GIANT Connections

Happy Friday staff! I think I may have run out of superlatives to describe the emotional rollercoasters we board from week to week. As I stated this morning, I am so grateful for your patience and grace as we continue to navigate rapidly changing information flows and quickly developing parameters on how we approach all aspects of doing school.

I hope that everyone has a great weekend! In typical Stancliff fashion, we bought Easter candy on sale way ahead of time. What that means is that all family members, adults included, have been grazing on a steady diet of chocolate for weeks now, and there may well be nothing left to hide in eggs this weekend.

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CALENDAR ITEMS:

• Monday 4/5
  • Start of last hybrid rotation B
  • Start of football and x-country practices
• Wednesday 4/7
  • All-staff meeting @ 1:00 PM
  • No students
  • All-in prep
  • No SIW
• Monday 4/12
  • First day of “all-in”
  • Rotation A starts
• Wednesday 4/14
  • Conferences (teachers available by WebEx from 5:00-8:00)
• Thursday 4/15
  • Conferences (teachers available by WebEx from 5:00-8:00)

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To Do’s:

• Teachers please finish and upload your conference videos to our Drive by 4/9.
• Teachers please use this form to let Mary know when you want us to schedule your 2 flex hours of conferences. We need this information no later than 4:30 on Monday, 4/5.
• Teachers please plan to integrate a quick discussion of content-specific info. students may include in their take-home conference slide deck as part of your warm-ups next week. (This ought to be fairly quick, but advisors have fielded some questions on content that they aren’t sure how to answer. It could be as simple as pointing kids to the slides that are in the advisory module and asking them what questions they have about your class.)
• All staff please use this form to submit names for our “Excellence in Education” staff awards. In the past, our admin teams have been the primary source of input for this process, but this year we would like to put it out there for everyone. As a reminder, nominees need at least three years of experience (including this year) in the district to be eligible. I will submit nominees to Andrea Wilson not later than Wednesday afternoon.

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On the Radar:

For all-in instruction, we plan to move our advisory to the back end of the day. We have already cleared it with Patty Givens and Scott McDonald downtown, so barring any new objections on a technical front, we plan to move forward with a PM advisory. This may mean, however, that on the first day of all-in we do some essential announcements and brief sharing of expectations and safety reminders at the beginning of the 1st period.

Mary will be issuing guidance early next week on conference logistics, and we will be communicating with families this week and next on a range of issues related to returning to all-in instruction in addition to families accessing take-home conferences and WebEx slots.

State testing will move ahead this year, but in a dramatically reduced format, including length and type of assessments as well as what is required at each grade level. We will be working on the logistics, but as a heads up, we will likely leverage advisory classes as the primary venue for administering these assessments. This will require a little bit of training for teachers, but we will streamline that to the extent that we can.

During next week’s staff meeting at 1:00 pm on Wednesday, we will highlight some of the new safety measures we are taking as well as other logistical developments associated with the all-in model. Please forward me individual questions you are hoping to have addressed in that meeting ahead of time, and I will get them on the agenda.

Now that the district has processed ACRs and settled on our FTE numbers for next year, Mary, Belén and I will be sitting down to work on the master schedule for next year. As we do every spring, we will send out a form soon that will allow you to submit assignment preferences.

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Shout-outs:

. . . go to Dan Potts and his army of track volunteers! Dan has been invaluable in helping our school community navigate rapidly changing realities associated with athletics and has consistently advocated for our students having safe access to opportunities. Thank you to Dan as well to everyone who has supported out virtual track meets! It has been super fun to watch our kids get out and be active even if they haven’t had a ton of time to hone their skills.

Birthday wishes go out to Stacy Welsh who will be celebrating tomorrow (4/30) Happy birthday!

Good Friday Morning Staff! I am thrilled to connect with you on the day before a much needed spring break. Two full rotations are in the books, and I just want to extend my thanks to everyone for doing their part to make it work as well is it could for our students and families. This post will be shorter than most with just a few reminders. My hope is that, in a few hours, your focus will quickly shift to whatever you have planned to make your spring break meaningful to you and your family!

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CALENDAR ITEMS:

• Monday, 3/29
  • Return to rotation A schedule
  • Fire Drill during advisory
• Tuesday, 3/30
  • Fire Drill during advisory
• Wednesday, 3/31
  • SIW (PLCs meet – menu of topics to follow)

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On the radar:

If you have reconsidered whether or not you would like to have a role in summer school initiatives and think you might like to participate, please fill out the survey here. It closes on 4/2.

In our SIW earlier in the month, I referenced an opportunity to have an informal equity listening session on Tuesday, 3/30 in the evening. With my candidacy for the position at Sisters still pending, I would like to hit pause for a moment, and will give you an update as soon as I can on rescheduling that opportunity.

