Monday Morning Reminders
August 26, 2013
Calendar
August 29: Grade Night Out: Chick-Fil-A,Waverly Place 5-8pm, hosted by Kindergarten
September 3 - 13 : Boosterthon!!
September 10 : Track 1 Boosterthon Fun Run
September 13 : Tracks 2,3,4 Boosterthon Fun Run
September 25 : Picture Day tracks 3 & 4
PRESIDENTS MESSAGE:
For the next few weeks, read about your PTA Board of Directors. Our Vice President of Communications is Sharon Brown. Sharon's children are on track 1. She oversees the Volunteer Coordinator, Key Club Liaison, PTA Bulletin Board Coordinator, PTA Website, Technology Committee, Yearbook, Character Education, Room Parent Coordinators and the MMR. If you have a question for Sharon, or would like to help out, please email her at slbrown@nc.rr.com.
BOOSTERTHON FUN RUN 2013
MCES is excited to be hosting our second Boosterthon fundraiser this September! The Boosterthon Fun Run is a 9-day experience that raises funds while promoting Fitness, Leadership, and Character. You can find even more about Boosterthon at https://www.facebook.com/Boosterthon and http://vimeo.com/46523531.
IMPORTANT DATES
*Boosterthon kick off for tracks 1, 3 and 4 Sept. 3.
*Boosterthon kick off for track 2 Sept. 11.
*Boosterthon Fun Run for track 1 Sept. 10.
*Boosterthon Fun Run for tracks 2, 3 and 4 Sept 13.
VOLUNTEERS NEEDED FOR BOOSTERTHON: If you can help hand out water or mark shirts, please sign up below.
Track 2,3,4 : http://www.signupgenius.com/go/8050C4EACAA2B0-boosterthon
Track 1 : http://www.signupgenius.com/go/8050C4EACAA2B0-boosterthon1
This year the theme is "Camp High Five". Students will be learning all about FRIENDSHIP and how to treat EVERYONE like a friend. FRIENDS...Respect Others, Don’t Bully, Shout Out Strengths, Stick Together and Show Sportsmanship! If you have “camp” related items you would like to lend to decorate the school please contact Denise Salisbury (salisc@msn.com)
or Amy Hallacher (cahallacher@yahoo.com).
GRADE NIGHT OUT:
Our next Grade Night Out:
Date/Time: Thursday, August 29, 2013 from 5:00 - 8:00 PM
Restaurant: Chick-fil-a Waverly Place
Location: 411 Colonades Way, Cary, NC 27518
Hosted by: Kindergarten
As always, we will have a game board for the children to enjoy. 100% of the proceeds from this activity come right back to the school!
ADDITIONAL NOTES:
BRING THE RESTAURANT VOUCHER!
Most restaurants require us to bring a voucher to receive credit. If you do not bring the voucher, we do not receive credit. You can print a copy of the voucher from the MCES PTA website, under Grade Night Out.
http://teacherweb.com/NC/MiddleCreekElementary/PTA/apt8.aspx
Most often we cannot provide vouchers at the location; however, you may ask at the game board before placing your order.
Carrie Ward and Amanda Tisdale
MCES Grade Night Out Coordinators
GIVE WITH TARGET PROMOTION:
Middle Creek has already won over $100! Let's keep it going!
Visit: http://givewith.target.com/school/6263
Simply select a K–12 school from our list of eligible schools and vote for it weekly until September 21 or until $5 million has been awarded, whichever occurs first. It takes just 25 votes to start. After that, Target will donate $25 to your selected school. Upon receiving 25 votes, each additional vote equals $1 more for up to $10,000 per school. If your favorite school is not on our list, please choose another school.
NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Voting ends on 9/21/13 at 11:59:59 p.m. CT or when $5 million has been awarded, whichever comes first. Max of $10,000 awarded per school. Voting is limited to legal residents of the 50 US/DC, 13 years of age and older. Limit one vote per person per week. See Terms and Conditions and eligible schools in the Give With Target app on Facebook.com/Target for details
GO PLAY SAVE (CITIPASS):
All Orders are past due! If you have not returned yours already, please bring in ASAP.
For questions contact Neha Vashi: nehavashi@hotmail.com.
CULTURAL ARTS SURVEY:
Do you have a child that likes to sing? The Cultural Arts Committee needs your feedback about planning a winter chorus event for our students. The survey is quick and easy. Please take two minutes of your day to offer your two-cents! Thank you!
The survey is here. http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/5NJTJ9H
PTA MEMBERSHIP:
Our membership continues to grow! We are now 327 strong thanks to:
Staff Member Kelly Cancro, and Parents Chris Fillio, Gaye Esser, Jacke & Jamie Kovicak, Alison & Jonathan Rhoades, Kara & Jason Stone, Jade VanErt, Tara West, Elizabeth & Rob Williams.
