This Volunteer/Visitor one-page document is for your reference. Please read this document and let me know if you have any questions.  This document is not intended to be shared/published/sent home – but rather for all of us to be on the same page and have similar practices at each of our schools when it comes to volunteer/visitors. Additionally, here is a link on the Portal of all district volunteer/visitor documents.

This and that:

• Stephen’s birthday was this past Wednesday, and Steve’s is next Friday.  Happy birthday to both of you!
• Below is the Behavior Coaching Referral link for the 2018-2019 school year.  Also, the coaches have a resource blog to share out with teams coming in early October.  Keep your eye out for this!

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeg9w-mBhG62RtYhymy3OOJbICvZ-gC1qDwW6Rwnz2C3_2g_A/viewform

• From Jon Lindsay… We have made quite a few changes to our expectations around observations, SLGGS, and evaluations in the last couple of years.  Some of the changes have come because the state has changed their rules.  Some changes have been put in place to help relieve some of your workload.  Expectations this year look exactly like last year.  I’ll do my best to help summarize those expectations.

Student Learning Growth Goals:  We are still required to have Student Learning Growth Goals.  The requirement and expectations are still the same.  The goals still need to reflect student growth.  For those of you who want to know all the expectations, please see the attachments.

Scoring: –  Last year we changed how we measure the SLGGs.  We have removed the state scoring guide and the Oregon Matrix.  We are required as a district to make sure we are reflecting on SLGGs in the evaluation.  We decided to fulfill this requirement by using Domain 4 Monitoring, Assessment, and Follow-up in our Summative Evaluation Rubric.  Domain 4 speaks specifically to how teachers use assessments.  SLGGs should be considered when evaluating Domain 4.  We expect that other factors, like classroom observations, will influence the scoring of this section as well.  There are five different standards in Domain 4.  The SLGGs may influence one or more standards in this domain.  We trust that teachers and administrators can have a professional conversation of how much influence that SLGGs had on the scoring.

SLGG Forms:  We will be using the same forms with very little change this year. We did remove the scoring guide.  HS and MS will use the form in Talent Ed. Here is the SLGG goal quality review checklist and a 26-page SLGG Guidance document (only for your reference!).

Summative Evaluations:  They will be done like usual except the matrix has been removed.  All probationary employees are on Summative Evaluation.  Employees of concern need to be on Summative Evaluation.  Regular/Contract employees need a Summative Evaluation every two years.

Observations: 

Probationary Employee= Six observations total. Two formal observations are required by the state. Four mini observations.  Two of the minis can be professional.

Employee on Summative Evaluation= Six mini observations.  Four classroom observations and two professional observations.

Employee not on Summative Evaluation= Three mini observations.  Two classroom observations and one professional observation.

Our committee discussed what counts as a Professional Observation.  We believe that this includes any meeting where an administrator either observes professional behavior or has a professional conversation with an employee. This may include an EBISS meeting, IEP meeting, PLC meeting, student or parent conference, goal setting meeting, committee work, etc.  In the case of some meetings, it would be appropriate for an administrator to observe several employees at a time.  The feedback could be given to the group or to an individual.  The important part is to let the employees know that it will be counted as a mini.

The changes will be published in the newest version of The Professional Growth and Performance Evaluation Manual.  We are certain, however, that most employees don’t look at that manual, so it will be up to administrators to share this information with them.

If you have any question, then please do not hesitate to call. Ext 1104.

