CSD Insider
Centennial School District Newsletter 2018-19, Volume 5
In This Edition
Spotlight On The School Board
District Updates & Happenings
District Operations
Inside Schools & Programs
From Our Students
Community Connections
Announcements
SPOTLIGHT ON THE SCHOOL BOARD
DISTRICT UPDATES & HAPPENINGS
Updates to District Calendar
The November 16th snow day will be made up on Thursday, April 18, 2019. All schools will operate as a normal student day on Thursday, April 18, 2019. Please plan accordingly.
Here are the revised 2018-19 calendar and Board approved 2019-20 calendar for planning purposes.
PSSA Testing Dates
During the months of April and May, Centennial students in grades 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 will complete the Pennsylvania System of State Assessment (PSSA). These tests are in the areas of English Language Arts, Mathematics, and Science. The testing dates are as follows:
Grades 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 – English Language Arts PSSA - April 23-25
Grades 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 – Mathematics PSSA - April 29-30
Grades 4 and 8 – Science PSSA – May 1
More information will be forthcoming in the weeks ahead.
Staying in Touch with Centennial School District and Your School
It is important for parents and guardians to update their contact information (telephone number, cell phone number, and e-mail address) in Skyward Family Access to ensure that eAlert e-mails, text message alerts, and voice recorded messages reach them.
EAlert e-mail is the main method of communicating pertinent information to students and their families. Text message alerts and voice-recorded messages are used for emergency notifications as well as for school absence notifications. Parents and guardians can opt into receiving text message alerts. For more information about Skyward Family Access, follow this link: http://www.centennialsd.org/Page/8401
To stay up-to-date with various events and news about the schools and the District, the community can follow the District on these social media sites:
To watch School Board meetings, student-developed videos, and other events, tune into the District's cable channel: CSD-TV on Channel 36 (Verizon) and Channel 28 (Comcast).
School Board meetings are live-streamed and can be accessed via the District website the evening of the meetings. Board Meetings live-streaming
DISTRICT OPERATIONS
Family Trips Scheduled During the School Year
To view the policy and the request forms, follow these links:
Absence Notes Made Easy - E-mail Your Child's Absence Notes
Parents and guardians are able to e-mail student absence notes to the school's attendance office. E-mailing an absence note is a convenient way to ensure that a student's absence can be reconciled as a legal and excused absence. If a parent or guardian has a note from a medical professional, it can also be e-mailed to the attendance office along with the student's name, grade, student ID number, or homeroom teacher. All schools will continue to accept written absence notes.
E-mailed absence notes should include the following information:
· The student's name
· The student's grade
· The student's ID number or homeroom teacher
· The date(s) of the absence
· A reason for the absence
· A contact telephone or cell phone number of parent or guardian submitting the absence note
Parents and guardians will receive an e-mail from the attendance office secretary confirming that the student's absence note was received by the school.
Each school has a unique e-mail address for accepting student absence notes.
Davis Elementary School
McDonald Elementary School
Willow Dale Elementary School
Klinger Middle School
Log College Middle School
William Tennent High School
Public Participation in School Board Meetings
For Regular School Board Meetings (Second Tuesday of the Month)
- Community comments will be taken at the beginning and end of the School Board meeting.
- The participant must be a resident or taxpayer of the Centennial School District.
- The participant must complete a Resident Participant Card and submit it to the Board President or Board Secretary to be recognized.
- The participant will be asked to give his/her name and address prior to addressing the School Board.
- The participant will have 3 minutes to make his/her comments. If the participant requires additional time, the participant should contact the Superintendent prior to the School Board meeting.
- Community comments will be taken during the presentation of an agenda item as presented within the Committee.
- The participant must be a resident or taxpayer of the Centennial School District.
- The participant must complete a Resident Participant Card and submit it to the Board President or Board Secretary to be recognized.
- The participant will be asked to give his/her name and address prior to addressing the School Board.
- The participant will have 3 minutes to make his/her comments. If the participant requires additional time, the participant should contact the Superintendent prior to the School Board meeting.
Public Attendance at School Events
INSIDE SCHOOL & PROGRAMS
Forensic Science Take Over at WTHS
The William Tennent High School Forensics 1 and 2 students had a new culminating activity this semester thanks to a new partnership with the Center for Forensic Science Research and Education (CFSRE). CFSRE’s vision is to “advance the field of forensic science for future and current practitioners as well as members of the justice system by providing innovation, mentorship, advanced technology and expertise to promote progress and quality in the forensic sciences.” CFSRE “offers programs to educate and train current and future forensic science professionals at all stages in their careers”. One of their signature programs, the Forensic Science Mentoring Institute, is a “non-profit, 7-week, academic program that specializes in teaching the forensic sciences to local high school students”.