Are you new to MCES or have a Kindergartener? What a perfect time to join the PTA, and your reason for joining is simple: to benefit your child.
Our membership is inexpensive and you might think we won't miss you or your dues if you don't join. However, what will YOU be missing? Your membership means so much:
CONNECT: You stay connected with other parents, get to know teachers and administrators better and stay in the loop about school events
SHARE: You put your own personal talents and skills to use for a great cause--your child and all the children in our community
EFFECT CHANGE: Your ideas and your vote count
LEAD BY EXAMPLE: Your child will learn the value of volunteering and working together to achieve goals
Consider becoming a member and joining the largest advocate for children and families in the country. Membership forms can be found here:
http://teacherweb.com/NC/MiddleCreekElementary/PTA/photo8.aspx
We look forward to having you!
PTA POSITIONS AVAILABLE:
Membership Co-Chair
Book Fair Co-Chair
Healthy Kids Committee Co-Chair
Reflections Art Contest Committee (2 Co-Chairs)
Carnival Committee (2 Co-Chairs)
*Please contact AnnMarie Marchese if you are interested in any of the above positions, Amm823@nc.rr.com
BOOKFAIR NEEDS CO-CHAIR:
The Scholastic BookFair is looking for a second co-chair to assist Beth Lewis with the event this year. The dates of the Book Fair are November 4 - November 18. There is a training luncheon on September 10 to attend. Duties shared with Beth include: finding volunteers to help with setup/cleanup/purchasing/wishlists, overseeing daily activities 8:00am-3:00pm and planning/executing the two family nights, currently scheduled for Wednesday, November 6 and Thursday, November 14 from 5:30-8:00pm. Please let me know if you are interested in helping out with the book fair this year at beth_lewisfamily@yahoo.com
REFLECTIONS:
2013-14 REFLECTIONS ART CONTEST & SHOW
A few parents have been inquiring about this year's Reflections theme, so they can have their children begin to work on their art projects during the upcoming track outs in Aug & Sept....this year's theme is: 'DREAM, BELIEVE, INSPIRE'. We will have an official kickoff of the program at our school in a few more weeks. Students pre-K thru 5th grade (including our AU kids!) are awarded prizes/ribbons for their participation by submitting original works of art in any of the following 6 art categories: Visual Arts, Photography, Literature, Dance Choreography, Video Production, Music Composition. More details will come home in student folders in September about this national arts education program sponsored by the NC PTA. There is information currently available online at the NC PTA website re: this year's Reflections program, for those of you that would like to get a jump start: http://ncpta.org/index.php/programs/reflections-arts-program/ . Also, our PTA is looking for 2 volunteers to Co-Chair this fun, annual event at our school this year. For more information, email last year's Co-Chairs, Deanna Zolfo or Lisa Sgoupis, dzolfo@nc.rr.com, lsgoupis@gmail.com.
INK CARTRIDGE PROGRAM:
How can you help? We need people that could drop 10 cartridges every month under your own name and address at STAPLES, when you get your $20.00 voucher pls send it to school in your child's folder with a note to "PTA" (Cartridges will be provided to you)The more volunteers we have the more voucher we can get to help buy supplies for teachers during the year. If you have any questions please contact Blanca Petrillo at br.petri@gmail.com
GROCERY CARD SIGN-UP:
Grocery card sign-up sheets have been sent home. When you purchase store brands at the following stores, a portion of the purchase price will be donated to our school. Harris Teeter TIE 4019, Food Lion #213693 and Kroger #90698. You must relink your store cards each August. You may do this yourself at the register or store website or simply fill out the sign-up sheet and we will take care of it for you! Thank you for supporting our school! Harris Teeter is offering a $200 gift card drawing for customers who link their VIC cards to a school!
TECHNOLOGY UPDATE:
The PTA has just purchased 55 Mimio Teaches for our regular classrooms, CCR classes, AU classes, Art, Music and Technology classrooms and a few more! The Mimio Teach is a piece of technology that will transform the existing dry erase boards already in the classrooms into interactive white boards - meaning that the whiteboards will interact with the lcd projector and classroom laptops! Very exciting! If you'd like to see more information about what is coming into your child's classroom, check out the link here: http://www.mimio.com/en-NA/Products/MimioTeach-Interactive-Whiteboard.aspx This project has spent approx. $43,000 of our hard earned money, raised through our fundraisers - so we'd like to shout out an enormous thank you to all of our generous and supportive families and staff members in the Middle Creek Community!!
Also, important to note: WCPSS has given all K-3 teachers a classroom iPad, which our teachers have already received and are currently using. The PTA has purchased a piece of software (bundled into the cost above) which will allow all the iPads to also interact with the Mimio Teaches. This means that the entire classroom will be connected - the teacher's laptop to the teacher's iPad to the lcd projector to the classroom white board. To see for yourself how this system really works together and all of its super-cool features and uses in the classrooms, the PTA is planning on having an expo during one of the PTA meetings later this year - so keep your eyes out for that important meeting.
