001All right, ladies and gentlemen, thank you all for coming tonight. Uh, it's a good solid turnout. So, um, I appreciate you taking a few minutes of time for coming and visiting us and learning a little bit about our school. Uh, I'm Drew Baro. I'm the principal here at CMS. This is the completion of my third year. Uh, next year will be year number four, but I've been in this district for uh, 10 years. Um, so, uh, feel like I've come to know the community quite well. Let's give that a try. Uh, feel like I've come to learn the community quite well and um, have really enjoyed uh, serving your kids and all the others that uh, I've been able to interact with over time. Uh so tonight uh the intention of this evening's uh presentation
002is really just a very fundamental tutorial just get to know our building sort of really generally speaking how we operate and what your kids and you might get to experience over the course of their entry into middle school. Um it's a fun ride. I have two kids myself. Both are um upper teenage years and it is um I like to use the statistic uh for folks. It is the uh fastest and largest period of growth in children outside of infancy. Um so when you see all the awkwardness and their you know gangly legs and tripping over themselves and you know you think what the where did my kid go? Um it's because their brain is just growing and developing so fast. Um it's not their fault and they'll get over it. Uh so we are
003looking forward to sharing a little bit with you and uh we'll move on. All right, just a quick little overview here. Uh CMS has approximately next year we'll have approximately 950 students. Uh we serve grades 6 through 8 and there should be about 350 kids, maybe a few, we lose some over the summer typically, but there should be about 350 kids in the sixth grade class. So that's a that's a pretty good size class especially we understand if you're coming from a small town and the kids are used to having you know 25 kids in their class 350 is a big change. So uh part of the rationale for doing events like these and some of our other transition events uh that Mr. Perez has done a really good job of of working through is
004to try and make those transitions smooth, easy um and try and make this place feel as familiar as possible on day one when school starts. I want to hand it over now to Mr. Perez, our sixth grade assistant [Applause] principal. No, no, no, no, no, no. Um, I just wanted to say, uh, thank you all for coming. And so far, um, some of you would know the emails that we're sending out, we're not just sending them to fifth grade incoming, we're also sending them to fourth grade. We want everybody to know as fast as possible uh what to expect. So, we know uh just this year is the year that I've started it, but what I found is it really just takes the idea of waiting to figure out what that place is like and
005getting it into your back pocket as soon as possible so you can start having that conversation of transition with your student. So, um that's just to get that off the table. Uh what Drew was saying um is really important to me. That fact that your student is growing. Uh there's going to be times where we have some tough conversations about a choice your child has made. My comment to you will be I'd rather them skin their knee here than break their hip at the high school. So with that being said, they're going to go through some things. We are prepared for them to go through those things and we walk through those things with them. So please know they get a lot of grace here and it's all because we do understand their brains are
006still developing at a very rapid pace. So that being said um we have our houses and teams uh that starts with just this year we had uh shrunk by one team. So what we have are four teams one uh two three and four that move up to uh five 6 7 and 8 that will eventually end at 9 10 and 11 sir this is no questions I'm just we're not doing questions here we're just six to seven we're getting out of here no just kidding go ahead what were you Okay. Yes. So, you'll see teams one, two, three, and four. These were usually um we've just gotten away from the team names. So, uh what was happening was is that they started at very minor incidences and then turned into major calamities as they went
007further. But, uh one, two, three, and four, those are sixth grade. They will actually move up next year. So this year sixth graders will move up to teams five, 6, 7, and 8. And our seventh graders will be condensing into 9, 10, and 11. This is our uh pods. Basically, this is where your students will meet uh a couple of times a day, but for the most part, it's really just to have team meetings and really get a home base. This is the place that we get students to really learn where to be comfortable. Uh this is a big building and some kids will worry about how to get around the building at first. uh one of the first things that they learn is the first two weeks of school we do a lot of
008learning of one another, not a lot of learning books and so on and so forth. It's the time to get comfortable with the building and the environment and the staff and so on and so forth. So that being said, this will be their home base. They will have community time here. Um often uh Fridays you have certain dance parties that will happen with uh certain teams that really like to do movement that will start the day off. So uh whole pod areas are definitely a place where your student will find their place of comfort here. This is the schedule. Um we have home room on team. on team is just that pod area that uh that you just saw. That's where the four core uh curriculum classes are going to be. So that's where you're
