Just ask Jackson (above photo) how happy he is to be back in school!

Students and staff hit the ground running by diving into their coursework and participating in fall sports, clubs, and activities.

We hope that you enjoy reading this digital newsletter and joining us on our school experiences.

The presentation of the distinguished Robert C. Freeman Citizenship Award comes with great pride for the Caledonia-Mumford Central School District.

The recipient of the 2021 Freeman Award is Senior Sawyer Richardson.

Congratulations Sawyer. Your name is among many other outstanding Raiders who have carried on the ideals of leadership and good citizenship in their careers and in their communities.

The award is given to a member of the Senior class who exemplifies outstanding citizenship. The award honors the late Mr. Robert C. Freeman, who spent the majority of his life here at CMCS, as an outstanding and well-respected student, athlete, teacher, guidance counselor and coach, both within the walls of Cal-Mum School and in the community. He placed a great deal of emphasis on good citizenship and his leadership was an inspiration to all who worked with him, studied under him or knew him.

Mr. Freeman entered Caledonia Elementary School as a student in 1918. In high school, he played Caledonia High School football from 1929 – 1932. In his sophomore year,
Mr. Freeman played on the infamous and historic 1929 football team whose season record was 9-0 and whom no opponent had scored upon.

After graduation from Caledonia High School in 1932, Mr. Freeman attended and graduated from Niagara University. Mr. Freeman returned to his beloved alma mater to teach history in the newly opened Caledonia High School building, located at 99 North Street.

His career was cut short by his three-year service in the U.S. military at the start of WWII. He returned to Caledonia High School to resume teaching history and also went on to assume the role of guidance counselor. Mr. Freeman became the head varsity football coach for the newly centralized Caledonia-Mumford Central School. He coached the team for 10 years before becoming principal of the junior-senior high school.

Students, faculty and the community held deep respect for Mr. Freeman for his firmness and fairness, realizing his motivation was the wellbeing of the students and the school. He was admired as a great man, a great coach, a great American and above all else – a truly great Cal-Mum Raider.

Sawyer, this award is presented to you by High School Principal, Dr. Rebekah Chenaille, on behalf of the whole school community. Your character and commitment to citizenship have earned you a place next to so many before you who strived to make Cal-Mum great. Congratulations and thank you for your contributions to our school and community.

Sawyer is the daughter of Duke and Caroline Richardson, who along with her brother Tanner, attended the award presentation.

The Tom Callan Football Award was presented to Senior Camden Reed. The award was presented prior to the kick-off of the September 17, 2021, football game against York/Pavilion Golden Knights.

Callan and Caroline Cappotelli, great-grandchildren of the late Mr. Callan, presented the award to Camden. His parents Michael and Erin Reed were present alongside Coach Mike Yokopovich.

The award is given to a CMBB Raider player who best exemplifies the values that Mr. Callan stood for both on and off the football field. The type of hard work and dedication that characterized Mr. Callan's life has become the cornerstones upon which the Cal-Mum football tradition is based. Tom believed that football games are won by the people who handle the under-appreciated chores of blocking and tackling. The names of these people are often lost in the headlines, but without them, no team can win.

Congratulations to Camden.

Cal-Mum High School students are taking the lead in the campaign to Stomp Out Bullying and to show acts of kindness. This is a school-wide activity and students of all ages are encouraged to participate along with their families.

The high school students created kindness challenges to focus on throughout the month. They invited students, teachers, staff and administrators to join the kindness challenge. They placed encouraging messages and posters around the school.

High School Social Studies teacher and head varsity football coach Mr. Mike Yokopovich was onboard. He challenged his football players and all students to be thankful for what they have and to appreciate what is at hand. To demonstrate that gratitude, Mr. Yokopovich challenged everyone to leave people, places and things better than when they found them. It could be a locker room, your bedroom, a family member, a classmate or a teacher. Did you leave it/them better than when you found it/them?

After a victory on October 16, Coach Yokopovich and his team cleaned the locker room, which really put a smile on the faces of the custodial staff. They left the locker room and the cleaning staff, better than when found them.

On October 28 the entire school will be wearing blue to show their support for Stomping Out Bullying and acts of kindness. The National Honor Society sold blue shirts so we are really eager to see everyone in their blue. Any blue will do!

By Senior Katherine Beachel

September 13 – 17, 2021 - celebrating our maroon and white traditions with Spirit Week.