TIME SENSITIVE OPPORTUNITY: If you are interested in joining Doug Reeves and his team at Creative-Leadership-Solutions as you work on a challenge, define a problem of practice, and test out interventions and ideas as you create an action research project, then sign up for the OSU-Cascades class.  It is a 2-credit class that is offered in Spring 2021 (see the syllabus for dates and course requirements).  Registration is currently open but will close on March 31st.  To register for the class, complete the registration and application form and upload them to this google folder. If you have attended a BLS-OSU Cascades class in the last 12 months, then you do not need to complete the application form.  There is an initial $35 application fee which will be billed by OSU-C once they receive your application. Additionally, we will compensate teachers for the five after school sessions (including May) and the time to prep for the May share out.  

If you have any questions, please contact Michele Oakes  ([email protected]).

Teachers, remember that we will hope to try and have scores entered for rotation B summatives by Friday, 4/2.

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SHOUT OUTS:

Thanks and congratulations to Karen’s work with Chinese culture club . . . and for Kelly Ye’s wonderfully creative and award-winning project!

Happy birthday shoutouts for break and the week after go to Jennifer Horn (3/20), Alisha Schmidt (3/21), Pat Roberts (3/30), Nicole Murphy (3/30), April McCarthy (4/1) . . . We hope you enjoy those Birthdays!

Good afternoon and happy Friday staff! I hope the week has gone well, and that rotation B has also gone as smoothly as possible. My guess is that many of you are being inundated with rumors and speculation about a return to having all students push back in. I have spoken to a few of you, but I do not have much, if any, intel beyond what you may have heard. What I do know, is that next week ODE will update the RSSL guidance and that will have a lot to do with shaping what spring looks like for districts across the state. Such guidance, as has been reported on, could include reducing the distance required for classroom seating and other interactions as well as overall square footage requirements for physical spaces. I hope that I will have more to report on this front headed into break.

In the meantime, I hope everyone will get out and enjoy the sunshine this weekend, and that we can recharge for our last week of rotation B headed into break!

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CALENDAR ITEMS:

• Sunday 3/14
  • Spring forward (set your clocks!)
• Monday 3/15
  • Virtual track meet (check in with Potts if you can help)
• Tuesday 3/16
  • Virtual track meet (check with Potts if you can help)
• Wednesday 3/17
  • All staff check in at 1:30 to review conference planning (In my WebEx room)
  • SIW (grade level teams) at 2:00
• Thursday 3/18
  • Stancliff out AM
• Monday 3/22 – Friday 3/27
  • Spring Break

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Staff To-Do’s:

• Please review the plan for the advisory schedule in the email that Mary sent
• Please review the list of your advisory students (if you have advisory) that received multiple NGs
  • Please plan to connect by phone with families to see what support they or the student may need and gauge how the feel the current rotation is going.
• For all families, we will have the first of our three SLGG related communications be focused conference information, and we will provide a script advisory teachers can work from for an email.

On the Radar . . .

Many of you have been inquiring about conference details. This is rapidly taking shape, and we will have a general information share prior to SIW on 1:30 on Wednesday in my WebEx room.

We still do not have any clarity over the testing standoff between the state and the federal government, but we will likely still have to send out some communication to families. When we do, that won’t necessarily be a signal that we are moving ahead.

Please use as much discretion as possible when referring to student information in an email. If information needs to be shared that includes a more than one piece of student information (name, assessment info, IEP information, other identifiable info) then this should not be sent via regular email. Generally, if any private information is needed to be shared we should be using BLS Send.

Initial enrollment numbers are out for fall of 2021. These numbers may flux depending on BLO enrollment, but as of right now we are looking at: 240 for 6th, 226 for 7th, and 192 for 8th.

Instructional technology has rebranded as BLS EdTech to avoid confusion with IT department, and here is their latest post.

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Shout Outs . . .

. . . to our team, which has been extremely generous in helping out when folks when guest teachers have not been available. Thank you so much for supporting one another!

Birthday love goes to . . . Shelby Paulson (3/13)!

Good afternoon staff! Thank you for another outstanding week of supporting students in this hybrid model. Everything we do takes a team effort, and it has been great to recognize our classified staff this week and the critical role they play in serving our students and families. Each of you bring unique talents and skills to our work, fulfill indispensable roles, and add value to our students’ experience. We honor and thank you!!!

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CALENDAR ITEMS:

• Monday 3/8
  • Incoming 6th grade orientation (5:00 PM in Stancliff’s WebEx, 6:00 PM for Spanish session)
• Wednesday 3/10
  • SIW 2:30-4:00 – Equitable grading practices with Doug Reeves (See the email from Lora Nordquist on 3/4 for the link)

(This is a departure from our previous plan for grade level meetings because we initially believed only ICCL leaders would be attending this presentation. This will push our grade levels back a week, but we will still push out lists of students with multiple no-grades to advisory teachers next week.)