The partnership with CFSRE started last summer when our Forensics teachers (Cindy Dale, Beth Karetny and Vanessa Schwoerer) spent a day at the CFSRE labs talking to forensic scientists and collaborating to enhance our Forensics curriculum. After several planning meetings during the fall, CFSRE director Heather McKiernan, research scientist Catherine Brown and business manager John Briley, designed two separate crime scenes (one for Forensics 1 and another for Forensics 2) and came to Tennent to set them up. The crime scenes were tailored to cover the material the students learned throughout the semester.
This culminating and real-life experience required that students apply the skills they learned throughout the semester to process the scene as well as collect and analyze evidence to solve the crime. To enhance the experience, CFSRE employees Catherine Brown and Meaghan Drumm, as well as veteran state trooper Alan Stewart, helped students run each crime scene. The students learned the mechanics of running a crime scene from experts in the field, an invaluable experience for them and for our teachers. 11th grader Elise Wood thought that this experience “helped better her understanding of forensics and helped connect everything she has learned this year".
The teahers planning on growing the partnership with CFSRE by expanding its scope at the high school as well as by implementing other programming in our elementary and middle schools. They are extremely appreciative for what this partnership has already done for the Forensics students and we look forward to see this positive impact reach more students in our district.
McDonald Food Pantry Awarded with AASA Grant
Willow Dale Students Finish on Top Again in the Khan Academy LearnStorm Challenge
From the start of the school year through November 9th, Willow Dale students once again participated in the LearnStorm 2018 competition, competing against 30,000 other classrooms across the country. Students in 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade enthusiastically completed research backed growth mindset assignments and standards-based math assignments on Khan Academy. Teachers and students then tracked their classroom’s progress using the LearnStorm tracker. Willow Dale students once again exceeded our expectations in both their dedication to learning and competitive nature. To give you an idea of how much learning Willow Dale students accomplished, let’s look at the numbers. Together, students completed a total of 352 levels. With an average of 79 assignments per level, that is a total of 27,808 assignments completed, or 166,848 questions answered. We are proud to announce that for the second year in a row Willow Dale placed as a Finalist in the LearnStorm 2018 competition. We are in awe of all the hard work students and teachers put in as they truly embraced the motto: “Keep Going, Keep Growing!”
Davis Collects Food For Friends
KMS Competes In The First Lego League Competition
This winter, Klinger Middle School competed for the first time in the First Lego League Competition at Hatboro Horsham High School. A team of eight students built and programmed a Lego Mindstorms EV3 robot to complete challenges on the "Into Orbit" challenge board. For many of the team members, this is the first time they're interacting with one of these robots. They needed to not only engineer their robot to solve challenges, but they also needed to learn how to program it, so that it would do what they wanted it to do in the two-minute thirty-second-time frame that they're allowed to run. On top of the robot challenge, they needed to work together to learn about how humans could survive in deep space. Students researched the physical, emotional, and social tolls that are placed on our astronauts during their time in space and devised a solution to help. The students presented for judges and competed against other schools in First Lego League Qualifier Tournament. Our students represented Centennial very well in the competition.
Although they did not win anything, they decimated their previous high score, persevered during the competition and completed a challenge that they had previously never completed. We are so proud of what our students were able to accomplish with only one month of preparation. Students are already gearing up for the next level of competition, The First Technology Challenge, where they will construct a larger autonomous and pilot controlled robot later this spring.
Congratulations to the WTHS Competitive Cheer team
The William Tennent Competitive Cheer team competed in the Suburban One League Championships held at Souderton High School on January 5th. For the second consecutive year, William Tennent has been crowned the Suburban One League Champions. The team qualified for the PIAA State Championships that were held in Hershey, PA on January 12th and finished 9th.
Congratulations to the William Tennent High School Competitive Cheer team!
Sharing African Culture
James Niles, 7th grade student at Log College Middle School, shared his authentic learning experience of Africa with his Social Studies class on Tuesday, January 9, 2019. He and his family traveled to Ndola, Zambia (located in southern region of Africa) over winter break to visit relatives and explore the rich culture. Coincidently, James’ Social Studies class was learning about Medieval African Culture and how it impacts society today.