The High School Student Council created a great week of fun activities and daily themes.

Families, friends, middle and high school students, and our community prepare every year for homecoming. It was especially unifying this year as the student body could celebrate as one, big raider family as they could not last year due to Covid-19 protocols. So, we celebrated this year, back and better than ever!

Every team this year got to participate and play at historic Hamilton Field or at our beautiful high school gym to bring back fall sports and memories. This year, our varsity volleyball team brought us our first homecoming game with a big win over the Keshequa Indians in just 3 sets! Our girls’ varsity soccer team also battled Keshequa the very next night, in a very close 1-1 game that led into overtime, but the Indians pulled ahead and scored in overtime, making the final score 1-2. The boys’ varsity team then played The Avon Braves but could not pull out a win. Finally, Our CMBB football team closed the week with a big win, 34-0, against York/Pavilion and ended Homecoming with the celebration of the year.

Our wonderful middle and high school students got to celebrate in style! Our fabulous Raiders had a movie week theme to celebrate Homecoming.

Monday was inspired by Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, our Raiders got to come to school extra comfy in leisure/pajamas clothes. We then had students wear Disney outfits inspired by their favorite Disney characters/movies. Wednesday, we unified each grade by having them dress up in a specific class color. Students wore country-inspired clothes on Thursday, some students even drove tractors to school! Finally, on Friday, everyone wore their maroon and white with pride as the varsity sports had a parade for the elementary and middle school.

The annual Pep rally took place and the Class of 2022 won the spirit stick!

She spoke to Ms. Mary Dorman's AP Psychology students about how to become a school social worker, what the job duties are and the variety of social work fields available as career choices. Mrs. Tallon also facilitated the class as they problem solved case scenarios.

Middle School Counselor Mrs. Jinny Mancuso worked with students in their classrooms showing them how to grow their minds.

Using the Second Step program, Mrs. Mancuso did a growth mindset lesson with the middle school students.

How to grow your brains!

• Learn what happens in your brain when you try something new

• Learn how your brain changes and grows with experience and practice

• Learn about neurons and neural pathways.

Mrs. Mancuso had the students arrange in a circle and pass the ball to a certain person as fast as possible. The more they practiced, the better they performed. Your brain is a muscle - the more you use it, the bigger it gets!

Second Step programs are research-based, teacher-informed, and classroom-tested to promote the social-emotional development, safety, and well-being of children from early learning through Grade 8.

Unit 1 - Mindset and Goals

Unit 2 - Recognizing Bullying and Harassment

Unit 3- Thoughts, Emotions and Decisions

Unit 4- Managing Relationships and Social Conflict.

Each year Cal-Mum bus drivers provide safety lessons to all students in kindergarten through grade 12.

They review rules for riding the bus as well as new guidelines related to Covid safety. The drivers also have the students practice exiting from the emergency exits.

Thank you to Cal-Mum Transportation for making our students’ safety a priority.

One of the most significant impacts of the pandemic over the past two school years, was to our libraries and the pause in the circulation of books and for students being able to visit the libraries..

We are very pleased to say that both the elementary and the middle-high school libraries are open to students and circulating books once again.

From Mrs.Mary Burns in the Elementary School Library

“The Caledonia-Mumford Elementary Library was delighted to welcome students back to our physical library for the School Year 2021-2022. Students in all grades are enjoying having a wide variety of books for independent reading. Also, finding the right book is so much easier when you can look through the actual book and read a little of it first! All students are borrowing books at a rapid pace and can’t wait to get new books each week.

We are working on many changes in the library. Students have access to a variety of activity centers and lessons which incorporate hands-on learning. Fifth Grade students are in a new program called Reading Buddies where they help the kindergarten students. The kindergarten students love having help finding books and then being read to by their new friends.”

Mrs. Elizabeth Barbour is new to the middle-high school faculty. Since starting at Cal-Mum in September, Mrs. Barbour has rearranged the library, created interesting collections of book titles, established quiet study times and added educational activities for students visiting the library.

From Mrs. Barbour in the Middle/High School Library

“This year the Caledonia Mumford Middle/High School Library and Learning Commons is open and full of energy! We have had over 1,500 student visitors in the first six weeks alone!

Students can visit the library to browse and check out books, seek assistance with accessing digital library resources, collaborate with other students in Makerspace and STEM activities, or join one of the library clubs.

