DRAGON DIGEST
VOLUME 3, ISSUE 13 / FEBRUARY 22, 2019
PRINCIPAL'S LETTER
Dear DeSana Parents,
I wanted to share some news with you today . . . some bittersweet news. At the February 12th Board Meeting. our very own Mike Sloop, Assistant Principal at DeSana, was named the new principal at Silver City Elementary School, beginning with the 2019-2020 school year. We are soooo VERY happy for Mr. Sloop, but know that we will miss him LOTS here at DeSana next year. It is always wonderful to see when a person attains a goal he/she has aspired to for many years, as is the case with Mr. Sloop. We couldn't be more proud of him and proud for him!
Please know that Mr. Sloop is committed to our students and staff for the rest of this school year as he carries out all of his normal duties and responsibilities as Assistant Principal.
I hope you will join me in congratulating Mr. Sloop whenever you see him in the near future!
Thank you for all of your continued support of DeSana! Your partnership in providing you kids . . . our kids . . . with the best education possible is truly important to us!
Stay dry!
Terri A. North
Principal
DESANA DAY OF GOOD DEEDS
FOOD DRIVE
Our February Mac and Cheese donations are coming to a close. Please get your mac and cheese boxes in by Thursday Feb. 28th! Imagine if EVERY child just brought one box of mac and cheese in (that would be over 900 boxes!)
Food collected will be donated to The Place of Forsyth, Jesse's House, and Bald Ridge Lodge to support their summer programs.
Winning Dragon Times in 6th, 7th, and 8th grade (based on class percentage) will get possession of the coveted Food Drive trophy (trophy will remain in DT class for one month) and a candy extravaganza!
DONATIONS FOR T-SHIRTS
T-shirt forms will be coming home with your students in early March. T-shirts are a mandatory part of D3 Day for safety reasons. We ask for a $5 donation per t-shirt to just cover our t-shirt costs. Our corporate donations are better spent on the organizations that we are trying to support. Each dollar donated toward t-shirts allows us to do more for our community. You will also have the opportunity on the t-shirt form to become a family sponsor. Family sponsor names will be written on the back of the D3 Day T-shirt and will help to cover the cost of any student that is unable to afford the t-shirt donation cost. We appreciate your quick return of the T-shirt forms on the due date of Friday, March 15. Thank you as always for your continued support of D3 Day!
ITEMS NEEDED
-Plastic grocery bags
· Magazines (particularly men's magazines) to send in the Treat the Troops boxes.
· 1 yard of new fleece for cat toys
· Old towels and blankets to donate to animal shelters
Boxes are in the atrium. Thanks for your help collecting these items we use for D3 Day projects!
PTO
IMPRESSIONS WINNERS
Many congratulations to the following DeSana Dragons for their outstanding performance at the Forsyth County PTO Impressions contest. The county level competition was this week and the following students were named as county level winners.
Photography: Quinn Johnson, 7th grade, 1st place
Art: Rachel Young - 6th Grade, 1st Place
Music: Hannah Lopez - 6th Grade, 1st Place
Literature: Anika Tapshalkar - 6th Grade, 1st Place
OFFICERS NEEDED FOR 2019-2020
The DeSana PTO Board has openings for a President, two Vice Presidents and a Secretary for the upcoming 2019-2020 school year. Please give consideration to participating. It is such a wonderful way to be involved in the life of the school! Officer nomination forms are available here.
ACADEMICS
2019-2020 ADVANCED STUDIES INFO SESSIONS FOR RISING 7TH AND 8TH GRADERS
DeSana's Administration will host Advanced Studies Courses Information Sessions for rising 7th and 8th grade students and their parents on the following dates/times:
Wednesday, February 27, 6:30-7:30PM
Saturday, March 2, 9:00-10:00AM
Thursday, March 7, 6:30-7:30PM
Tuesday, March 12, 6:30-7:30PM
Thursday, March 14, 6:30-7:30PM
Monday, March 18, 6:30-7:30PM
Tuesday, March 19, 6:30-7:30PM*****
Saturday, March 23, 9:00-10:00AM*****
Monday, March 26, 6:30-7:30 PM
Thursday, March 28, 6:30-7:30 PM
*****These sessions will be translated for our Spanish-speaking families.
All sessions will be held in the DeSana media center.