• As a reminder, this is who you have as a first contact SRO. (However, if you have an emergency, call 911.) Officer Stoaks – Realms MS; Officer Smelser – CMS, PBMS, SVMS; Officer Krauger – PCMS; Deputy Quick – HDMS; Deputy Toney – LPMS
• We are hearing that there is an uptick in suicidal ideation recently in our area. Please take a moment to review this community resource page on our website and remind your staff to report any concerns connected to student safety to you or a counselor.
• Per Bend-La Pine Schools policy EBBA First Aid, “each school shall have, at a minimum, at least one staff member with a current first aid card for every 60 students enrolled. Names of the first aid cardholders will be posted.” Check out this spreadsheet to see how your school stacks up as we start the new year. Please remember to post those names as well.
• Every other year we require schools and departments to deliver Schoolwide Standard Response Protocols (SRP)  (lockDOWN, lockOUT, etc.) training to all building staff. The training is delivered by district safety personnel, SROs and fire officials. Please plan on a 50 minute training. Training should be complete by December 31, 2018. Please take a moment to reserve your top choices for training at: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1O8Tu_zYmhHivAtJTYL0QNOgMd3M9u40ntE14AceN6eU/edit?usp=sharing
• If you missed the 2018 Safe Schools Alliance Safety Day, please consider attending one of the three SRP and Reunification Trainings with John-Michael Keyes coming up in early October. This training draws on the research and collaboration of experts in education, law enforcement and emergency management to assemble real-world solutions that can be brought to the classroom. One critical aspect of the training is accountable reunification of students with their parents or guardians after a school crisis or emergency. Together, the SRP (our LockDOWN, LockOUT, etc. protocols) and SRM provide school and district safety teams with proven methods for planning, practicing and achieving a successful response to crises and reunification. Learn more or register online: https://bit.ly/2PKYjom

Reminders:

• See all of you Monday afternoon at 3:15 for our first Leadership meeting of the year.
• New admin meet at 1:45 in the board room on Monday.
• As was mentioned at our Horizontal meeting, there will be a nation-wide Emergency Alert for all wireless phones on Oct. 3 from 11:18 – 11:48am. Again, because this is the first event of its kind, we do not know details of what to expect. (Will there be an audible sound if the phone is off? Sound if the phone is on vibrate? Will all of the phones have the alert at the same time, or will there be alerts on different phones the entire 30 min.?)

To Do:

• I mentioned a few weeks ago that there will be a meeting on Oct. 5 @ 7:30am here at the Ed Center regarding conference scheduling of interpreters. I asked that each school in need of an interpreter send one person to this meeting. So far, I have not heard from anyone that they will attending. Please let me know if you (or a designee) will be attending so I can plan accordingly.  Thanks! [Refer to 9/7 blog note for more details]
• I had an elementary principal reach out to me this week and ask if a date had been selected yet for the 5th grade “move up” day for spring of 2019.  I had to confess that I hadn’t even thought about it yet!  So, would you please check your calendar and see if Tuesday, May 21 would work for you as 5th grade move up day? Please let me know by the first part of next week so I can determine if we need to find a new date; or, if not, can ask Gary to run this date by the elementary admin to see if it will work for them.

This and that:

• There will be a Level 1 Assessment training (only for those of you who have not had this training) on Oct. 12 from 12:00 – 4:00. Contact Misty Groom (Ed Center) for more details and to register.
• Just under a year ago Shay sent out a DACA-related letter to our district sites and facilities, reiterating our stance in providing a safe and welcoming environment to all of our students/families. In light of news that ICE had recent Central Oregon presence and report of at least one of our parents facing deportation, I wanted to share this letter with you again – as well as the suggestion of sharing it with your families once again. Here is the letter [Spanish] [English].
• Following are a few reminders from Julianne… A quick reminder that our 2018-19 Drill Guide is available on the Portal at https://portal.bend.k12.or.us/system/files/bend-la_pine_schools_safety_drills_guidelines_2018-19.pdf. This month a lockDOWN, fire and bus evacuation drill are required. Schools are encouraged to deliver fire drills with ‘blocked exits’ and fire and emergency response drills during passing periods, lunch and before and after school. Please remember to send your drill completion form to Marsha Baro within 48 hours of your drill or emergency response.
• Please share the following information with your staff via email or staff meeting:
  On October 3, 2018, many student, staff and visitor cell phones should receive one emergency test broadcast message with an audible alert sometime between 11:18 and 11:48 a.m.This broadcast is expected go to Wireless Emergency Alert (WEA) compatible cell phones that have wireless carriers that are participating in WEA, which are switched on and within range of the cell tower. These messages are set to alert the public of emergencies — including AMBER alerts and tornado or flood warnings, for example. This test is being conducted by Federal Emergency Management Agency in coordination with the Federal Communications Commission.We want to make you aware of this for two reasons:
  1. This could be a teachable moment for you and your students OR it could be a distraction to your teaching and learning environment if cell phones are on and receiving messages during this time.
  2. This is not a test conducted by Bend-La Pine Schools. This is the first nationwide Presidential-level WEA test and individuals cannot opt out.