Final important note: the PTA has also purchased 6 more lcd projectors to fill out the remaining gaps in the CCR and AU classrooms so that they will be able to use their Mimio Teach tool. The cost for this purchase is approx. $2,000.
AGENDA SALES:
Agendas will be sold at the school store on Tuesday and Thursday mornings from 8-8:25
SCHOOL STORE VOLUNTEERS NEEDED:
Tuesdays: K-2 kids welcome from 8:00-8:25am
Thursdays: 3-5 kids welcome from 8:00-8:25am
The school store sells little pencils, erasers, fun little school items for kids to purchase - prices range from $0.10 - $2.00, so kids can easily afford to buy something even with a little bit of pocket change. It is located at the end of the main hallway, adjacent to the 2nd grade hallway.
CHILD ADVOCACY UPDATE:
There has just been another update on the bills passing in the NC State Assemblies. Please see our Child Advocacy Tab for more information: http://teacherweb.com/NC/MiddleCreekElementary/PTA/apt31.aspx Updated topics range from ESEA (Elementary and Secondary Education Act) Reauthorization to the NC House and NC Senate budget details to the private school voucher bill and the legislation on class size ratios and cuts to Teacher Assistants and Pre-K slots.
SCHOOL COUNSELOR UPDATE:
Mrs. Fillard is in need of school supplies for less fortunate families. Below you will find a list of the items needed. Please pick up a few extra supplies and donate them if you are able. All supplies can be dropped off at Mrs. Fillard's room every day between 8 and 8:30. Thank you so much for all your help (as always)!!!
Items needed: set of 5 tab dividers, 1 inch binders, 2 inch binders, plastic folders, paper folders, tissues, dry erase markers, one subject notebooks, marble composition books, markers, crayons, pencil boxes, pencil pouches, pencils, backpacks.
Parent Volunteers Needed!
For the past three years, Mrs. Fillard has coordinated a parent volunteer program through which parents teach monthly character education lessons to their child's class. These lessons are prepared by Mrs. Fillard and last about 30 minutes. Parents and teachers arrange a mutually convenient time for the lessons. One important change this year will be that the focus of the program will be on bullying prevention. WCPSS has developed a Bullying Prevention program that is very similar to the late Character Ed program with many of the same "traits."
Again this year, we are looking for one parent volunteer for each class (or two if you would like to share the responsibility with someone and teach bi-monthly). Please consider participating in this FUN and IMPORTANT volunteer opportunity!!!
If you are interested in volunteering for this program, please contact your child's classroom teacher, and make sure that you have gone through the WCPSS volunteer clearance process. An online training will be offered in August. You will receive an email with more information after we have gathered our list of volunteers.
Thank you!
(Mrs. Fillard and Mrs. Chapman)
CONSUMER PRODUCTS FUNDRAISERS:
Box Tops and Labels for Education:
*Get 25 Bonus Box Tops when you buy any 6 participating General Mills products using your Food Lion MVP card between 8/21 - 8/27. See Food Lion store for additonal details.
*Earn 5 eBox Tops for MCES by liking Sam's Club on Facebook and entering MCES zip code 27539. Go to http:/www.samclubs.com/boxtops
We will have 3 classroom contests this year for Box Tops. The class on each track that brings in the most Box Tops will win the prize. Our first contest begins now and will end October 18, 2013. The prize will be a recess bag with playground balls. Good Luck!
We will also have individual prizes this year. Each month one student from each track will be randomly drawn to win a school store gift card. All you have to do is send in Box Tops and/or Labels for Education to be eligible.
Shoparoo:
We earned $323.84 with the Shoparoo App last school year!! Thank you to everyone who is using the app to earn $$ for our school. Be on the lookout for Shoparoo contests!
Shoparoo has doubled points for qualifing receipts this year. Less than $10 = 10 Roo Points ; $10 - $50 = 20 Roo Points ; $50 - $100 = 30 Roo Points ;
$100+ = 40 Roo Points
If you would like to start helping, please click on my invite for you to join Shoparoo and start earning money for Middle Creek Elementary :
http://app.shoparoo.com/share/szn8tb8
?'s contact Sharon Brown slbrown@nc.rr.com
MCE TWITTER ACCOUNT:
The school has made a MCES Twitter account to get word out about events, etc. Parents can follow us @MiddleCreekES . For parents who DO NOT have a Twitter account, they can still follow us by doing the following:
to follow us text 'followMiddleCreekES' to 40404
to unfollow us text 'leaveMiddleCreekES' to 40404
EVERY FRIDAY IS SPIRIT DAY: Wear MCES spiritwear or blue and gold (our school colors)!