009going to be on team. Encore is going to be we'll talk about it a little bit in a different slide. Bluehawk is one of my babies. Uh it is really our curriculum that's been developed for executive functioning for sixth graders. A lot of my time spent in elementary schools is finding that we have a wide spectrum of abilities for executive functioning. So with that being said, we have developed a curriculum. This was myself with educators uh both special ed as well as regular ed that we sat down and figured out what was the best way to uh meet students where they were at coming into the grade and recognizing the executive functioning needs that they have. And uh most of our students uh participate in Bluehawk and right now they're doing a passion project that
010culminates in everything that we've done for the first three quarters. Oh, I do want to say something different. Um want to make notice of something different. Lunch is 30 minutes long. They will be coming from a place that pretty much had 25 minutes to eat and 25 minutes for recess. So be prepared for that complaint. On team classes, these were the uh classes that I had talked about before. Uh each grade team consists of about 80 students, four teachers and four on team classes. This is language arts, math, science, and social studies. Off team is our encore and wellness. Uh this will be uh two times a day during third period and seventh period. Currently STEM, art, writing, computer for real world. Uh health and wellness, general music, band, chorus, orchestra, percussion. It is important
011to know that um band, chorus, orchestra and percussion are fullyear commitments. So those will uh take place of one of the encore strings and then uh it'll be encore one or encore 2 whichever they choose to uh elect from other than that. We have two days a day and bday. So students won't have one class um that is not core I should say students will have off team classes that will be one day and then they will have a different class the next day um unless it is something that's geared towards having it every day. This is um Mr. Baristo and I'm going to give the microphone back over to him. Geez. So I'm Drew Barberto. I uh gave my introduction spiel a little bit earlier, but I think the next slide we get to
012introduce some of the others. Obviously you have Mr. Perez Casta who is here behind me who will be uh for the large part you're your point person while your kids are in sixth grade. Uh the assistant principal in seventh grade is Miss McGrath who's been here for quite some time. She even went to school here. Not here here, but in the district. And then Miss Faulner, um, who is also a long tenure staff member. She's the eighth grade assistant principal. Um, and then next up, I'll hand the microphone off to Dr. Ro. I need a new picture up there. Um, hello. I'm Dr. Sonia Ro. I'm the special ed director here. Um, we have Liz Demick, too, who's the assistant special ed director. And if your student has an IEP, we'll get to know each
013other really well. And we also work with teams of teachers um with the multi-tier system of support to just make sure every student gets what they need when they need it, no matter what. So, I'll introduce the support service staff. Um, we have two school psychologists, Miss Quley and Mr. French. And then we have two behavior interventionists, Mrs. Podilski and Dr. Potter. And then we have Kim Painter, who's a school psychologist. So, lots of support, lots of people to help assess and help students. These are counselors. Um, I want to first apologize. I did not get them the information for tonight as soon as um I could. So, unfortunately, they're not here this evening. But they are phenomenal group of people. And oh, there's I didn't see I'm sorry, Miss Saunders. You want to come
014up? She snuck in. Hi. I need a new picture, too. I don't even know when that was taken. Um I'm Rebecca Saunders. I'm one of the school counselors. Uh, next year I will be in sixth grade. We're trying something a little bit different next year. Um, what we like to do is loop with the students so that we get to know them really well over the three years. So, next year we'll have three of us in sixth grade, hoping to loop with everyone as we move up. Um, we are here to support your students social, emotional, and academic needs. Um, we're here to support them for the things that come up daily so that they can get into the classroom and access their academics. Um, we are here this summer for a few days. You
015can always reach out to us. Um, and we will be sure to get back to you. Thanks. you are here in Bluehawk. We do a lot about we we take some time to recognize that students are going to see more than just uh their normal staff members, teachers, um paras. They're going to be other people around the building. So, uh, our cafeteria and our cafeteria workers are phenomenal people. Uh, they do a great job making sure kids get fed, but they're also very active with the students. They know who the students are. Some of our staff have been at the elementary schools before they've come here, so they know um, it's another resource for students. So, uh, part of our Blue Hawk is introducing our cafeteria staff, our janitorial staff, our nurses, and our front
016office to make sure that students recognize that their resources aren't just the adults that they see every day. Out and about are field trips. Uh, I'm always asked to ice skate. I don't know why. I'm not I'm not built for ice skating. I don't look like I'm built for ice skating, but uh I think they want to see me fall and I but I always go because it's a fantastic thing uh to be able to be seen outside of the school at u activities. I try to go to some of the football games, lacrosse games, uh things that kids have that are extracurricular. But as far as our field trips, and things of that nature, those are really, really fun things that our students get to be outside and learn different types of curriculum like