  Test Details:

  During the WEA test, cell phone users should receive a single, distinct dialog box on their device, which should say “Presidential Alert” followed by “THIS IS A TEST of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System. No action is needed.” This text should be accompanied by a special tone and vibration, which should be repeated twice.

  To learn more about this test, please review the following documents:
  https://www.fema.gov/emergency-alert-test

  https://www.fema.gov/frequently-asked-questions-wireless-emergency-alerts/

• Here is a video that you may be hearing about. Please do not plan on showing this video to students. Showing it to staff is your choice, but I would encourage you to keep in mind that suicide is a sensitive issue and it has likely touched all of our lives in varying degrees. Although this video is very well done, it does not follow some best practices for discouraging suicide and offering hope for those who are feeling helpless. Following is what the Redmond SD is sharing with their staff:

A team of community members, with love in their hearts, came together to produce a video that was released this week on social media. While the video includes some local students, it is not a production of a local school district, it is rather a video produced by the Hunter Holmes Memorial Foundation.

Some have asked if this video will be shown in our classrooms and to students. The short answer is “no.” Our district offers rich social emotional health and wellness curriculum throughout all levels and uses commercially-produced content, including video, for teaching and learning. As this video was not included in our adopted curriculum, it is not being used in our classrooms.

Please help us empower our students to talk about suicide and depression in productive, meaningful ways and show them where to find vetted resources. Together, we can help normalize conversations about suicide prevention, how to find resources in our community that support youth and adults through stressful times, and how to help our children navigate current entertainment in ways that facilitate increased parent-child communication around youth suicide and youth suicide prevention.

Teaching young people how to help a friend is an important part of a comprehensive school based suicide prevention strategy. Educational videos that teach basic suicide prevention skills are often a helpful part of the instruction. Videos are most effectively used with an accompanying curriculum and as part of a larger presentation on mental health, mental illness and helping friends in distress.

These resources may be helpful to you in discussing this video with your students, if asked:

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255)
• Oregon Youthline (a free, confidential teen-to-teen crisis and help line; supervised teens are available 4 to 10 p.m. daily; adults available all other times) at 1-877-968-8491 or text teen2teen to 839863.
• The Deschutes Co. Suicide Prevention website has resources and supports that reflect best practices.www.deschutes.org/suicideprevention
• www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org (information and support)
• www.thetrevorproject.org (crisis intervention and resources for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning young people ages 13-24)
• www.namicentraloregon.org (National Alliance on Mental Illness of Central Oregon)
• https://www.bend.k12.or.us/district/organization/student-mental-health (district website with resources)

Reminders:

• New building admin have a meeting on Oct. 1 beginning at 1:45 in the board room. (And you’ll be here early enough to pick your seat for the Leadership meeting!)
• Our first Leadership (all admin) meeting of the year will be on Oct. 1, starting at 3:15.  We’ll be meeting in the Board Room.
• If you haven’t yet, don’t forgot to fill out your SIF and MS Alt fund spreadsheets that can be found on a tab the the bottom of the main page of your Staffing Plan sheet. You can start spending these funds once this step is completed. (Dirk, let me know if you need help with locating these.)

To Do:

• Please pass this opportunity on to your staff as you see fit: Mid Oregon Credit Union is continuing a partnership with KTVZ to present $500 monthly awards for innovative, sustainable classroom projects that are worth being recognized in the community. The program identifies the classroom efforts and awards the teacher/school the funding, and a news story airs on KTVZ to provide a spotlight on the good things that are happening in education. Here is a link for additional information. Please send any nominations directly to Kyle Frick (Mid Oregon) at [email protected]
• Here is one more group that is looking to recognize student writing – with the promise of free food: An essay contest, for current 6th graders, is being sponsored by the Disabled American Veterans Auxiliary. The 350 word or less essay will speak to the importance of voting.  If this becomes a class assignment, all students from the winning class will earn a pizza party.  Here is additional information that you can share with any interested 6th grade teachers.

