Week Ahead: Sept. 17-21

| September 13, 2018 | Week Updates | No Comments

Another great week down … another great week to come.  HS is off on WWW for Gr  9 and 10s, a retreat for Juniors, and UniLand (my made up description) for Seniors next week.  Be sure to wish your HS colleagues good luck as they embark on a really amazing week!

Thank you in advance for helping us all retrain for Evacuation Drills using the new model of mustering.  We will be doing this during DEAR today.  You can find this information in your email and posted below.

Here is what’s up for us next week:

Monday, Sept. 17
Day 1, ABCD (Adv)
BIG NOTE: Hang is out of the office today … Molly’s covering – Lord help us all 🙂
1:30-3 Admin Mtg (Molly attends)

Tuesday, Sept. 18
Day 2, EFGH (DEAR)
11-12:00  SST

Wednesday, Sept. 19
Day 3, BCDA (DEAR)
8-9:30 New Family Meetings
1:30-3 New Family Meetings
3:15-4:30 Divisional Mtg, Library (topic – research)

Thursday, Sept. 20 
Day 4, FGHE (Adv – Assembly)
9:30-11 Admin Mtg (Molly attends)
9:30-11 New Family Meetings
12:55-1:30 Assembly – Wild Rhino

Friday, Sept. 21
Day 5, CDAB (Evacuation Training)*
11-12:30 New Family Meetings
1:30-3 New Family Meetings
5-8 MS Dance

Saturday, Sept. 22
Happy Birthday Abby Morgan!

Upcoming (on the radar)

  • Sept. 24-27, Author Visit (all division assembly canceled)
  • Sept. 26, Early Dismissal – PD
  • Sept. 28, Family Fun Day (expected attendance for at least a short period of time)
  • Oct. 6-7, EARCOS Weekend Workshop at SSIS (Jacob Humes leading, Emotional Coaching)

 

New Procedure for Evacuation Drills:

The SSIS Safety Committee has made a recommendation that all divisions muster by homeroom/advisory during an evacuation drill.  This recommendation was accepted by the Senior Leadership Team.  This requires that we retrain ourselves and our students regarding what happens on the field once we have evacuated the building.  This retraining will be just for MS and will not involve any actual evacuation bell (fire alarm).
We will do this over the course of three training periods.  The first will be Friday (Sept. 14) during DEAR time.  The second will be Friday, Sept. 21 during DEAR.  The third will be Tuesday, Sept. 25th during C block (this one will be unannounced to students; we will evacuate at 1:40).
For tomorrow, we will direct students to gather in the MS gym right after lunch without reporting to DEAR.  You will meet your advisees in the gym.  You will need to bring your classroom evacuation folder.
Once we are all in the gym, the agenda for the Friday, Sept. 14 training is:
  1. Molly will explain the change in procedure to the entire student body.
  2. We will exit the gym and muster on the field in the correction advisory groupings and order.
  3. Advisors will complete attendance and hold up red/green signs as needed.
  4. Molly will direct all students to identify the teacher on the left and right of their line so that they can better remember their location.
  5. Molly will lead a “field silence” for 2 minutes so that we can practice being silent on the field.
  6. We will dismiss to E block.

Note for teachers who do not have an advisory – you should stand in line in your correct order / number.

Evacuation Training for Friday, Sept. 21: For this training, we will gather in the gym again to start.  I will address the group and explain the goals for this day’s training.  You will meet your advisees in the gym and will need your evaluation folder.

The agenda for training Friday, Sept. 21 is:

  1. Molly will explain the change in procedure again to the entire student body.  The goal for this training is walking in a silent, single file line and gathering in the correct location on the field.  We will do two drills, one from the gym and one from D block.
  2. We will line up in the gym and exit to the field in single file, silent lines.  We will muster on the field in the correction advisory groupings and order.
  3. Advisors will complete attendance and hold up red/green signs as needed.
  4. Molly will direct all students quickly report to D block classes.  Teachers will join their class and remind them of our goals (silent, single file lines; regroup into advisory groups).  Teachers will depart at the time given to them by Molly (this will depend on how fast we do the first drill).
  5. At the specified time, teachers will lead the evacuation drill and regroup on the field in advisory groupings.  Our goal is to accomplish this in under 3 minutes.
  6. Once we have completed the training, we will dismiss to D block.

Repeat Post: Check on Grade Books:  We are 5 weeks into the school year.  It’s time to really check through how you are entering student feedback into PowerTeacher Pro.  Based on our Grade Reporting Guidelines, there should be at least 2-3 feedback marks in the grade book.  Thank you all for attending to ensuring students and parents are updated on how things are going so far.

Repeat Post: Announcements in 1st Block: Now that we are not having advisory every day, it is very important for us to review the announcements each morning in first block.  You can access announcements through PowerSchool Learning; and here is the link as a shortcut: Daily Announcements.

Grade Level Workload Calendars:
Link > Tips and Guides > Calendars > Calendars for Faculty and Staff
 
For your convenience:

These calendars reflect only the active classes. If classes are activated after today then I will have to update the calendar – please let me know of newly activated classes.

As a reminder:
A – Assignment
H – Homework
P – Project
Q – Quiz
T – Test

Grading Scale in PowerSchool:  Again, sorry for the late changes in the grade scale and issues with the A+ designation.  We will be keeping the A+ designation for the 18-19 school year.  You can either recalculate the grades manually, or let them reset when you enter new grades.

Author Visit:  Visiting Author Ann Bryant is coming Sept. 24-26.  Because she expressed concern with doing an all middle school assembly, we have removed it from our schedule.  This means that Sept. 24 will return to a regular advisory day.  There will not be a special schedule on that day.

Sunshine for the entire school: Catriona would like to have an SSIS Sunshine Committee.  This group will be in charge of planning the school wide socials and happy hours.  We get to have 2 representatives on the Committee.  Please let me or Catriona know if you are interested.

Speaking of Sunshine:  We do need to collect some funds for our MS Sunshine Committee.  A donation of 500,000 VND from most faculty members will ensure that our Sunshine Committee can shine brightly.  You can drop that off with a Sunshine Committee member or with Hang.  Also, the two current members, Geneva and Erin, could use some additional members.  Please let me know if you are willing to switch or add.

Support Family Fun Day– Family Fun Day takes place on Saturday, September 29 from 10:00am to 1:00pm.  Stop by and support the PTA and HS clubs/advisors for an hour or two, as this is an expectation for all SSIS faculty.

Related Posts

About The Author

Ms Principal