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TO DO’s:

• Reach out to Mary or Steve if you have not had a chance to get a summative score entered for rotation A.
• You received a survey from Jim Boen about helping with summer school in early August. Please only fill out the survey if you are interested.

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On the radar . . .

Officer Schaier has been reassigned from middle schools and Bend Tech over to MVHS for the rest of the school year. He will continue to help us when needed in an as-needed capacity.

We are working out the logistics of conferences over the next few days but here are some things to expect:

• Students will prepare a guided slide show of their semester 2 progress to present to their parents
• WebEx conferences will be by invite/appt.
• Each teacher will create a 3-5 minute video that contains:
  • An introduction to you
  • How to best connect when needed
  • Overview of courses taught
  • Scan of the room
  • Highlights of important class policies
  • Overview of units taught
  • Tips on how to thrive in your class

We hope to have as many details as possible worked out by early next week, in terms of scheduling logistics and will subsequently update the back-to-school-docs folder. We will also do an information share in an upcoming SIW.

Shout out’s . . .

One more hooray for our support staff! Thank you for all you do!

Birthday love goes to Coach Mac and Mary Koike (3/12) and Shelby Paulson (3/13) Enjoy your birthdays!!

Happy Friday Staff and congrats on finishing up our first three week session! From what I’ve observed, students are starting to open up a bit and despite our distancing measures, classes are beginning to feel more vibrant. I hope the transition to periods 4-7 goes as smoothly as possible. Please reach out to Mary and me for any help or support needed!

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CALENDAR ITEMS:

• Monday, 3/1
  • Start of Rotation B
• Wednesday, 3/3
  • SIW 2:30 (whole staff in Stancliff’s WebEx)
• Thursday, 3/4
  • Picture day (Students called down by alpha groups)
• Friday, 3/5
  • Picture day (Students called down by alpha groups)
• Monday, 3/8
  • Forecasting orientation for families (5:00 for English, 6:00 for Spanish in Stancliff’s WebEx)

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TO DO’s:

• Teachers please try to have summatives associated with these first three weeks entered into Synergy by Friday, 3/5. We will use that Synergy data to populate our spreadsheet for grade level meetings on 3/10.
• Teachers please take a moment to fill out the survey that Lyndsey sent in order to help us guide our efforts on re-centering ATLs in our curriculum

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ON THE RADAR:

Next week we get show our appreciation for all of our support staff. We have an amazing crew here, and would not be able to function without their hard work and talent.

Quick note on picture day . . . please know that we do not have a more straightforward way to get the right kids called down for pictures than to use the overhead announcement even though we know it will end up being a bit disruptive. The small window and timing of many schools trying to get this done did not leave us with a lot of options.

Quarantine recommendations do not apply to individuals arriving to Oregon from other states or countries or Oregon residents returning from other states or countries if they have received both doses of a two-dose COVID-19 vaccine (or one dose of a single-dose vaccine if it becomes available), AND It has been at least 14 days since their final dose of COVID-19 vaccine, AND They have no COVID-19 symptoms. Individuals should still monitor themselves for COVID-19 symptoms during the 14 days after travel and, if symptoms develop, they should self-isolate and seek testing. Here is the full document from OHA.

As many of you have heard, US Department of Education has not lifted the requirement for states to carryout federally mandated testing. We do not know yet what this means for Oregon. Stand by for more information as the Department of Education did give several options to states related to format and schedule.

The district rescinded their offer to have us do forecasting during the week after break when we are back on an advisory schedule. That means that we will likely have slightly shorter periods during the week leading up to break in order to create some time in the morning to complete forecasting. More details to follow soon.

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SHOUT OUTS:

To our awesome staff for braving the cold and nailing a pretty efficient fire drill today.

Huge thank you’s to the work put in by Stacy, Rachel, Gavin, and Mary in getting advisory lessons pushed out these past three weeks! They now have a much deserved break.

Next time you see Richard Ferguson (aka Aracely’s awesome guest teacher) please tell him thank you for doing such a wonderful job with Aracely’s students! Lucky for us, he is assigned to PBMS!

. . . and a preemptive shout out and thank you to our awesome support staff! Enjoy your week!

Happy Friday to all! In a rare moment of administrative clarity, it occurred to me that just because I often receive information late on Fridays from folks downtown, that doesn’t mean I can’t have as most of it cued up and ready to go. I will work harder to make sure this update is ready by 4:00 pm on Fridays, but feel free to wait until Sunday night or Monday to read. I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

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CALENDAR ITEMS:

• 2/24
  • SIW (PLCs – Please confer with one another regarding a preference for in-person or WebEx format, and have someone from your PLC me know what your plan is. I will send some prompts for part of the PLC discussion, but I also want you to have plenty of time to plan and share ideas for rotation B.)
• 2/25
  • Stancliff (out)
  • Fire drill (advisory)
• 2/26
  • Fire drill (advisory)
• 3/1
  • Start of rotation B
• 3/4-3/5
  • Picture day. Details to follow

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TO DOs . . .