017our ropes course. I'm always asked to get into the harness. I I won't do that either. No. Um, but they they have a great time and I think it they're just built for um large amounts of confidence. I think we do things here that other districts would love to do. So, let me tell you something. Your kid is just going to have a phenomenal time here. So, these are some of the other things that we do. Sixth grade athletics, I was just talking about that. uh whether it's track, cross country, um let's see, field hockey, wrestling, lacrosse, and basketball, just showing up to these types of things. Anybody that can show up and show support, the students, they play their hearts out and they have a blast doing it. uh the clubs that we have
018whether it's Blue Hawk news that's actually one of the greatest things is we have some great characters who come out in the Blue Hawk news. So when you get it please take some time watch uh watch the whole reel. They're they're just fantastic. But the clubs that we have are often something students won't even consider in the beginning. And once they get some friends and once they find themselves in the right place and once they want to be comfortable, they'll start uh we have an afterchool bus that picks up at 4:15. So they'll start going to clubs and they'll start going to things that um are within their interest but also help them build some confidence around the building. Oh, and our musical theater is amazing. Electronic devices. This is true. So, as we know
019know all know there's much to be said about uh cell phones and electronics with our with our kids. So, uh, a few years ago, two years ago, we started the, um, practice at school that when kids come in the the door, their phones go off and away. Um, there's a lot that's I think in possibly coming down in terms of state legislation that means that self that will help reinforce that quite honestly that the phones are going to be off and away when they're at school. Um, so that's, you know, generally speaking, that's that's the way we're we're looking at things here. Um, sometimes kids have watches. Um, especially I I've noticed a lot of the younger kids have watches that the parents have used to communicate them with about, you know, after school plans
020and things like that. Um, we strongly um request that uh you use pickup patrol and communicate with us in the office because we have systems to to get the information to kids here in the building and it just really helps um to reinforce that off and away thing the cell phones because they really are such a distractor. Um, and I quite, this is me maybe going on a soap box a little bit, but it really is good practice for kids to learn about what the cell phone is doing to them and how it's affecting their brain and distracting them from what they're really trying to do. So, the more that we can reinforce that focus on the task at hand and not that the thing in their pocket or in their backpack or whatever, uh,
021is is really truly helpful. Um, and um, the other thing I wanted to say about that, I'm totally blanking. Um, oh, the uh, wait till 8th uh, wait till 8th campaign. I know um, there's a strong push about trying to keep uh, cell phone wait to give a cell phone to their children until 8th grade. Some of you may have already given one. That's totally fine. Um but there's a there is a growing um movement to try and delay um having the cell phone in kids hands until then. Um that does exist here. So if your kid tells you I'm the only one at school that doesn't have a cell phone, there are several there are lots of kids that don't have that. So if you are engaged in that, that's totally fine. And it
022seems as though like as time goes on, uh there will be fewer and fewer phones just because of some of the state legislation that could be made in the future and then our practices that we have here at school to begin with. Um and honestly, it's kind of like a community thing. The more we practice keeping them away, the easier it is for both the kids and for us and probably for you too. So, um that's some background with the cell phones at school. Uh, one more piece on that. The watches. We've had four four parents say, "I've put my child's watch on school hours." And it don't work. I promise you, all four have not worked. So, we asked, "Please put the watch because it is it's one of those things now. If I
023don't have the phone I'm looking at, it's definitely the watch I'm looking at." So, it's just another thing to be mindful of. Um, and what I would always tell people when they talk about um giving my child access to the internet, it's actually I'm giving the internet access to my child at this particular rate. So think of that with the next time your child is asking for that cell phone is who am I giving my uh access to my child? Sixth grade expectations. Don't you love expectations? Be respectful of peers, teachers, staff, our um school community. This is a place where we want everyone to feel welcome and supported. That is really huge. I talk about the 99 uh to our kids a lot. The 99 is an idea that 99% of the kids love
