Success & High Expectations
Creating & Sustaining this Culture
BRANDING & SETTING THE TONE
Branding is an essential piece of the puzzle as you set the tone for your staff. Use your main school logo and make derivatives of it to brand everything that is important in your school building. The students, staff and community will latch onto a brand. Brands are solid, and give you a visual to believe in!
Main Coyote Logo
How old is your mascot logo? Have you considered rebranding? This is a great way to involve students, staff, and the community to buy in to all of your plans!
Mission
Have a mission? Is it connected to your mascot? Can your students, and staff recite it easily? Mix your staff into groups during a retreat or planning week and challenge them to create a mission. It's amazing what they can accomplish with chart paper and markers when put to the test!
Motto
Once you have a Mission, create a tag line. Something catchy, and easy to remember! Our motto ties into the name of the road to our school, The Coyote Way!
Criminal Justice Academy
A strong brand leads to programs adapting your main theme and running with it.
Conservatory for the Arts
Our art teachers came up with this logo, utilizing the CCCA as a theater stage if viewed from above.
Engineering Academy
Our Engineering Academy represented our Coyotes with a paw, and 17 nodules on the gear as a nod to our opening year of 2017.
Create a Theme Every Year to Support Your Work!
Year 1
Use your main logo in all you do so your brand is sold to students, staff, and the community. It is important to ensure that all staff ordering product use the approved logo.
Year 2
We had opened our school with our H.O.W.L. mission, but wanted to solidify it. During our summer retreat and planning week our staff created and solidified Collective Commitments that they would follow as a staff!
Year 3
After focusing on our H.O.W.L. mission for year one and two, we are focusing on our motto for year three. This fits in nicely with our year three roll out of trauma informed care to our students.
SYSTEMS OF SUPPORT...
It is important to set up systems of support for students, staff, the community, and your administrators. If there is a clear way of work for all stakeholders, all will be empowered to make decisions and have knowledge of how your school works, or whom to speak to if they need assistance. Empowerment is key for a collaborative culture, and leads to everyone achieving at their highest potential.
FOR STUDENTS...
PACK Leaders
12th, and 8th grade students who serve as peers and mentors to 9th and 6th grade students. These students are enrolled in a Leadership Skills course and are assigned to classrooms. They work with students, not as assistants to the teacher. They tutor, goal-set, and work with small groups of students.
Coyote Cash
We use PBIS Rewards to award "Coyote Cash" to our students based on our H.O.W.L. mission. All staff members have access to this app, and can reward students at any time for exhibiting our H.O.W.L. Students were recognized over half a million times this year with Coyote Cash.
PACK Shack
This is our school store that is open every Thursday during lunch periods. Students can spend their Coyote Cash each week. Students use their case for snacks, school supplies, spirit items, prizes, & special privileges. The PACK Shack is run by students for students.
Student Mini-Sessions
We set up in the 4 corners of our gym for the first 10 days of school. Every day during 3rd period, four classes come to the gym and rotate through four different sessions with administration, SRO, and school counselors. These mini-sessions set the tone with our kids for our school year. Our sessions this year were Grade Level Milestones, Equal Opportunity Schools, Discipline Review, Coyote Core+ Intervention Period.
Students of the Week
We use a mach form for all staff to nominate "Students of the Week." This is a link in our weekly staff Howler Hub. Student names are announced on the intercom each Friday. They meet me in our courtyard where they receive a print out of what was said about them, 12 Coyote Cash, and they get to help raise the "Coyote Nation" flag. Pictures & names are posted on social media and in our weekly Howler Hub! Students also receive a phone call home to their parent/guardian from their grade level administrator.
Bump Up Letters
We use "Bump Up" letters after standardized scores come in in June to push our students to take higher level courses. We also are in partnership with Equal Opportunity Schools to increase participation in our Advanced Placement classes.
Spring HOWL
Homecoming week is never enough dressing up and spirit filled fun for our students. We incorporate a second week of dress up and activities during 2nd semester called Spring Howl. This usually is in late February or March, prior to testing, to release some energy. We incorporate powder puff, and more dress up days into this week of fun!
Howlabrations
We have two academic celebrations each year. One in January for 1st semester, and one at the end of the 4th quarter. This ceremony recognizes honor roll, and all of our students of the week. We also ask each department to select an award winner. Each of these winners receive a medal.
Coyote Core+
We piloted a web-based system to run a daily intervention period each day for our students. Departments were given priority days, and had to select a minimum of 10 students on their priority day. All students self-selected intervention periods daily when they weren't selected by the staff. If students weren't selected and/or didn't select, they were placed by admin each week.
Tuesday Tutoring
Our NHS & NJHS students offer after school tutoring every Tuesday to our middle and high school students. This is a free program that builds community with our students. It also provides an opportunity for our NHS & NJHS students to earn community service hours.
Student vs. Staff Games
We play staff vs. student games at pep rallies and as the "finals" in several fundraising contests.
Include Students in Decisions
Kids have awesome ideas. Ask them for assistance when creating or changing traditions for input. Use their artwork (photographs, etc...) to fill your school with art. Get photos printed on canvas. Create a gallery wall in common areas to display and rotate student artwork. Let them paint parking spaces! Update traditions with new thoughts and ideas!
FOR STAFF...
Common Area Expectations
During our first retreat our staff defined our H.O.W.L. for our students. They denoted what our expectations look like in our hallways, cafeteria, gym, classrooms, locker rooms, on social media, etc.. These are posted throughout our school.
Posters for Classrooms
These posters help our teachers define our H.O.W.L. within their classrooms. We ask each teacher to write their class expectations on this poster. We also require them to have a 3-step intervention process within their classroom. One of the 3 steps must be a phone call home to a parent/guardian.
