Welcome to the two NEW members to our team!
Dr. LaKisha Clark, Bend Tech Academy Principal
Kelly Beaudry, Assistant Principal, Bend Senior High School.
To Do:
From Jennifer: Wayfinder training: Recently you received a login code from Wayfinder, and an invite from Jennifer Hauth, to a mandatory 45 minute virtual admin training with Wayfinder on Friday, August 11, starting at 9:00.
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From Deby in Support Services: Be sure you send your administrative and office team members to these trainings in August. The Office Manager training is
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Kinsey: Taking It Up workshop: Our district’s intention is that all staff—prioritizing leadership—participate in Coaching for Educational Equity (CFEE, a week-long intensive workshop) and/or the two-day Taking It Up. Many of our leaders are already CFEE graduates, so we’re well on our way.
CFEE and TIU are incredibly valuable ways to engage in the ongoing journey of understanding oppression in Oregon’s history and education system, as well as to develop shared language as a leadership team and staff.
If you have not yet participated in CFEE and don’t anticipate being able to do so in the next year or so, please sign up ASAP for Taking It Up this August 22-23. Please include this invitation in your welcome-back message to your staff and encourage them (particularly your ICCL members) to sign up.
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From Ryan in Human Resources: Please encourage your new certified staff members to attend the New Licensed Staff Orientation on Monday, August 28th at Silver Rail Elementary School with all our newly-hired certified staff.
The orientation will take place from 8:00 AM to 4:00 PM, with breakfast service beginning at 7:30 AM. Lunch will be from 12:00 – 1:00, hosted by Bend Education Association, and job-alike sessions will be held from 1:00 – 4:00. A more detailed agenda for the day will be available at the orientation.
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Staffing Plans: Keep on updating those plans as changes occur in your staffing! In September, April and I will schedule a time to meet each school’s Principal and Office Manager to review your school’s plan.
Information:
From Lora: Leadership Training next week: Our two day Leadership Launch is scheduled for August 7 and 8 next week at the Riverhouse Convention Center 8:-4. Plan to join our BLAST team at Dana Pederson’s home the evening of August 7@ 5:00.
The MS and HS Horizontal Team training is scheduled for August 10 8:00-4:00 @ BSHS in Perseverance Hall.
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Inservice Week : Here is a reminder of the the guidelines for inservice week, as you and your leadership teams plan and prepare to launch the school year.
August 30 is our District Training Day. That morning, plan to have your staff meet in the same room for the virtual welcome back event. After that event, building leaders will lead training with your staff focused on priority standards/equitable grading and MTSS Tier 1 student support systems. More to come on this during our August 10 MS/HS training.
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From Dean: The job description for the Graduation Coach has been updated. Here is the link. The main updates are:
- Being a part of the decision-making process for the GED
- Tracking supports for Native American students (per ODE direction)
- Participate in Ninth Grade On Track meetings
Dean will be scheduling a meeting with Grad Coaches and Admin who oversee them in the first weeks of school to solidify the role of the Grad Coach in each school.
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HDESD Substitute Management: You may have received this email from Kristen at the HDESD regarding the new substitute software. She suggests that teachers run through the module prior to school beginning – which takes about 20 min. Here is her message:
You’ve likely heard that HDESD is transitioning to a new substitute placement software platform in the coming school year. We are pleased to introduce Red Rover, which will significantly streamline the processes around absence management, sub placement and time tracking. Red Rover is a one-stop shop that is more secure and user-friendly than the current process which requires two systems (one to find sub placement and another to clock hours).
We wanted to keep you informed as we will be communicating with school office managers, teachers and substitutes beginning next week. They will receive instructions and training directly from Red Rover and we will be working alongside them to ensure they have what they need to use the new platform, including the free mobile app. We will also be asking school office managers to help us communicate with their accounting, billing and secretarial staff as well as serving as point of contact for each school (with support from our HDESD sub team).
HDESD will officially go live with Red Rover on August 21st, at which time subs will be able to start accepting assignments. Meantime, we will be working with teachers to build their profiles and enter absences beginning August 9.
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From Scott McDonald: This is the second reminder that this coming fall, we will be switching from WebEx to Microsoft Teams as our preferred video conferencing platform.
Although there is plenty of time to get comfortable with teams before WebEx goes away in late October, we hope that many of you will consider making the jump sooner rather than later.
If you regularly host meetings with students or staff, I recommend watching the following training videos-
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/join-a-teams-meeting-078e9868-f1aa-4414-8bb9-ee88e9236ee4
Watching all the tutorial videos will surely make you a Teams Wizard. However, if you only have time to watch one, then choose “Manage Meetings” and you will get by.
Obviously, there is a great deal more that you can do professionally with the Microsoft Teams app besides video conferencing. The Microsoft Teams Help and Learning Site is full of resources that will help you better understand how to make the most of the platform at work.
Feel free to call the the Help Desk at 541 355 1200 if you have specific questions about this change or any other IT related matter.
Also…
Beginning this week, a new network for personal devices (Bring Your Own Device) is available in our schools and district facilities. This network is called BLS BYOD. BLS BYOD will be replacing BLS Wi-Fi (our old personal device network). Staff and students needing a wireless connection for their personal device should now use BLS BYOD. This change does not impact district issued computers, iPads or other devices. Additionally, district owned devices should never be connected to BLS BYOD.