We are offering multiple sessions to hopefully accommodate your family, so please choose the session that is most convenient for your family. These sessions are designed for both parents and students. We will discuss the reasons why your child may consider taking an advanced course(s), how advanced studies courses differ from on-level courses, the benefits of your child challenging himself/herself academically, and the procedures for registering for advanced studies courses here at DeSana.
If you are unable to attend any of these dates/times, administration will speak with students here at the school on Tuesday, 3/19 during the day. The PowerPoint presentation, Readiness Forms, and Registration Forms will be posted on our DeSana website after 2/27/19. An important date to remember is Friday, 3/29.. Registration forms will be taken up to 6:00 PM on 3/29. After this time, registration is closed. This is a firm deadline. All registration forms must be hand delivered to our DeSana front office and the parent/student will receive a receipt for their registration form. We hope you are able to attend one of the Rising 7th/8th Grade Advanced Studies Sessions!
HIGH SCHOOL TRANSITION INFORMATION
On Friday, February 22nd, DeSana 8th graders are visiting their high schools, either Denmark or Alliance, for 8th Grade Student Visitation Day for 9:30-12:00 PM.
8th Grade Student Visitation Day will be a field trip where we transport students by bus to Denmark and Alliance and they will have another opportunity to tour the facility and experience a day in the life of a high school student.
In early February, DeSana teachers completed recommendations for the three core required classes of English, Math, and Science. On February 27th at 8:00 AM, the parent/student portal on infinite campus will open for students to complete their 9th grade registration and will close on March 6th at 4:00 PM. During this time, you will need to follow the instructions found in the Denmark Course Registration Packet and sign up for a total of 7 courses and minimum of 3 alternates. Also at this time, you will also see what recommendations for core classes our DeSana teachers did regarding your child. If you are not in agreement with this recommendation you may follow Denmark’s wavier process found in the Denmark Course Registration Packet. The on-line wavier opens Monday, March 11th at 8:00 AM and closes on Monday, March 18th at 4:00 PM. On March 26-28, students will be able to see their final course selections online.
Ms. Bell and Mrs. Moore have met with every 8th grade student on February 6th, 7th and 8th during classroom guidance to help students develop their individual graduation plan. This will outline courses for registration based on pathways and their requirements for graduation. Our counselors are here to help your students in this process; so, please do not hesitate to contact them, Ms. Bell at abell90@forsyth.k12.ga.us for last names A-L or Mrs. Moore at cmoore29@forsyth.k12.ga.us for last names M-Z.
ALLIANCE ACADEMY for INNOVATION TRANSITION INFORMATION
The above information for Denmark is the same type of registration process for Alliance. Below are important dates they have shared:
Avengers Assemble 2023 Date – February 22nd 9:00 – 11:00 AM
Parent Portal opens/closes – February 27th through March 6th
Waiver process opens/closes – March 11th through March 18th
Course verification – March 26th -March 28th
Avenger Day – July 24th
RESULTS FROM THE GEORGIA REGIONAL SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING FAIR
On February 2, the Georgia Regional Science and Engineering Fair was held at the Alliance Academy, and DeSana has much of which to be proud!
Congratulations to the following students for placing at the Fair:
3rd Place Winners:
Treya H.
Kanishka P.
Elise N.
Natalie V.
Alexis B.
2nd Place Winners:
Sakthipriya R.
Shreyas G.
Kunal T.
Sebastian F.
And a HUGE shout out and congratulations to our three 1st place winners, who will be moving on to State Competition:
Druvitha L.
Sedona Z.
Sneha S.
We are sooo VERY proud of all of our young scientists!
LANGUAGE PROFICIENCY TEST FOR NATIVE SPEAKERS OF OTHER LANGUAGES
Does your child fluently speak another language? Are they currently a 7th or 8th grader at DeSana? Would they be interested in earning high school world language credit by taking a proficiency test rather than having to take the class?
