Miner Minutes
December 1, 2017
The Week Ahead
Tuesday: School leadership team meeting at 7:45am; 12:30 select 8th grade students touring IB program at CHS; Happy birthday to Ms. Redmond!
Wednesday: Hallway Huddle at 8:30am; more visitors doing observations throughout the building (High Point University); PLC meetings throughout day
Thursday: Crisis team meeting at 7:30am; progress reports go home for A day classes; PBIS reward for 8th grade during Miner Time; school wide spelling bee during Miner Time; Happy birthday to Ms. Wagner!
Friday: Progress reports go home for B day classes
Saturday: Happy birthday to Ms. Kelsey King!
Sunday: Happy birthday to Ms. Driver!
CCS Safety Audit: TUESDAY
The County will be conducting a safety audit this week on Tuesday. During the audit, representatives from the district will walk the entire inside and outside of the school. Furthermore, they will also interview five teachers and students. Please remember the following:
-- Know the procedures for fire, tornado, lockdown/blackout, & evacuation drills
-- Have your red folder accessible and up to date
-- Wear your Staff ID
-- Have your classroom doors locked and windows closed
-- All materials in Science classrooms are safely stored and locked
-- Ensure students know to whom they can report a problem/bullying and that they should never let people in through exterior doors
IB Updates
8th graders who are interested in participating in the IB program at Concord High next year will take a field trip on December 5 from 12:30 to 3:30. This trip helps to strengthen the IB continuum across schools! Here is the list of students attending.
A HUGE thank you to everyone for completing Subject Group Overviews and the ATL chart in preparation for last week's submission to IB. Also, thank you to the nine small groups who completed revised unit plans for submission, one from each subject group. These documents, along with other required documents, equaling about 1,000 pages were submitted on November 30! Now, IB will evaluate our submissions, peruse our website, and prepare for their visit to us on April 16 and 17. Please continue to work on unit plans!
Three Thank Yous
Anyone interested in being in the CCS Teacher Leader Cohort? Please email Dr. T specifically by Wednesday if you're interested.
It’s that time of year again to recommend up to two teachers for the Teacher Leaders Program. The Teacher Leaders Program is designed to help teachers continue to grow in their professional practice throughout their careers. This growth may be in the classroom, through greater leadership in the school, or by moving to administration. The eligibility for the Teacher Leaders Program is as follows:
- Student achievement data that meets or exceeds expected growth (if applicable)
- An Accomplished rating on a minimum of one of the following standards of the North Carolina Educator Evaluation System (NCEES)
- Standard 1-Teachers Demonstrate Leadership
- Standard 4-Teachers Facilitate Learning for Their Students
- Administrative Recommendation
- Minimum of 2 years of teaching experience prior to beginning the program
TRAIL Enrichment Leader Program - students needed! Please email Patton/Elder by WEDNESDAY with name suggestions!
(from Mr. Patton)
Mrs. Dunlap-Elder and myself are facilitating the TRAILenrichment leader program here at CMS. TRAIL is a free 10 week noncompetitive physical activity program that serves to empower participants to live healthy and productive lives. We are in search of 20 boys and 20 girls that could benefit from this program and your recommendations are greatly appreciated!TRAILenrichment combines character-building lessons with physical activity and nutrition education in order for adolescents to develop skills needed to succeed and become happy and healthy adults.Practice is two times per week for 10 weeks between February and May. Throughout the season, students train alongside high school and college mentors to run a 5-kilometer race. Students will have access to:
-Transportation
-Healthy Snacks
-Free Giveaways
-Gift Cards based on participation
-Supervision
Easy fundraiser for CMS - Monday, December 11th!
Fundraiser with Speedway Christmas: December 11th go to the Christmas light celebration at the speedway (20$ per car) and CMS will receive a 2$ donation from EVERY CAR that comes through the event that evening!
Concord Scoop Announcement Submissions
Info/Updates from Ms. Redmond
- If a reservation is made to the Google calendar for the LGIA and technology is needed then a work order must be created prior to the event day for me to set it up. I am not always on campus and if a technician has to come and check it then I must have a work order.
- Please be mindful that students are switching out Chromebooks because they do not want to pay for the repairs. Please try to watch carefully. We will do an inventory check by 4A class before Christmas break. I will put a paper in your mailbox that you will fill out and turn back to me. You will receive this in your boxes on Monday, December 11th and it will be due back to me on Monday, December 18th. You will have 3 - A days that week to get it completed. You can pick which day. Keeping up with inventory is a big part of my job and I appreciate all the help you can provide.