024to come in here, want to be successful, come in here to learn, and just want to do a great job, make people proud. 1% is hurting. That 1% can be 2%, can be 3% really quick. So, by show of hands, five or zero, who is stronger? The 1% zero. The 99% five. Nope. It's the one that's the loudest. If the 99 is quiet, that 1% can get really loud. So, we teach the 99 speak up. There's no such thing as a rat. There's no such thing as a snitch. It's our community. We won't allow it. Try your best and be willing to take healthy risks when learning and making new friends. Have a growth mindset. Focus on progress, not perfection. Be kind to yourself and others. Not everyone will learn the same way you do,
025and that's okay. Be an upstander. If something is happening in your school community that doesn't look or feel right, do your best to model appropriate behavior, support, and tell teacher, counselor, other staff member, we're here to help. We've done some groovy things here, I have to say. Um, our Blue Hawk summer camp, uh, brainchild of Dr. Roach and that is a one, two, three different days of just coming enjoying CMS just coming and spending time and enjoying what the space is going to be and being comfortable within the space before you have to be here. It's phenomenal thing. Uh the second QR code on the left is navigating sixth grade. uh our counselor Bri Taylor runs that and it really is a way uh it's the orientation before orientation and that's helped some students that
026want to get a head start on what it is to come and learn what the building is about. And then our orientation day has been scheduled for the 19th and we're working on times because we connect our orientation with the high school. You've all been um very very good stewards. I appreciate you because you're all being recorded. Um and this is our website. This is where you can find CMS news, important updates. this uh or this recording will actually be placed on the website for uh adults, I'm sorry, parents that did not get to make it tonight. So, we'll have this actually on the site. Lunch menus, athletic clubs, and much more. Uh actually, we do have a link for transition on here as well. And I guess we'll see you and your children soon.
027Hold on. Just wanted to say one last thing. Um, we never actually like explicitly said it during this presentation. We are here for your kids 100%. And um, we just want to make sure that you know that there are just layers and layers and layers of support. Whether it's the counselors or social workers or special ed staff or our administrators, um we are here to make your kids transition from elementary school to middle school and then their stay here as um educational as possible. And that's social emotionally, that's academically. Um and we want to do everything we can to make that um this crazy time in their life as positive as possible for them. So, we just urge you to please reach out if you have questions. will be down here uh to answer any
028questions um after we're done here. And I'm sure that you're going to go home and think and talk um with your family at home. If anything comes up, definitely reach out. We're here. Thank you all for coming tonight and we really appreciate it. Oh, we got a question. Yeah. Gotcha. Thank Yes, I totally missed that. I appreciate that. So, the kids are issued Chromebooks when they come here. It'll be uh they'll get a Chromebook. It'll be their Chromebook for the three years that they're here. They use it, they're supposed to use it for uh school only. They It's the kind of thing the teachers sort of have control over when the kids have it, you know, open in class and when they don't. Um honestly, it's something that kind of the way the um teachers
029use it in the classroom varies from classroom to classroom and the teachers sort of uh comfort and how they you know organize things and whatever. Sometimes teachers will just say you walk in the classroom, you put your Chromebook on the side table. You only take it out when I say it's time to take it out and others it's just something that's at their desk. Um but it also changes over time, you know, from sixth, seventh to eighth grade as they grow to be become a little bit more um adept at that and responsible I guess is the better word. Yes. That's a fantastic question. You do not. If your child is currently enrolled in an elementary school in the district, they will automatically enroll here. Um, if you are not enrolled in elementary school, you
030will need to um complete some enrollment paperwork. Yes, thank you. Uh, in I want to say early August. Don't quote me on the exact date because I didn't give you one. Um, uh, we'll get an email from the school district. It'll say Alma start is open and ready. And that will have all of those beginning of the year sort of forms that, um, typically it used to be paperwork, but that you would get on the first day of school. That's all the the stuff online. I believe all the ele elementary schools have done that at least for a year or two as well. Um, so it should be relatively familiar. There will probably be um more and more forms that are part of that as we're becoming more adept at using that. There'll be some
031surveys in there, some um opt-in forms for some of the things that we do here at school and then just the you know just the demographic data. So, um, two different things have gone out to elementary schools and that should have been dispersed to parents. That's going to be the music selection as well as a preference of gym class, whether it be um, Aspire or team sports. It's not to say that you're choosing one of those, but it's really to say this is what be my preference. So that way when we're creating scheduling, we have an idea of what classes and sections to have. Um Drew told me to describe Aspire. So um team sports is just that. It's team sports. Aspire is more um living activities. So these are going to be your archery.