If you answered “YES!” to these questions, then we would like to tell you more about an opportunity we are making available to our current 7th and 8th grade students at DeSana Middle School who are native speakers of languages other than English. Forsyth County Schools uses a proficiency test to assess a student’s mastery of reading, writing, listening and speaking capabilities in 12 different languages - Arabic, French, German, Hebrew, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Polish, Russian, and Spanish. Depending on how a student performs on the proficiency test, they could earn high school credit and move into higher level language courses to be challenged more appropriately.
Any student interested in signing up to take the proficiency test in their native language, should do so by March 1st by clicking here. The testing dates will most likely be March 12-13 in one of our computer labs at DeSana and testing should only take 2-3 hours. This is a test of students’ current language abilities and does not require studying ahead of time for the test.
If you have any questions, please contact Mike Sloop, Assistant Principal, at 770-667-2591 (ext. 491507).
PARENTS: REVIEW GA STUDENT GROWTH MODEL REPORTS
The 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 Georgia Student Growth Model (GSGM) Student Reports are now available to parents in the SLDS Portal. Please read the GSGM Parent Letter for more information regarding GSGM reports. Accessing these downloadable reports through Parent Portal provides parents with individual student performance information. For information on accessing GSGM reports through SLDS Portal, please see the instructions below. For additional information on navigating the SLDS Portal, please refer to the SLDS Parent Portal Guide.
How to Access the Georgia SLDS Portal
Parents can access the Georgia SLDS Parent Portal by following these steps:
- Sign in to Parent Portal.
- Click the SLDS Portal button at the bottom of the list on the left side of the student’s page.
- After clicking the SLDS Portal button, the Parent Portal Welcome Page will open. If you have access to more than one child in the district portal, you will see a dropdown box containing the name of each child.
- If needed, watch the linked video Accessing your Child’s GSGM Reports – Video Tutorial
- For information on reading GSGM reports, watch the linked video Understanding Your Child’s GSGM Reports – Video Tutorial (Spanish)
If you have any questions, you may contact one of our assistant principals, Ms. Sharon Epperson or Mr. Mike Sloop.
GEORGIA PARENT SURVEY
It is time to let the Georgia Department of Education (DOE) know what a great school DeSana Middle School is! Each year, the DOE asks schools to survey students, parents, and school personnel to collect perception data on the climate of every school in the state. We have completed the student and school personnel surveys and are now reaching out to you to get your feedback on how we are doing serving your children at DeSana. The survey is only 24 questions, so please take about 3 minutes to fill out the survey. Click here to access the survey or you may fill it out the next time you are in our building checking out your child. Thank you so much for taking the time to fill out the survey!
DRAGON ACADEMY FOR THE 2018-2019 SCHOOL YEAR - - - AN OPPORTUNITY FOR ADDITIONAL LEARNING & ASSESSMENT TIME FOR STUDENTS!
Dragon Academy is an opportunity we offer students throughout this year from 4:15-6:15 for completing, taking or re-taking formative and/or summative assessments (i.e. unit tests, projects, essays, quizzes. etc.). Dragon Academy happens at least two times a month --- on Fridays --- with teachers and an administrator supervising each session. It is a fantastic opportunity for students to drastically improve both their learning and their grades. Students are be invited by their teachers . . . or they may invite themselves . . . to attend Dragon Academy if they are missing work or need to re-take an assessment to show better mastery of the standards or complete a project. Although students have about two hours to complete their work, once they complete all that they came to accomplish, students are able to call their parent to come pick them up. Snacks and drinks are sold for a very reasonable cost so students may focus on their work, not on their gurgling stomachs! Any necessary school supplies are provided for students to use to complete their work, as needed.
Please mark your calendars now for these Dragon Academy dates for the rest of the school year:
· March 15 & 29
· April 19 & 26
· May 3 & 10
THE ARTS
DOODLE FOR GOOGLE
The annual Doodle for Google competition has begun! Want to win a $30,000 college scholarship, a $50,000 Google for education package for DeSana, and your artwork to be featured on the google homepage for a day? See Mrs. Petit for an entry form and more information. Entries are due to Mrs. Petit March 14th or you may enter on your own by March 18th.