James created a slide presentation containing pictures of homes, villages, natural resources, geographic features, architectural structures, currency, wildlife, language and education. James’ relatives run a school in Ndola, so James was able to get a closer look in the schools. He claimed “each room in the building represented a grade… each classroom contained roughly 30 students.” James went on to explain that the classrooms lacked the type of technology we have here in Centennial. They used chalkboards and no signs of Chromebooks.
James also shared some artifacts with the class like Zambian currency and an 8th grade textbook. His class was intrigued at how small Zambian textbooks were compared to ours. James’ was kind enough to bring back his real world learning to the classroom and share his experience with his peers.
Kindergarten Pipeline to the Future
Centennial School District kicked off its Kindergarten Pipeline to the Future reading program with a bang. Local businesses were invited into our classrooms to read to our students. One of the goals set by Dr. Baugh is for Centennial to "Improve the academic achievement of literacy of all students, at all schools, to close the achievement gap." The mission of this program is to foster a love of reading with our youngest learners. Research shows that developing early literacy skills is linked to greater success in life. And, success starts when we provide high-quality programs, especially for our most vulnerable students.
Businesses have a vested interest in the successful education and development of our nation's student population. We are most appreciative of the businesses who took time out of their busy workday to read to our students. A special thank you to our inaugural readers Greg Crompton from Quaint Oak Bank, Judy Doherty from Greater BucksMont Chamber of Commerce, MaryEllen Rosanova from Hatboro Federal, and Allyson Felder from Verizon Wireless.
We welcome the opportunity for our local business partners to see firsthand the academic growth which occurs in our classrooms on a consistent basis.
If your business is interested in being a part of the program, please contact Ms. Shawanna James-Coles, Principal of Practice at 215-441-6000, ext 12499.
Klinger Kafe
Klinger Kafe is a student-run cafe led by our Autistic Support and Life Skills classes with the help of the Family Consumer Science classes. The students have been working together for the past three years to run the cafe for faculty and staff. The cafe runs bi-weekly and students play a role in a variety of jobs. Students take food and beverage orders from the staff through the use of Google Forms. Then, they take the information from the Google Form and create tickets for a smooth delivery and to double-check order accuracy.
Once order forms and tickets are completed, students create an assembly line in which they fill each order with drinks and food. The students sell drinks such as coffee, hot chocolate, tea, and water. They sell pretzels, mints, and a special baked item each week - courtesy of students in our Family Consumer Science classes. Once orders are prepared, they are placed in order according to zones in the building. The students deliver items, greet customers, exchange money, make change, and even provide loyalty cards for frequent customers to earn a free cup of coffee.
When they aren’t filling and delivering orders, our students are counting money and taking inventory. They even get to re-stock the Klinger Kafe pantry this year by taking monthly Community Based Instruction trips to Shoprite. The student-led cafe has provided opportunities for our students to strengthen many important skills, including social competencies, such as working as a team and professionalism with customers; functional academic skills, such as counting money, making change, and organizing inventory; and vocational skills, such as learning to follow their work schedule, complete required job responsibilities, and following directions.
Klinger Kafe is a great example of how we provide our students with instruction while providing real-world applications!
FROM OUR STUDENTS
Fashion, Skill and Awards
This past Friday night, January 25th, the first William Tennent fashion show was held in our own auditorium, sponsored by Inspiring Teens Magazine, a national publication. The fashion show brought 300-400 guests both local and from as far away as Virginia. Along with the fashion show, there was an award ceremony for the magazine, recognizing national winners including William Tennent Senior Dylan Abell for Photographer of the Year. All ticket proceeds will support our growing fashion program, run by fashion and marketing teacher, Mrs. Slipp.
Earlier this year, Mrs. Slipp invited Leslie Conway, the owner of the magazine, to speak to her fashion and marketing class about fashion photography and how she launched the magazine. Commenting on Ms. Conway’s visit, Mrs. Slipp explained, “Students wrote fashion articles for the magazine, and we realized that we could form a partnership to help in recognizing all of the amazing teens at William Tennent.” After two months of brainstorming, the idea of the fashion show/award ceremony was born.
Pennsbury High School’s jazz trio welcomed a great turnout of guests as they were directed to their seats in the auditorium. The show included three fashion categories: upcycling, couture, and streetwear. In between the walks, there were performances from the William Tennent Step Team and Phresh, a hip hop dance group from Philadelphia. Screams and cheers from the huge participating audience shook the auditorium. Throughout the show, Inspiring Teens Magazine distributed their awards. The night was set for fashion and performance, but creativity and self expression were the real stars. At the end of the show, the William Tennent Designer of the Year award was presented to junior Austin Reid. Congrats to Mrs. Slipp, Inspiring Teens Magazine, award winners, and all participants for a successful show!
