Team,
Have a restful well deserved Spring Break! ~Juan
To Do
On April 4 we will have our last ICCL/Admin meeting of the year. As was communicated in January, the February ICCL/Admin meeting was reallocated to allow you time to work on sharing a high point of your Climate/Culture and Academic work for this year.
The April meeting will be spent sharing these “high lights” for the first part of our time.
The second part of the meeting, school teams will be asked to review and provide feedback on the proposed multi-year professional development plan focused on priority standards/grading and the BLS Life and Career Readiness plan.
The meeting will be at BSHS in Perseverance Hall, the same location as our first meeting from 4:30-6:30
End of the year planning:
June 14: the last Wednesday of the year (this is not and early release day)
June 16: the last day of school for kids (this is an early release day)
June 19: this is a holiday
June 20: this is the final work day of the year for teachers BUT if they complete all their end of the year work and responsibilities and have everything “checked off” by their administrator then they do not have to report to work on this day.
June 22: this is our all admin CEL day. Mandatory attendance.
This and That
An announcement from Steve Cook:
Dear Team,
I have a couple of announcements before we head off into spring break that I wanted to share with our district and school leaders. Two moves of note are the following:
- Tammy Doty has been promoted to executive director of elementary schools and is now a member of Cabinet. While it is atypical for me to appoint people into positions, after multiple conversations with our chief human resources officer and our deputy superintendent, it became abundantly clear that Tammy’s levels of responsibility mirror those of the current level leaders. Tammy will be among the leaders choosing the second executive director of elementary schools, who will begin in the summer of 2023.
- Back in November, we commissioned a departmental review of our DEI department, including our ELL services, to give us a better picture of the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats of the two departments. This review was conducted by the Coalition of Oregon School Administrators. (This report in its entirety is available upon request.) It contains some very important points of feedback and recommendations, along with several commendations. The weaknesses and opportunities were not surprising to us, but external recognition of those assessments was valuable. Most of the opportunities for growth, improvement, and system recommendations tie directly to increasing resource allocation. As a result of these recommendations, I am moving forward with the following staffing changes/additions:
- Kinsey Martin will become the executive director of policy, advocacy, and equity (job description here ), reporting directly to the superintendent.
- The district will post the position of director of multilingual services (job description here).
- The district will post four half-time positions for a team of LEAD/Equity TOSA’s (coaches) (job description here).
I am excited that these steps will directly support our goals and also reflect our deep and growing commitment to promoting equitable experiences and outcomes for all our students, as well as better serving our multilingual students and families. I would also add a very strong vote of confidence in the work of Kinsey Martin, for keeping up so much of this critical work over the past couple of years. As you will read in this review, she has been integral throughout this process. And while Skip Offenhauser’s retirement is a loss, I believe that the elementary leadership remains in capable hands with Tammy Doty’s skills as a building and district leader, as well as her deep knowledge of elementary instructional practices.
Best, Steve
From Sean Reinhart
Sources of Strengths class/club:
Are you intending to have a Sources of Strengths section or club next school year? If you have not reached out to Jennifer Hauth or Sean Reinhart regarding your intent to implement and plan for a Sources of Strength class or club for next year, please do so by April 7, 2023. They are putting together a final budget for being able to fund Sources of Strengths and need to do this before forecasting starts. Thank you!
From Kinsey Martin
Multilingual Staff Evaluations and Staffing:
Just a reminder: I am supporting a portion of mini’s and formals for each Language Specialist, Mutilingual and LEAD TOSAs, Dual Immersion Coaches, and probationary-status Dual Immersion teachers. For itinerant Language Specialists, let me know if you want to coordinate end-of-year evaluations differently than in prior years.
Family Liaisons are not on a formal evaluation cycle this year, but feedback conversations are ongoing–always feel free to send me feedback (concerns, appreciations) throughout the year on your site’s assigned liaison, as it is helpful for me in supporting their work across buildings.
Multilingual staffing/school assignments for next year may shift slightly—there are several retirements, etc, on the team, as well as population shifts across schools. I’ll be in touch with each principal to talk about any changes to your site, but in the meantime if you have ideas, questions, etc, on multilingual staffing or services please reach out!
Dress Code:
Right after spring break, the LEAD/Equity TOSAs will have a student mini-lesson ready for you regarding the dress code. I would recommend reserving some time at a staff meeting in early/mid-April to conduct the actual lesson with your staff, as it provides a great opportunity to discuss bias and to calibrate your interpretation of the rules together. That would also allow your teachers to become familiar with the lesson before teaching it to students.
The lesson is geared for 6th-12th grades, but easily accommodated for 5th grade; a family letter will be included as well. As the weather warms up, proactive conversations with staff, students, and families about clothing choices will help avoid misunderstandings, surprises, or unintended harm—thanks for your partnership.
From Scott McDonald
During Spring Break week (March 27-31), IT will be making some changes to the “electronic” web help desk ticket system (https://bls.fyi/help). The most significant changes will be to the category layout used for creating new tickets. Our hope is that the enhanced ticket system will be clear and intuitive for everyone. If you wish to provide any feedback or have questions about the changes, please reach out to our “human” Help Desk at extension 1200.
From Dean Richards
Please communicate with staff that we will not be running Basecamp for rising 9th graders this summer. This decision was made because we have not seen greater outcomes for students who have participated in Basecamp.
Sharon Bellusci
Central Oregon Decoding Dyslexia
Please join us for the Central Oregon Dyslexia Conference on April 22nd. We are excited to announce that Bend-La Pine and Redmond Schools are partnering with Decoding Dyslexia Central Oregon to host this Dyslexia Conference. The International Dyslexia Association – Oregon Branch will be presenting along with local dyslexia tutors and literacy specialists.
I hope you will attend and encourage administrators in key areas to attend. The conference is free and will focus on ways to reach and advance all struggling readers, but especially children who have characteristics of dyslexia.
We would love to have this information shared to principals and key personnel, even at the MS or HS level. Our message is that it’s never too late for kids to become better readers. When the wave of kids impacted by COVID starts hitting MS in the near future and then in the HS, everyone will need more understanding of reading struggles and how to help kids who missed out on so much of their foundational skills. This conference can bring better a understanding of reading to that conversation that will help BLP prepare for that future.
More information and registration : https://www.eventbrite.com/e/central-oregon-dyslexia-conference-tickets
Calendar
March 27-31: Spring Break
April 3: Pacific Crest Middle School Classroom/Environmental Observation
April 10: Principal Professional Development @3:00-4:30 in the Board room
April 13: Middle School Admin Work Session 3:00-4:30 pm @Pilot Butte MS
April 14: CEL – all administrators 8:00-2:30 @ BSHS Perseverance Hall
April 24: VP/Dean Training Room 314 @ Ed Center
Fish On…