In the next few weeks, the library will be transformed as new furniture revitalizes the space, allowing students to collaborate, learn, read, and create in a more modern 21st Century Learning Commons. For more information, please visit the Library website at https://sites.google.com/cal-mum.org/mshslibrary"

Visit the Elementary School Library webpage for more information.

Elementary School

October is Fire Prevention Month and Cal-Mum Elementary School students enjoyed a visit from Caledonia, Mumford and Scottsville Fire Departments, sharing lessons on safety.

We appreciate all of the time and effort you put into helping our students be fire safe.

Our first few months of Kindergarten have been a blast.

Kindergarten students have been developing their fine motor skills using a pencil to draw different types of lines which will lead to the development of forming letters.

In math, they are working on writing and counting from numbers 1-10. In Listening and Learning, students have been listening to different nursery rhymes and creating crafts to coordinate with the units.

All of the students have been working so hard in the classroom. Some of their favorite activities so far included the fire safety event with our local firefighters and kindergarten chalk day.

After getting to know each other a little better we began to learn about the challenges that children around the world face when it comes to accessing books to read. It was amazing to find out that books are brought to children by elephants, camels, and even by donkeys! We realized just how lucky we are to have access to so many books in our classrooms, our school library, and our two community libraries.

In math, we have also been exploring strategies we can use to solve multiplication and division word problems. Later on this year we will be memorizing our facts! We had some special news too! Mrs. Janet Yaekel received the Golden Apple Teacher Award given through WROC channel 8 news. We congratulate her on a job well done.

Fall was an exciting time for sixth graders. They participated in their first spirit week and pep rally.

In social studies, we will soon start our unit on Ancient Egypt where students will be immersed in learning about pyramids, mummies, King Tut, and many aspects of Egyptian culture.

Sixth grade ELA is currently reading The Lightning Thief and students are loving the world of Ancient Greek mythology. But at the same time we are working on our inferencing skills, citing evidence, and analyzing our evidence. Students can’t seem to get enough of the reading and are eager to find out how the story ends!

Math students are learning how to identify ratios in tables, graphs and equations. Soon we will learn to convert fractions to decimals, decimals to percents and percents to fractions!

Sixth-grade science classes participated in a Zoom meeting with former Caledonia graduate, Joshua Ingersoll. The Stellar Science lesson he presented was on satellites and orbits. Students really enjoyed their interactions with Josh and asked many great questions!

Sixth-grade teachers are excited for the rest of the school year.

October is the time for apples - for Cal-Mum third grade teacher Mrs. Janet Yaekel, October brought her a Golden Apple. Mrs. Yaekel received WROC News Channel 8’s Golden Apple Award. Victoria Stahl, a student in Mrs. Yaekel’s class, nominated her for the award.

Mrs. Yaekel has been an elementary school teacher at Cal-Mum for more than 20 years. Before moving to third grade, Mrs. Yaekel taught kindergarten.

When asked what she hopes her students learn from her, Mrs. Yaekel said, “I want them to know that they matter, that they are amazing. That if they do their best and try their hardest, that is enough. And to not compare themselves to anyone else but to strive to be their personal best.”

Congratulations to Mrs. Yaekel, Golden Apple Award Recipient.

The communities of Geneseo and Caledonia-Mumford raised $1,555 in the annual Dig Pink volleyball match, held on October 12 at the Cal-Mum High School gymnasium.

Businesses from both communities donated gifts and raffle baskets for the fundraiser. The proceeds from the Dig Pink match and give-aways go to the Sideout Foundation. In addition to the money that was raised by the event, both teams honored breast cancer survivors in their communities.

In volleyball, side-out means to regain control of the ball. The Side-Out Foundation helps people with breast cancer regain control of their lives. The Foundation utilizes the sport of volleyball to help with its fundraising efforts.

Living Environment teacher Mr. Ben Hoy, engaged his students in an activity he called, The Bachelor: Organelle Edition, in which students roleplay as organelles in the cell. The goal is to make connections between what keeps a cell running and what keeps a city running, giving organelles personalities that match their jobs within the cell.

The activity required a good amount of face-to-face communication, which some of the students struggled to get comfortable with at first. Once they began talking with one another, great communication opened up and the students really grasped the concept of organelles and their function in the human body.

The students considered things like career choices, family status, where would they like to live and other ideas important to them. Then they were challenged to consider what steps they would need to take in their futures to achieve their goals.