Amelia McGovern '19
COMMUNITY CONNECTIONS
There is a saying that is common in some circles: Think globally, act locally. As part of the Centennial Community, we would like to recognize excellence at the local level. This monthly series will recognize an outstanding local business.
We would like to encourage people to shop locally and support businesses within the Centennial School District. Each month, we will recognize a local business, talk about what makes them outstanding in our humble opinion, and we will encourage you to submit nominations for future articles. To be considered for review in our monthly electronic newsletter, the business must be within the boundaries of the Centennial School District, provide superior business services, and be accessible to all citizens in the region. Please submit your recommendations through our District Electronic Suggestion Box!
Dr. Marc Shragher Chiropractic Center
This month’s community corner spotlights Dr. Marc Shragher, owner of Shragher Chiropractic Center. Dr. Shragher has been incredibly generous to the community and frequently offers promotions to benefit local charities. His generosity directly affects families of the Centennial School District. He recently supplied Thanksgiving meals to 64 families and donated $2,000.00 to Centennial families in need through generous donations from his patients and in coordination with local community stores. We are grateful for his support.
About Dr. Shragher: Dr. Shragher grew up in Northeast Philadelphia. After graduating from William Penn Charter H.S. and Gettysburg College, Dr. Shragher went on to pursue his Doctor of Chiropractic degree at Palmer College of Chiropractic in Davenport, IA. In 2002, Dr. Shragher founded Shragher Chiropractic Center. He has established a close working relationship with many physicians in the Bucks County region.
Dr. Shragher completed a 3 year post graduate program in Neurology through Southern California University of Health Sciences and is now a Board Eligible Chiropractic Neurologist. In addition, Dr. Shragher completed a 3 year post graduate program in Rehabilitation through Southern California University of Health Sciences and Board Eligible Chiropractic Rehabilitation.
Dr. Shragher uses a natural and conservative approach to health concerns. Treatment considerations may be a combination of the following depending on your individual needs: manual technique, activator technique, exercise, nutritional counseling and orthotic supports.
In his spare time, Dr. Shragher is very involved in his home and work in communities.
Dr. Shragher’s office is located at 1319 Foster Road in Warminster. He has office hours Monday through Saturday and appointments can be scheduled by calling 215-672-1996 or through his website www.shragherchiropractic.com.
Announcements
Centennial Education Foundation - March 2019 Jackpot Calendar
Internet Essentials from Comcast
Your family may qualify for affordable Internet access and a low-cost computer. Please see the brochure below for details. To learn more or to apply, call 1-855-846-8376 or visit InternetEssentials.com.
Follow Us on Social Media
Instagram: @Centennialsd
Twitter: @Centennial_SD
Employment Opportunities
Current employment opportunities are posted regularly on the Centennial School District website. Follow this link to learn more about current administrative, teaching, and support staff opportunities: www.centennialsd.org/jobs
District Calendar
To stay in touch with District events, follow this link to the Centennial School District calendar: http://www.centennialsd.org/Page/2
Centennial School District
District Administration
Dr. David Baugh, Superintendent
Dr. Jennifer Polinchock, Assistant Superintendent
Mr. Christopher Berdnik, Chief Financial Officer
Ms. Lissa Johnson, Interim Director of Human Resources
Mr. AJ Juliani, Director Learning and Innovation
Mr. Joe Rutz, Assistant Director of Learning and Innovation
Mr. Robert Whartenby, Director of Facilities/Assistant Business Administrator for Operations
Dr. Percell Whittaker, Director of Pupil Services
Ms. Shawanna Coles, Principal of Practice
Board of School Directors
Dr. Andrew Pollock, President
Mr. David Shafter, Vice President
Mr. Charles Kleinschmidt, Assistant Secretary
Mr. Steven Adams
Ms. Mary Alice Brancato
Mr. Andrew Dixon
Mr. Flemming Godiksen
Mr. Mark B. Miller
Ms. Tara Pellegrino
Principals
Dr. Dennis Best, William Tennent High School
Mr. Martin Hayes, Klinger Middle School
Mr. Patrick Golderer, Log College Middle School
Mr. Andrew Doster, Davis Elementary School
Mr. Ernesto Ortiz, McDonald Elementary School
Ms. Cathy Perkins, Willow Dale Elementary School
Email: csdpr@centennialsd.org
Website: www.centennialsd.org
Location: 48 Swan Way, Warminster, PA 18974
Phone: 215-441-6000
Facebook: www.facebook.com/csdinfo
Twitter: @Centennial_SD