032These are going to be uh fishing. These are going to be uh usually smaller groups with more handson activities that are going to be uh based on outdo recreational sports. Yes. Did that answer your question? And I'm still getting emails about um band choice or um music choice. Please do not worry if if you haven't done it. Nobody is judging you right away. Um but you you can certainly send that email in and we'll make sure that your child gets the selection you're looking for. If you decide to wait somewhere close to July and they come home and they they're in general music, um that's where you blame yourself. Um but you you want to get that out as soon as possible. Yes. That might have been the way the school did it if they
033did it with your student because there was a form to fill out. So if they if the school chose to do it with your student, then that's how they selected it. But those forms should have gone home to parents. Yes. world language. Um, students get what is called exploratory. So there are three trimesters, Latin, Spanish, and French. So they're not actually picking a language. They're being exposed to the culture of that language. They're not getting they're not diving into the actual language portion. That's in seventh and eighth grade. What they're doing is they're having exposure to it to make to see which culture they would like to look further into by learning of the language. If that makes sense. Yes, we do. We do not have an AI policy per se. Um what we're we're
034the district is actually in the process of developing sort of like a some guidelines um that we would like to use right now. It's um we're looking at it for staff only. So because everyone's learning, you know, what this looks like in education. Um as we roll things out to the staff and look at it internally, then there'll be something that's more forward- facing to to families. Um, generally speaking at this grade level, we're helping kids learn how to use it um, effectively for educational purposes. Um, and with things that are under the guidance of teachers. Um, we're not looking for kids to sort of use it on their own. Um, not that they probably aren't, but um, that's sort of educationally that's that's what our intention is. I think I saw another hand up
035back there. It does. And I will say for um that AI question um if a student blatantly uses a chat GBT or something of that sense to put into something um our staff have access to AI figure outers if you will and they put that in and they they can give up to a percent of how much that written project was used with AI. So yes, um, every one of our children will go to Princeton or Harvard. So there is an expectation that uh you will be sitting with your child at the table for four to five hours. And no, just kidding. Um what I can tell you is that it we have a very similar experience across uh teams. So I don't want to give you the idea that somehow team one is lighter
036than team two. No, they all understand that we have to give the same experience if that makes sense. So they do talk with one another. The teams do uh under a team PLC. I'm going to have this we're going into this subject. we're going to need to do this much homework. They actually collaborate so that they're not overloading um from language arts to science to math to social studies. So they do work together so it's not overwhelming. Does that make sense? Yes. Great question. We need to take these to note and make sure they're in our slides for next year. So, thank you for these questions. Um, so Alma is something that you can access u there. It's basically an ongoing grade book that you can peer into obviously just your child's um grades. teachers
037update are are supposed to update um grades that they're you know assignments that they're grading u on a weekly basis. They should have some things up updated in there so you can sort of see as grades come in how your child is doing. Um if there's homework that they haven't done. Um there's also uh we use Alma also as a place to put like your I Ready scores. So once there's a report for I Ready, we'll upload it in there so you can access the the scores there. um any you know important documents like a 504 or an IEP that will um be loaded in in Alma as well obviously with um permission. Um so when you say comprehensive that's I think we use it a little bit more heavily as like a a um
038central hub for information for your kid and a way for us to communicate. Yes, with the caveat obviously it takes some time sometimes for teachers to grade things. So that we have to have a little bit of flexibility there. Yeah, sure. If I could add to that. Um I kind of re I kind of perceive Elma to be a reaction. Um I do know that uh teachers work with calendars, Google classroom, those are your proactive activities, right? So now you're talking to Bobby and Janie about I know you have this much homework. I know you have this project coming. I know you have. So now the more active you are in that proactive portion, the less you have to worry about Elma in that part case of checking in. So teachers are really good as