This and that:

• Here is a bit of an enrollment update from Tuesday evening of this week: We were projected to grow, as a district, by 320 students this year, which is slightly over our actual average growth from the past 20 plus years. However, we have only grown by 53 students (notice this is still a growth in our district) over last year. Specifically for middle schools, we have grown slightly overall, but are 39 under our projection. Our approved district budget and building staffing allocation are both based on our projected enrollment (which we currently have not reached), so I do not anticipate any additional employee support coming to any of our schools – nor do I see any immediate reductions being called for.
• As you know, and will hear more about soon, finding enough Spanish interpreters during peak times like conferences is difficult, yet families needing this service have the right to trained and competent interpreters. In an attempt to help remedy this shortfall, we are working with the ESD to use some of our non-certified, Spanish-speaking staff who are interested in being paid outside of their work time to provide this service. Feel free to begin asking any potential non-certified employees on your staff if they would be interested in this.  If so, we ask that they notify Kinsey of their interest by participating in a one-hour interpretation training so basic expectations can be explained.  Here is more from Kinsey regarding this: If you anticipate using bilingual non-classroom teachers for language interpretation during conferences, please invite them to attend one of these trainings: October 3rd from 2:15-3:15, or October 9th from 4:00-5:00.If neither option falls within their contract hours, we will time-sheet them to attend.To register, please contact Kinsey.
• In this article about learning – and forgetting what we’ve learned – the author points to studies that indicate “about 56 percent of new information is forgotten within an hour, 66 percent after a day, 75 percent after six days…” then goes on to offer suggestions of how the most important learning can be taught in ways where retention is much higher. Likely this will not be new information for you, but will no doubt be a good reinforcement of what you already know or connection to prior knowledge!

Reminders:

• Most of you are aware of this already, but this is also a good time for a reminder: Dana Pedersen – principal at Ensworth – is the point of contact for any questions you might have regarding FAN, homeless education and foster care.
• Looking forward to seeing you all on Monday at 3:15 (meeting start time) at HDMS. Please be there a few minutes prior to this. Here is the agenda.

To Do:

• Please work with your staff to have your enrollment updated/accurate by the end of the day Monday (9/10). This includes having all new students in Synergy, and all students that have not appeared at school yet removed from Synergy.
• As you likely are aware, completely honoring interpreter requests during our conference times is nearly impossible. With this in mind, we are going to try something new this year. Rather than schools making the request for interpreters and holding our breathe that some of these requests get filled, we are instead going to find out when interpreters are available during conference times, share this information with schools, and then communicate with families when interpreters will be in the building. We will not have a good idea of when interpreters will be available until the week of Oct. 1. What I would like to do is hold a meeting with one administrator from any building that will be requesting an interpreter. We will meet at 7:30am on Friday, Oct. 5 here at the Ed Center (in Gary Timm’s office – right next to mine.) So I have an idea how big our group will be, please let me know whom from your school (if anyone) will be attending.

This and that:

• I wish you all could see what I get to see when I visit each of your schools… the excitement, passion, love of getting to work with students – and how it plays out so commonly and differently at the same time at each of your sites. Stopping in to see what was happening on the first day with kids was definitely fun – and something I miss about not working in a building. (To me the feeling is sort of the same felt before a big game [performance, contest, recital, etc.] in that there is some stress leading up to this day, but once it began then the stress turned to adrenaline and it was a whole lot of fun!) I either witnessed or received pictures of your staff adding some fun to their first day outfit in an effort to make kids feel welcomed as they entered, signs around lockers that helped to remind 6th graders how to open their locker, teaching on how “intentions” directly affect the results they experience, as well as tons of support from all staff in the building. The starts of the year are always a mix of chaos, excitement, nerves, planned and unplanned events, and dreams of accomplishment. May these feelings of hope and positive determination continue for the days and weeks ahead.
• Here are the dates for Leadership (all admin meet at the Ed Center board room @ 3:15pm) meetings this year: Oct. 1, Nov. 5, Dec. 3 (social), Feb. 4, April 1, June 17 (BBQ).  Additionally, there will be two meetings (one in March and one in May) that have a PD focus and will be calendared at a later date. More to come regarding our PD-focused meetings next month…
• You may or may not have heard by now that our state has decided that a SBAC “opt out” will be counted as a “Does Not Meet” from now on. This brings two things to my mind.  First, the perception – portrayed through the media – of how well our schools are doing educating kids in our community will likely take a hit as this change will no doubt drop our school’s “Meet” percentage. Second, the validity (and usefulness) of analyzing OAKS scores for informing instruction just got less valid, reliable and useful. (My opinions)
• In this article, What Teachers Look for in School Leaders, author Jon Saphier contends that research indicates trust is a foundational factor needed for collective efficacy – which is essential for high student achievement. Mr. Saphier outlines, from a teacher’s perspective, how a principal can build trust amongst her/his staff. In reading this article my mind wandered toward how trust and school culture are connected…
• This message is from Hayley regarding an update on Skills Trainers:Unfortunately, we learned today, that one of our Skills Trainers will be out on medical leave with a broken leg for the start up of our Skills Training Sessions!Amanda, Cristina, Jen, and Lorna have worked to arrange the schedules to provide Skills Trainers for students that had spring plans in this first session. We are optimistic for our Skills Trainers return and appreciate you understanding with this situation!