FESTIVAL OF ARTS COMPETITION
The Festival of Arts is fast approaching and first place for the middle school division wins $500! DeSana had three students place last year with one student winning first place! Anyone interested should submit artwork to Mrs. Petit by March 8th.
CHORUS NEWS
Congratulations to the following students who passed two rounds of auditions and participated in the Georgia Music Educators Association All-State Chorus this past weekend in Athens, GA:
Deeksha R. (7th Grade)
April C. (7th Grade)
Elizabeth G. (8th Grade)
The All-State choirs are made up the best singers from the entire state and we couldn’t be prouder of our singers!
Next Thursday (2/28), we are super excited to leave for Disney World as we compete in the Festival Disney Competition. There is a mandatory parent information meeting this Friday, February 22 at 6:30pm in the chorus room. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact Mr. Bigliani (cbigliani@forsyth.k12.ga.us)! Wish us luck!
ACTIVITIES
6th GRADE FIELD TRIP
Tellus Science Museum Field Trip Permission Forms went home with all 6th grade students this week. Students should return their signed permission form along with $30 cash or check written out to DeSana Middle School to their science teacher. The Field Trip will be Tuesday, May 14.
SCIENCE OLYMPIAD RESULTS
DeSana Science Olympiad participated in the Science Olympiad Regional Division competing against 30 teams. The following people placed in the top 4:
- Battery Buggy – placed 4th by 8th grader Neha and 7th grader Suhani
- Roller Coaster – placed 4th by 6th graders Timi and Connor
- Disease Detectives - placed 4th by 6th grader Shriya and 8th grader Rishit (pronounced Ree-sheet)
- Mystery Architecture – placed 1st by 8th graders Sameya and Sakthipriya (pronounced Sak-thee-pree-yuh)
- Write it Do it – placed 3rd by Aarohi and Shanmathi
GEORGIA YOUNG AUTHORS
The DeSana ELA department would like to congratulate our grade level winners for Young Georgia Authors competion!
From sixth grade – Aryan B.
From seventh grade – Ella C.
Congratulations and good luck at the county level!
PARENT 411 - HELPFUL LINKS FOR YOU
OTHER IMPORTANT INFORMATION
EARLY RELEASE DAY / CONFERENCE DAY ON FRIDAY, MARCH 8
Parents, please mark your calendar now for an Early Release Day on Friday, March 8th, when our middle schoolers will be released at 1:30 PM. Please start making plans now for where your young Dragon will spend his/her afternoon after dismissal on this Friday. There will be no after school activities on this day as our teachers will be involved in parent conferences. Teachers will be communicating with parents with whom they would like to discuss their student’s progress during this second semester, and inviting them to come in for a conference on the afternoon of March 8th. Likewise, if you have a concern about how your child is progressing, please contact your young Dragon’s teacher(s) to schedule a conference. We will be happy to set one up.
DESANA'S NEXT LOCAL SCHOOL COUNCIL MEETING
The next meeting of DeSana’s Local School Council (LSC) is scheduled for Friday, March 1st at 7:30 AM in the front office conference room.
IMPORTANT YEARBOOK INFORMATION
Did you miss the deadline for purchasing a 2018-2019 DeSana Yearbook? On-line and in-school sales will re-open on February 25, 2019 for a limited time. Please don’t wait to order as sales will close as soon as we reach our goal! Price is now: $50
Visit: balfour.com or send in cash or check to Mrs. West on the 7th grade hall
Questions? Email Mrs. West: mwest@forsyth.k12.ga.us
MANY THANKS TO OUR AMAZING BUSINESS PARTNERS!
*ALL AMERICAN SPECIALTIES
*BROWNS BRIDGE CHURCH
*CHICK-FIL-A @ THE COLLECTION
*DUNKIN DONUTS
*DR. HOM PEDIATRIC DENTISTRY & ALPHARETTA COMPREHENSIVE DENTISTRY
*HI FIVE SPORTS
*MARVEL SOCCER
*MILTON DENTAL SPECIALISTS
*NORTH GEORGIA PROMOTIONS
*OMEGA LEARNING
*RBM OF ALPHARETTA
*RISPA
*VERTICAL CHURCH
Forsyth County Schools does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, age, disability, or gender in employment decisions or educational programs and activities.