039teams to create um work calendars and things of that nature. So look for those things and that should help a lot with that. Yes. I don't believe we're sending anything to students. Uh everything that you're getting right now comes probably directly from me or something that is programmed to send to you as a parent. So I won't send anything to students. Uh we it's an early morning, I got to be honest with you. Um, so 7 o'clock is when we start uh when the staff is here and we start um uh admitting students into the building. 7:25 is when kids need to be in their home rooms without being marked tardy. Get ready. Yep. So class assignments most likely will come out um as we get closer u maybe mid August. Is that fair to
040say, Mr. Press team team assignments will be step up day but the actual class schedule will be closer to the first day of school. Yeah. Yep. the as for the bus schedule that usually gets sent out at the beginning of August. Uh they start working on it immediately uh at the end of the year. We have just gotten somebody that is working with us at the bus company that's helping us do that. So that all that information is sent out probably about a month before school starts. Sir. Yes. No. No. Okay. I was wrong. Um, no. No, they cannot. Um, I think a lot of that has to do with traffic. Yes. Yes. I think it's not safe because coming one day way down Guinea is flat and coming the other way down Guinea is
041going to break a child down. They will be pushing their bike to school. Oh, you're going to love this one. I wouldn't equate it to the hung hunger games per se, but um basically if so, uh if you come at right at 7 o'clock, you'll stream right through. No, no problem. at the obviously the closer you get to 7:25 the more of a backup there is um I would say generally speaking the little you know informal studies that we've done any anywhere between 7 and 7 7:15 you're in pretty good shape if you start showing up after 7:15 you're going to be cutting it really close just because of the the backup of cars um in the afternoons while we're on that topic if you're picking your child up uh in the afternoons amazingly people
042dismissals at 2:08 people will start lining up for dismissal at like 1:30. Um, which is Yeah. So, um, uh, but I mean, everyone's got things that they need to do, but so if you come, so usually we're done, um, with kids getting picked up by 2:20. Um, so if you come to pick up your child, say at 2:15, if that works in your schedule, you're going to breeze right through. Putting it in the calendar. Hello. Yes. There's nothing to worry about. I promise they'll be just fine. You drop them off here. we'll do some child labor and then we'll send them back to you. Um it's it's really really cheap. So no, um we have a athletic director who's fantastic, so the information is put out well in advance. Uh we do have a late
043bus again, so they get directed back into the building when they're done and they actually get to do homework waiting for the late bus and they'll get onto their bus. They normally have to sign up for their late bus at lunch. so that if they're a cross-country kid and they know that what what bus they're going to have to take home, they fill out for that bus at lunch, we work that hard to make sure that they know where they're going. Um, just on the athletics question, there is a school bus driver shortage. So, if anybody in here is interested in driving a bus, first student is definitely hiring. Now, I'm saying that because um for track, you brought up track. Um families are needing to transport their kids to um we have track practices
044in the spring like at to at the high school and so oftentimes practices will start at like 4:00 or 4:30. So families oftentimes kids will ride the bus home and then their parents or families will will bring them over. So there are some um athletic events we have buses for and others we do not and we require um families to work together to to carpool their kids. So it's something we're working through. It's not ideal, but it's just the reality that we're in right now. Um, bunch of them. I'll start over here and work my way over. It does. Um, I think there have been some glitches here and there. So, if you're having trouble, definitely check out our website because there's like a how-to step-by-step guide for any of those kind of questions. Um,
045if you go through that, you feel like you're stumped, def definitely reach out and we'll help you out with it. Oh, I see what there's there. But I believe there's some kind of a process that she figured. Anyway, we'll get back on that one. We'll we'll definitely correct it for the video. Yes. So, good question. I don't know if you noticed on the the athletics for sixth grade um there aren't as many um school sponsored athletics because of the youth sports still exists for the rec sports. So once they get it to seventh and eighth grade it becomes a little bit less of an of an issue. Does that does that help? Oh, gotcha. Yeah. Yeah, it they maybe four days a week for cross country in the fall. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. I'm just realizing
046so the the link um if you're an exit parent I believe you're currently using link. Is that true? So link if you're using link I think it transfers but if you don't No. Am I totally wrong? Okay. Okay. All right. I stand corrected. I will definitely Thank you. business administrator. Everyone get that? I want to make sure the record stand is clear. Thank you. So the team and the pod is basically the place where the team lives and the house is kind of a thing of the past, but it's a way that uh students traveled vertically from one grade to the next. So we try and keep them together with similar faces from one grade to the next. So there's some familiarity from one grade to the next. So, for example, when they come in