- On June 1, 2017, the Digital Learning Competencies for Teachers and Administrators were approved by the State Board of Education as part of licensure renewal requirements. The requirement of two Digital Learning Competency CEUs will go into effect for teachers and for administrators with licenses expiring on or after June 30, 2019. Please keep this in mind as PD comes available in the next few months. You need to get those CEUs! The easiest way to get them is to attend PD with me. I will be providing optional PD so keep a lookout for dates and PD agenda. What kind of PD would you like? Shoot me an email if you have something in mind that you would like to learn more about.
- Please remember to schedule a time with Ms. Gascoigne to get ID badges made. She is making the schedules with 4A teachers!
- Hour of Code week is December 4 - 10. https://hourofcode.com/us 5 Reasons to Get Coding article http://www.pbs.org/education/blog/5-reasons-to-get-coding Let me know if you would like some ideas for your class to code and I would love to know your plans so I can tweet about your class that day!
Reminder - No 1:1 in ISS
This is just a reminder that Laptops are not allowed in ISS. If you are giving a test, you can forward that information to Ms. Moore and she will have them take it on the desktop. With this being in place, it is imperative that you send or forward the student’s assignment in hard copy form. If you get busy and are unable to print the assignment off, you can forward that to Ms. Moore in email and she will ensure that the student will receive it. If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact Ms. Moore.
Winter Wonderland Dance - December 15th
The Winter Wonderland Dance sponsored by CMS is quickly approaching!! The dance will take place on December 15th from 4:00-6:00pm. This is a fundraiser that goes into our general fund for supporting our school. We need some volunteers to help for comp time! Please sign up with the following link: https://docs.google.com/a/apps.cabarrus.k12.nc.us/document/d/1RVMIjFf9DCma2sLStwgNDo3eUcIUmiddSItYAs6SBis/edit?usp=sharing
Upcoming Parent Night
Our MTSS and Empower committees are teaming up to plan a parent night during our dance on February 9th. Students of parents who attend the parent night will get free admission to the dance. Food and childcare (for younger siblings) will be provided to parents. If you have any ideas for this night or would like to help with planning, please contact Melissa Mascari, Carlyn Joseph, or Amy Brewer. Parent surveys were sent out on Friday. We are asking parents to return the surveys by December 8th. Please return completed surveys in Melissa Mascari's mailbox.
Nominate a colleague!!!!
Faculty members of the month
HS Program Choice Apps due December 20th
High school Program Choice applications have begun. Please know that some 8th grade students may ask you to fill out a teacher recommendation. These recommendations need to be returned to Ms. Duncan by December 20th, in a sealed enveloped with a signature across the seal. Also, students should only be asking teachers they had in 7th or 8th grade, NOT 6th grade. Any questions see Ms. Duncan.
Benchmark Information - it will be here again before we know it!
We all must attend a training before benchmarks are given, and this will be more in depth than last time. We are taking your feedback provided and making improvements on the process.
Training = Monday, January 8th during your planning time in Room 350 (915am; 1045am; 130pm; 245pm)
Benchmarks will be:
Thursday 1/11 – B day = 6th & 8th Math/7th ELA
Friday 1/12 – A day = 6th & 8th ELA/7th Math
Monday 1/15 = Holiday
Tuesday 1/16 – B day = 8th Science
Wednesday 1/17 = Makeups Media Ctr.
Thursday 1/18 = Makeups Media Ctr.
Friday 1/19 = Makeups Media Ctr.
Extended Calendar
Dec 11: CMS night at Lowes’ Motor Speedway!
Dec 12 7:30 – 8:30am Faculty meeting
Dec 14 7:45-8:30am SIT Meeting
Dec 15 7:30-8:30am PBIS Committee; Winter Wonderland Dance 4-6pm; Happy birthday to Ms. Carpenter! 7:00pm Winter Chorus Concert
Dec 16: Happy birthday to Ms. Lawing!
Dec 18: Happy birthday to Mr. Thomas!
Dec 19 7:30-8:30am MTSS Committee
Dec 19 7:00pm Winter Band Concert
Dec 21- Dec 29 Winter Break
Dec 22: Happy birthday to Ms. Thompson!
Dec 25: Happy birthday to Ms. Wassell!
Jan 8: Benchmark training during planning periods
Benchmark #2 will take Jan 11th - Jan 19th. Please make sure you are present during these days as we will need all hands on deck for testing.