• Teachers, remember that as we wind down the first rotation next week, we need to have some summative evidence that we can log in the Synergy grade book (this does not apply to advisory classes.) Our hope is that whatever this is, it can be graded and loaded into Synergy by 3/5, so we can share with parents and inform the data dashboard for our grade level meetings.
• Teachers please be thinking about the ways that you were able to honor Black History Month over the course of the last few weeks, and be prepared to share with your PLC on Wednesday.
• Please remember that the new chime is not a release bell, rather a reminder that class will wrap up in a minute. Please wait for the actual release time to send students to their next class.
• Please check here to see when your next supervision duty is and consider adding it to your Outlook calendar. Please arrange to have it covered if something comes up.

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ON THE RADAR . . .

Here is a link to the teaching and learning department’s blog. In this week’s edition, there are some helpful tips about lessons and content delivery on Wednesdays.

If you are asked by a community member about “area change requests” processes, please refer them to the story on the district website, but a couple things you could share would be that they must be submitted by 3/1 and that everyone whose students are attending a school outside the from outside the attendance boundary, regardless of whether they already had filled one out for their current school, must fill one out this year.

The district is rolling out a series of PD opportunities associated with our recent shift on grading practices. This will not be revolutionary for us as we already have a criteria-referenced system, but there may still be some valuable opportunities for our staff. For example, there will be an opportunity for staff to receive credit for participating in an action research project associated with assessment. Standby for more information.

Scott McDonald recently loaded a blogpost regarding Apple Classroom, and we will be sharing a series of tech steps students should take in order to have this to be effective.

Here is a link to the updated and condensed version of the district inclement weather policy.

SHOUT OUTs . . .

Hopefully everyone got a chance to see the art work that Pat’s kids did, but if not here is a link just in case. Great work!

Huge thank you to Shelby and the Life Skills department for their collaboration on processing library books!

Big thanks to April and Matt for continuing to make the most of a robotics season that has been very challenging to pull off during COVID-19. Well done!

Good afternoon staff! I hope everyone enjoyed the weekend and the day today. My weekend was going really well with a mix of rest, family time, and some skiing and hiking, and then I pretty much fumbled the Valentine’s day situation in epic fashion. I’ll spare you most of the details, but Sunday began with Amy coming downstairs fairly early to find me simultaneously watching a soccer game and a rugby match at which point she said, “Happy Valentine’s Day!” And in a moment that I seem uniquely capable of screwing up, I wondered aloud, “Is that today?” I hope all of you faired better. On the bright side, we wound down the day as a family, playing a card game called “Skull King” which I highly recommend. With a short week ahead of us, I hope the following information helps you plan and hit the ground ready tomorrow!

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CALENDAR ITEMS:

• February 17
  • SIW (2:30-4:00, individual day)
• February 18
  • Fire Drill (11:30)
• February 19
  • Fire Drill (11:30)

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TO DO’s:

• Teachers, please remember to get your SLGGs dialed by the end of SIW this week. Please reach out if you need any guidance.
• In case you missed it in the email last week, I believe all would benefit from reviewing this guidance on inclement weather.

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ON THE RADAR:

• Report cards were mailed home this last week. It is certainly possible that we may have some surprised parents that would like more context. Please approach these conversations, if they happen, with patience and grace, and let us know if you need support.
• Please be prepared to be flexible with lunch locations this week. Even if temps are good, outside conditions on the ground may impact our decisions on whether to head out.
• The district has asked us to ensure that we have an anonymous way for folks to submit safety concerns. Here is a Google form that will only collect personal information if you choose to share it. We will also add this to our Hybrid site for families to use. It is also just as effective to email Mary or Heather your concerns, if you prefer, and they will be a part of our safety meeting records.
• For classified staff on evaluation cycle this year, we will be reaching out in the next couple of weeks with details on the timing of that process.
• With all of the information swirling about exposure at the high school level, you might be curious about our protocol for communicating with families. Here is a link to the protocol document that lives on our hybrid site.
• Reminder that Scott McDonald and crew curate a tech blog for the district with helpful hints and resources.
• The other middle school principals and I had a great WebEx conversation with our incoming superintendent, Dr. Cook. He is very excited to be a part of our community. He will be visiting schools the week after spring break.

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SHOUT-OUTs:

Big thanks to Mary and the lunch crew for flexibility in lunch distribution and supervision!

Birthday wishes this week go to Ron Varner! (2/18)