047in sixth grade, obviously, and you know, the kids only know the kids that they're they went to the same school with, um, we mix two of those teams together for seventh grade. So, then they'll know, you know, mathematically half of the kids, probably more than that, and then when they go to eighth grade, they're mixed throughout all three teams. So, they get a chance to meet even more kids. Um, historically, we had just one house. So basically, you came into a team in sixth grade and you were in that team for all three years. And we received feedback from families, from students, from staff members that when the kids got to high school, they felt like they didn't know their class because they were only with, you know, 85, 100 kids all three years. So
048we wanted to create a system where we got a little bit of both where um they could have familiar faces each year, but they could also meet some new kids. Um so by the time they got to high school they felt more like cohesive as a group. Uh we don't give um kids a chance to choose uh people that that they're with but we have a system in place where we have uh teachers giving input on who they think are good positive uh learning partners with kids. So, um, feel like that system works pretty well and I I know it would be really nice to be able to to choose kids to be with, but with, you know, 350 kids, it will become kind of crazy if we get that kind of um access. Sure.
049Yes. Um I think excuse me that is where Encore comes in. So Encore classes don't go by pod. They actually just go by whoever's listed up for that particular class, however they sign up. So this is where you get access to students that are not in your pod and lunch as well as um yeah and lunch. Yes. Um you'll get a combination. So right now we our grading system is and Drew is gonna stare at me while I do this. Yeah. So the grades your kids get now will be very similar to what they get up here. It's not pass fail. Uh but it's basically have the kids do they meet the standard that we're trying to assess or have they exceeded that or are they working towards it? Generally speaking, that's what we're um
050what the grade system will be like when you're here. Yes. Sure. It's really really flexible. Um, and different clubs have different, you know, expectations depending on their, you know, the level of commitment that it requires. Like a a musical theater production requires a higher level of commitment than like games club, right? So, um if games club is on Mondays after school, a lot of kids absolutely love that club, but if that um um overlaps with say uh say they have a part in the in the play, they'll skip games club and go to the play practice during that period of time and that's that's not a big deal. Um does that answer your question? Okay. Um each there's a couple different um they do like a drama club cl uh a drama club camp and
051that's open for like anybody who might be like feeling their way through and that's maybe just like a couple of weeks long. Uh they do a a uh play that is tryyouts that's open to everyone like u it just depend they've got a bunch of different options that they that they put out. Yes. Yeah. So, it's a there's three separate days. Each day is it is um they're not connected or anything. They're just it's supposed to just provide access for kids to just come here, get to see some faces, meet some some new or old friends, um get acquainted with our grounds, with the building. Um, it's just supposed to be fun and to get them in the door uh just to reduce some of that anxiety that they might be having or just have
052fun and celebrate being here. Sure. Our ropes course coordinator plans the whole thing and it's really small groups and they're doing team building. So, they really get to know each other and they get to know the staff and it is purely just to have fun and get excited about being in middle school. the weekl long one, navigating sixth grade, that is more like welcome to sixth grade. You know, here's what you might want to plan for or how to do undo your lock. That's a big thing. And that's a good note. If your student's worried about their combination lock, you can you have to give us till July, but you can come into the front office and pick up a lock so your student can practice that through the summer. So, that's a good little
053tip. Um, but it's that's more of like welcome to sixth grade. Here's what it is to be a sixth grader. I would like to say a little bit about your student worrying about coming here. Um, we've done plenty of events up to this point in time, but we're now in the position of uh our traveling sixth grade panel. So on the 16th we will be having uh the three uh smaller institutions East Kingston, Kensington and Newfields will be coming here to take kind of like a trip right before step up day. Uh what we will then do is the three larger schools we actually have students that been recommended by their teachers and we will be going to those three schools lunches. Now, what I've found is when I go to a lunch, people want