Reminders:

• MS Horizontal on Sept. 17, beginning at 3:15pm, at HDMS. Please work to arrive a few minutes prior to 3:15 so we can start on time as we have a very full agenda. I’ll include the agenda with next week’s blog post.

To Do:

• Principals, I have updated the MS Calendar (linked here, or also accessible directly from the TRIBE blog at the top left) to reflect the times I will not be available (that I know of) for the 2018-19 school year. As I have asked you to do in the past, would you please add one site visit a month (I come to you) on this calendar… September – May.  I will again plan on taking about an hour of your time at each visit. Thanks!
• Check out this blog post.  OK, I admit that I read my wife’s library blog … because it is good! In this one she shares first week of school picture books that could be read aloud to classes. After reviewing some of the titles and scanning the comments folks have left, it made me want to buy one or two of these and read to classes in my school (if I were a principal still). Being able to deliver a message around culture to your students, directly from you, in a fun way that the kids would enjoy… Wouldn’t you have fun doing that?

This and that:

• Don’t you love this photo?!  Roger just found out that he had won Administrator of the Year in our district, and to say that it took him a bit by surprise would be an understatement. Congrats Roger!
• Jon and/or Debbie will be talking to us at our Horizontal meeting on Sept. 17 regarding a few HR topics, one of which has to do with the implications the JANUS court decision has on us as a district.  There is much still to work through as it relates to this, but one thing is certain… you must remain neutral in terms of your advocacy for/against (paying of dues towards) union membership. You must not communicate anything that either encourages or discourages a stance. Please refer any questions that come your way to either BEA leadership or HR.
• Sean will come to our first horizontal meeting to discuss school psychs, but he wanted to share this document in advance that outlines a School Psych’s roles and responsibilities.  Feel free to take a sneak peak at what Sean has to say in a few weeks!
• If you were wondering who our district behavior coaches are, what schools they support, or what their role is, wonder no more!
• The following information is from Kerry Morton – and is a great reminder of the new math by-pass process we are using this year.  Please note that she is wanting to know numbers by grade of how many meet these by-pass requirements. Let Kerry or I know if you have any questions.As the year begins, many of you are prepping for students to take the by-pass assessment. Below is some information that will help you:
  • Link for the By-Pass documents and assessment – you must use your gapps account
  • Student must take both the written and EasyCBM to by-pass a grade level according to these requirements
  • The assessment will take approximately 1.5 hours – 1/2 hour for EasyCBM and 1 hour for the written assessment
  • Please DO NOT send home the EasyCBM or written assessments with students
  • If students are not entered in EasyCBM, please contact Stephanie Bent and Dave Vanloo at least two days prior to the administering the assessment

  Since this is the first year using these assessments, the team would like to find out the number of students by-passing at each school at each grade level. Please submit that information to me once you know the numbers.