The password to connect to BLS BYOD is knowledge. After connecting, you will be prompted for your district username and password.
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From Doug Pigman, Executive Director of Facilities: Welcome back Administrators!
We hope you had a restful summer, and you had an opportunity to do something fun.
We wanted to send out a recap email to provide an update on the current state of our Outside Services crew. Knowing that we have struggled in the past to get the needed summer help, we posted the positions mid-February in an attempt to get our posting out before the competition. We were looking to hire and onboard 13 temporary summer staff but received very little response. At that time, the job openings were posted, and the projects and workload had been identified, but by mid-June, we had only one (1) additional summer staff member on board. By late July, we had only four (4) additional summer staff onboarded, however, during this time, we were then five (5) permanent staff down, putting our team at a deficit of one (-1). As a result of being extremely short-handed, our staff has been working overtime in an attempt to keep up as much as possible, but everyone can clearly see it is not humanly possible with this much of a staffing shortage. Our permanent employees, who would normally be committed to summer projects, have now had to switch to mowing and maintaining the grounds the best they can. The normal areas where attention has been historically focused, such as weeding, parking lot sweeping, sidewalk edging and other normal summer tasks, were simply out of our control to fully maintain. Field lining is set to begin next week; therefore, we will need to move employees from the mow crew to complete field lining on time, which means we will have even fewer employees maintaining grounds at this time.
The Outside Services crew takes great pride in their work and would like to have everything finished for the returning students this fall. If there are specific projects you may have requested to be completed this summer and it has not been done, our team requests your patience as we are working to the best of our ability.
For your viewing pleasure HERE is a copy of 2022 Bond projects progress.
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From Garra in Nutrition Services News:
Due to the Oregon “No Shaming Law” we are only allowed to discuss meal balances with parents or guardians. Uncollected charges are considered debts to the district and as such may need to be covered with general fund dollars which takes money from the classrooms. To avoid this, our staff work diligently in sending notifications by email, US mail, and phone calls to parents trying to get payment or a free and reduced application. When all of these efforts have failed, our staff may look to you for support. Often a phone call from an administrator is more influential.
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From Paul in Human Resources:
New UKG Interface
On August 4th, UKG updated their dashboard interface. This is a cosmetic change only. Please be patient as you grow acclimated to the new interface and access the content as you did prior to the upgrade. This video provides an overview of the changes.
Safe Schools and Professional Development Opportunities
UKG’s Learning module will store our Safe Schools Compliance Training materials and replace Performance Matters as the method to view and sign up for professional development opportunities. Here are some resources to orient yourself to the Learning module:
- Video Overview of the Learning Module
- Video Overview For Safe Schools Access
- Google Doc of Learning Module Tips
Safe Schools trainings are now available in Learning as are many Summer PD classes.
New Substitute Request System
HDESD has replaced Frontline’s Absence Management/Aesop/Sub-Finder software with Red Rover. The ESD will be sharing information on how to access, set up and use Red Rover prior to the start of the school year.
IMPORTANT CHANGE: Effective immediately, all staff will submit their time off requests through UKG. If a staff member requires a substitute for that absence, then they will ALSO submit a substitute request through Red Rover.
Time off requests will be made through the Self-Service tab by clicking on the button (see below) and following the prompts. Each staff member’s time off options are different depending upon their position.
Tech Support
- Support for UKG Timesheet/Time off questions contact Payroll Department: [email protected]
- Support for UKG HR questions contact HR Technical support at: [email protected]
- Help Desk phone support at x1200 for issues like login and multifactor authentication problems
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From Kinsey: Inclusion and belonging are critically important values in our organization. A key opportunity to demonstrate these values is to respect important holidays observed by faith groups in our community. Some of these dates are not designated days off school within our district calendar, so we need to do our best to keep them free of major activities.
On the following fall dates, please do NOT schedule school family nights, special events or trips, or exams/required activities or trainings (for staff or students) that can’t be made up. In addition, share with your office, athletics, counseling, and teachers as applicable.
- Saturday, Sept 16 Rosh Hashanah
- Monday, Sept 25 Yom Kippur
Learn more about these holidays and how to accommodate here. Guidance for best practices around religion in our schools here.
Calendar:
Here is the link to the SIW calendar for 23-24
- August 7, 8:00-4:00 at the Riverhouse Convention Center: A Culture of Safety and Belonging: K-12 Leaders
- August 7, BLAST (Bend-La Pine Administrator and Supervisor Team) K-12 and District Admin Dinner at the home of Dana and Dan Pedersen, 5:00. You and your spouse/partner, are invited to an amazing dining experience catered by our own nutritional services department. Come and enjoy a relaxing time to eat, drink, and be merry, with your colleagues at the Pedersen’s beautiful country setting. Dana’s address is: 62880 Dickey Road (east out Hwy 20).
- August 8, 8:00-4:00 at the Riverhouse Convention Center: A Culture of Leading and Learning: K-12 Leaders
- August 10, 8:00-4:00: MS/HS Team Launch 8:00-4:00 @ BSHS in Perseverance Hall.
- August 11, 9:00-10:00; Wayfinder training, virtual link sent to you from Jennifer Hauth.
- August 28, 7:30-9:00: New Teacher Orientation Day at Silver Rail Elementary
- August 29, (time TBD, but plan for about 1.5 hours around 8:00) District Virtual Welcome Back Event and District Training