054to know if I know the dog's next door neighbor's uh landlord. Um, but when the sixth graders go, the sixth graders as a panel get asked, "What are locks like? What is the school like? Will I get shoved in a locker? Um, how big are the bathrooms? This, that, and the other." So, it's an amazing thing where I think that I'm going to go and be this wealth of knowledge and they really just want to know if I know their cousin. Um and then the kids go and they want to know everything that these kids know. So the idea is to have the students that go are the actual alumni of that school. So they are really comfortable about asking those questions that make them comfortable about coming here. So it's really cool to say,
055you know, how long is it going to take me to figure out a lock because I don't have to. I don't do that. And sixth graders, man, you're going to learn it like that. And so it's a really really big confidence booster that that travel panel is. Well, look here. Oh, there we go. We have encore. No, this is going to blow your mind. Um so we have encore that is quarter and then we have encore that is trimester not randomly assigned they they are assigned sometimes this is where I'm I'm in team three my my really best friend is um on team one and we don't really have any classes together but is it possible that I find out he's taking art during the period of time and I'm going to take art that
056time too. So that's how we get some of those friend groups that can be built that way if you look at it from that point of view. But realistically what it comes down to is that we're trying to make sure that if a student takes a music that they're really getting to be um really getting to be vocal about the other encores that they're going to take and the encores that they're going to be losing out on. Does that make sense? Super. One more. Yes. Um so we have we um Dr. Ro talks about um multi-ter system of support. So we have and um this is something that the district is working on in their um elementary schools, middle school and high school. So we try and um identify kids just based on their um
057assessment data and teacher input and parent input and that kind of thing. If kids are struggling, we have um classes that we can um put them in that is intended not to remove them from their core class, but to um give them an little extra dose to try and bring up those skills that they might be lacking. And if that doesn't work, then we, you know, keep track of their assessment data and we can use um other pathways too to get them support, special education or something like that. Sure. One of the things that we do here that I really really enjoy is we have data meetings. So the team will get together and we'll go over each individual student on that team, how they're doing, how they're performing, um what is their what is
058their characteristics like in the class when they're in certain classrooms and teachers talk about that one particular student through a meeting that goes through all the students on that pod. With that, we can keep track. So that's the proactive stuff we do as opposed to waiting for a student to struggle. If that makes sense. Uh great question. Um so unfortunately no. It's uh finding time in our middle school schedule is like getting blood from a stone. It's very very challenging. So oftentimes there are some things that we end up having to um having to interchange. So we have something called community time for example that's a chunk of time where um it's used for um teams to do team meetings or just time to build that community within the the the pod. Sometimes an intervention
059might take place during that period of time. Uh sometimes there's some um combination or switching we can do in an encore schedule that provides some time um in their schedule. So, um, we try and get creative so nobody loses anything, but sometimes that is just, um, some of the the conversation that we need to have is figure out what what's the most important thing to do and what does this kid need? Good question. We we do so advisory is uh uh Tuesdays and Thursdays. Community time is Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. So, um, it's 30 minute chunk of time, two days a week. Yes. Absolutely. Okay. So, we'll, like we said, we'll put it on the um the website and we'll also post the the PowerPoint to the website. Yeah. Yeah. Great point. Um the counselors,
060uh our counselors have all been down to the fifth grade, so the students have seen a student version of the same slideshow. Um so, feel free to have family conversations about, you know, comparing what you saw and what they saw and that kind of thing. Sure. That's exactly what would help them if they're not here for that orientation time that um summer um sixth grade. Go back. Uh navigating sixth grade. That was the word I was looking for. that navigating sixth grade is going to be exactly what they're looking to have um to replace that if they're not able to come. You would want to come for that full week. Yes, I may not have updated this slide. Yes. Well, looks like people are starting to creep out the side door. So, um, thank you
061all very much for coming and do know that you do have my email. If there's any questions you have, anything that arises, any um, trepidation that your students going through, please feel free to email, call, and thank you all for coming and have a good night. [Applause]