• As part of National Suicide Prevention Week, Deschutes Co Health Services is sponsoring a QPR Suicide Prevention Training on Wednesday, September 12th from 5:30pm-7:30pm. Cheryl Emmerson will be facilitating, with assistance from Leanna Leyes. You may recall that QPR training is provided to each of our school’s staff every three years.  If you have recently hosted this training but have others interested in attending, please have them register here.
• As most of you are aware, I get the opportunity to work with our counselors throughout the district. Last spring I was approached about the possibility of having a more formal process/understanding of when it is appropriate/needed to get a substitute for a counselor absence. I created this form and sent it out to all counselors to get their input.  In early August, after a few tweaks to the draft, Cabinet approved the process noted at the bottom of the page.  I’ll be sharing this with counselors at our October meeting.
• As most of you know, Marshall campus is going through a variety of changes – but not just to the buildings.  Here is some additional information regarding other changes occurring in the coming months: This fall, Marshall High School will begin offering new CTE pathways for students. New principal Sal Cassaro is excited to lead Marshall with a focus on allowing students to pursue their passions in career and tech fields within a small school environment. The five new CTE pathways include STEM engineering, construction technologies, business and marketing, health occupations and JROTC. These programmatic changes will continue to evolve and take shape throughout the school year and will continue to include key input from students and staff. Sal will host a meeting with current Marshall students prior to the start of school and is planning an open house for the fall.
• Here is an article that was in a recent Marshall Memo, entitled: “Approaching a New School Year with a ‘Design’ Perspective.” There are a number of things that we have “traditionally” done at the start of the school year. This article made me pause and consider why we do them, what might we replace them with, and what (if any) would be the reasoning for making a change.  I hope this article makes you think a bit about whether your start of the year is the best it can be (like it made me reflect on what I might have done differently).

Reminders:

• Our first MS Horizontal of the year will be Monday, 9/17/18, at HDMS – starting at 3:15.  Let me know if you’d like to add anything to the agenda.  (I’ll be sending you the agenda with these notes on the Friday prior to our meeting.)
• And speaking of MS Horizontal meetings, if you don’t already have these in your calendar, here are our Horizontal meetings for 2018-19.

To Do:

• Principals, here is this year’s admin work calendar for you to fill out and return to me. Please take your best guess of days you’ll not be working by blocking them out on the calendar. Please plan to have these returned to me by the start of September. VP’s, you should turn yours in to your principal.
• Rather than try and schedule a horizontal meeting in August, I’d like to come visit with you at your school for 30 minutes at a time that works for you.  Please let me know when you’d like for me to come to your site in the next few weeks.  Again, I’ll try and keep it to 30 minutes of your time and there is nothing you need to prepare for in advance.

This and that:

• This will be the first TRIBE of the year – but I will not send out another weekly post until the end of this month. I did want to send this one out in early August in order to remind or provide you one-stop shopping access to a number of documents and other information prior to your staff returning. This one is going to be heavy on “sit and get,” but I’ll try and make it as painless as possible…
• You may have noticed already, but our fall conferences come a week prior to the end of the first quarter.  The reason for this is Halloween.  We are avoiding making our (and elementary as well) parents choose between coming to school conferences or taking their child trick-or-treating.  Pretty sure we’d lose that one.
• Here is a list of dates/times and tentative locations (tentative because I have not heard back from all of the principals yet as to whether they are able to host on the date suggested) of our Horizontal meetings for this year.  You’ll also find this list stored on the TRIBE BLS Docs tab.

Reminders:

• At our Horizontal last May, we discussed some changes in MS math sequencing and identification of excelling students.  At that time we agreed that it would be a good idea if we had our math teachers proctor the easyCBM during the first week(s) of class in order to help identify any students who should be placed in the next sequenced math class. As a reference, here is the bypass test requirements, pathways guiding principles, pathways info for parents, and MS math acceleration options. And maybe most useful of all, here is the link to the Google Doc with all of these documents (including the bypass tests by grade level). Please note that even though you are going to be administering the fall math easyCBM, you will still be asked to also have students complete the fall math ACT Aspire assessment as you’ve done in the past. There will be further discussion regarding the on-going feasibility of both of these being administered in the fall, but for this year please plan on completing both with students.
• Another item from our May Horizontal that I followed-up on was the question around Article 15 in the BEA contract. As a reminder, the language reads: “One-half day at the end of the first and third quarter for school grading on a quarterly system.” The question was (basically) “does the whole school need to be grading on a quarterly system in order to get this half-day grading, or can those individual teachers grading on a quarterly system within a school have the half-day?” The answer, as a reminder, is that the only way any teacher receives a half-day grading is if the whole school is on a quarterly system. In practical terms, if your whole school is issuing final quarter grades (i.e. SVMS) then conferences start at 11:15am on Oct. 25. If some teachers (or no teachers) are grading issuing final quarter grades, then everyone starts conferencing at 7:15(ish) on Oct. 25. If you already have some teachers grading on the quarter system, a conversation with your ICCL/staff about having everyone issue final grades each quarter may not be out of line.

Calendar:

• Next Wednesday (8.8.18) is our Leadership Academy in Sunriver. If you haven’t already, please let Andrea Wilson know right away how many ICCL’s you’ll be bringing from your school. Please bring a copy of your school’s Design Plan with you. Also, that evening is the annual admin dinner at Mike Tillers.
• As a reminder, Safety Day training will be on Aug. 9 at Summit HS.  Registration begins at 7:30, first speaker at 8:00 and concludes at 4:00. The keynote trainer for the day is John Michael-Keyes, who’s team developed the Standard Response Protocols we use in our district. Please plan on attending!
• If you have not participated in the Take it Up training previously, I encourage you to attend with some others from your staff. It will happen on Monday and Tuesday, Aug. 13, 14 at PCMS.
• You have received emails inviting you to sign up for the Innovative Teaching & Learning conference happening on Aug. 21 & 22 (Tues & Wed) at PCMS.
• The second annual Trauma Informed Summit will happen on Thursday, Aug. 23 at SHS.
• Principals, plan on being at Summit HS on Monday morning, Aug., 27, in order to introduce your new certified staff. Introductions should be brief, warm, and welcoming.
• Our district staff welcome back (with crazy good speaker, Chad Hymas) will begin at 1:00pm at Bend High on Tuesday, Aug. 28. Because activities will end around 4:00pm this day, feel free to encourage your staff to arrive to work at 8:00am that morning and stay until 4:00pm that afternoon.

TO DO:

• Have a great last week with your students and staff!

THIS AND THAT:

• Earlier this week Skip and I spoke about required trainings in the fall for your teachers. He is working on putting together a concise list of what and when those trainings are, and will communicate these prior to your teacher’s departure next week.
• At our last Horizontal meeting we spent some time talking about Article 15 in the BEA contract – regarding schools grading on the quarter system receiving 4 hours of work time. This week I was able to follow-up with folks here regarding “option C” that we discussed to see if it would fit within the language of our current contract. In short, it does not. I’d be happy to fill you in on the reasons for this if you’d like – just let me know. Therefore, with current contract language, your school can take 4 hours of prep (Thursday conferences then begin at 11:15) if everyone grades on a quarter system. If you will not be issuing final grades school-wide every quarter then your Thursday conferences will start in the morning and last until 7:15pm.
• I end this year’s Tribe updates with a story that is one of my favorites, of a person whom “beats the odds” – that highlights the power of the will of the human spirit – one that didn’t listen to the doubters, but stuck to their vision. Hope you enjoy the message of this 2:28 minute video.
• The fall district Welcome Back will occur, as you know, on August 28.  What you may not know is that it will begin at 1:00 and end at 4:30pm at Bend High. This is a workday for many, but not all of our employees.  For whomever it is regular workday the expectation is that they come to this event. [And besides, Chad Hymas, the keynote speaker is fantastic!] Because it is scheduled to end at 4:30, we are asking all secondary admin to have their staff start their workday at 8:30 (rather than 7:15) so they can stay throughout this event during their 8-hr workday. However, this is not a hill to die on. If an employee wants to start at 7:15 and leave this event at 3:15 then they can do that. (They will be missing staff awards, free food and live music.)
• I currently plan on not being in the office on Tuesday afternoon, but you can reach me by cell at any time. If I haven’t told you yet, we are moving (to DRW) and can’t get into our new home until noon on Tuesday, have to return our U-Haul by 4:00pm, and have to be completely out of our current house that same day by 5:00pm. And, I wish there was someone (else) I could blame besides myself for committing (six months ago) to getting a puppy at this same time.  Hope you enjoy the photo of Christie and our 9-week-old “Mellie.” Things are a bit crazy around the Boen house right now…

REMINDERS:

• This will be the last TRIBE for the 2017-18 school year… can’t believe we are looking through the rearview mirror at another year!
• Looking forward to seeing you all at the Leadership BBQ on Monday, June 18 at noon.
• Please keep in mind what you might do – or have your ICCL’s involved doing – to create a memorable moment for your new certified hires between now and the start of the year.  As a reminder, here is the link to an “ideas page” that might help spur a new idea to try.