Top 3 Offenses Explained, with Consequences
This poster is a simplified version of the top 3 offenses on our campus. We have defined the expectations and the consequences of each for ease of understanding for staff, students, and the community.
10 Days of Coyote Holidays
Those last two weeks prior to winter break are always tough to get through. Make it fun and exciting for your staff by creating dress up days & fun activities!
Holiday Wishes
During our 10 Days of Holidays I put out a mach form and give my entire staff an opportunity to make 3 wishes. I promise to grant at least one. Typically I find that my staff does not spend their classroom funds, nor their departmental money, so these funds are used to make these wishes come true.
Staff Howler Hub
Each week I send a staff newsletter out via our "all-staff" email. This digital resource provides our staff with a wealth of information on upcoming events for the week ahead. Click here to check it out! https://www.smore.com/dgv05
Staff of the Week
We use a mach form for all staff and our community to nominate "Staff of the Week." This is a link in our weekly staff and parent/student Howler Hub. Staff names are announced on the intercom each Friday. They meet me in our courtyard where they receive a print out of what was said about them. Their picture & names are posted on social media, and are put in our Weekly Howler Hubs.
Participation is Encouraged!
All staff are encouraged to participate in our Red Ribbon Week, Homecoming Week, Winter Holidays, and Spring Howl Dress Up Days! This builds relationships with students & brings out personalities and talents you didn't know your staff had!
Howler Hub Special Editions
We use our Howler Hub format for "Special Editions" to communicate clearly with our staff. We have created a Discipline Edition, a Summer/Welcome New Staff Edition, Planning Week Edition, and Quarterly School-Wide Data Edition. Click here to see an example of the Planning Week Edition: https://www.smore.com/bcnew
Click here to see an example of the Discipline Edition:
Click here to see an example of our Summer Edition:
The Golden Coyote
Our Golden Coyote is awarded by staff to staff. This is awarded every 2 weeks. Whomever receives the Golden Coyote gets to choose the next recipient. Our administration takes a photo and posts the new recipients name and picture in our Howler Hubs and on social media.
Staff Self-Care PD
We are a trauma informed school. Our roll out during year two focused on the needs of our staff. During the week of Valentine's day we held our 1st Staff Self-Care PD. Our Trauma Informed Care team offered 9 experiences including engineering experiences, 3-D art, Corn Hole, Yoga, Cross-fit, Walk & Talk, CJA, Zen Doodle, and the Zen room.
Collective Commitments
During our summer retreat and planning week our staff solidified descriptors for our H.O.W.L. mission for our staff. These collective commitments are shared with all new hires and are reiterated several times throughout the year to commit and recommit to them.
Canvas Pictures Posted
Our journalism department takes amazing photos. We have used these photos to decorate all of our common spaces!
Mission & Motto Everywhere
Our Mission & Motto is in every classroom and every room in our building. This helps solidify all that we do as Coyotes!
Teacher & SRP of the Year
Find a great way to immortalize your Teachers & SRP's of the Year. Each of ours get their name and year etched on a paw that is then placed on this wall in the area of their choice.
FOR THE COMMUNITY...
Howlapalooza
Transition program for incoming 6th grade or 9th grade students. This program is run by our PACK leaders. Students are given a tour of the campus and partake in numerous activities including tie-dying t-shirts, learning how to access the cafeteria, the media, and how we H.O.W.L.
Howler Hub
Each week we send a parent/student newsletter out to our families via Remind, Twitter, Facebook, and emailed through our School Messenger system. This digital resource provides our community with a wealth of information on upcoming events. Click here to check them out! https://www.smore.com/x0r1e-howler-hub
PBIS Explained
Our new student welcome packet includes information about our PBIS system, along with other important information for our new families.
Campus Clean-Up
We held our 1st annual "Clean-Up at The Creek" on June 7th from 9am-1pm. I offer volunteer hours to students. Each team of 8-10 students is led by a staff member. I limit the number of teams to 10 total, and use a mach form for sign-ups. This morning has numerous positive consequences. Students and staff always have a little more respect for their campus and our custodial staff after this morning!
Who's Who
We create a visual for each grade level that is posted on our website. This is a quick reference for our community, with pictures of our admin, school counselor, & class sponsor. This also provides them with the class remind, class color, and contact information for these important contacts!
The Growlers
We have an annual athletic awards celebration event, which is our version of the ESPY's. Part of our "check-out" for coaches each season is them getting a donation of 25 awards from the community that can be put in a "swag bag" for each Growler award winner. We hold online voting for our Growlers to involve our entire community. We recognize each team (MS & HS) on stage, and each individual award winner. Walk-up music makes the event a blast!
Halloween Safe Zone
This is held on our campus and put on by our Dance Department. They create a Halloween maze for older kids, and a less scary maze for younger students. All of our clubs and programs set up tables with candy and non-food items. This activity brings our community on our campus and allows them to engage and interact positively with our students and staff. This also promotes community service with our students.
Food & Clothing Drives
Hold these as often as you can and invite your community to participate. We do food drives, and hold clothing and prom dress/tuxedo drives.
Tweet @TheCoyoteWay
Since our inception we have asked our students, families and staff to interact with us during breaks and vacations via Twitter. This has created a family atmosphere and is an easy way to build relationships amongst students and staff.
FOR YOUR ADMINISTRATIVE TEAM...
Admin Vision Document
The Admin Vision Document is a basic form, but has helped me tremendously in assisting my administrators in focusing their work. It allows each of them the freedom to have a vision for each responsibility, and a way to effectively communicate that vision to me. We then have a fluid, working document to reference at our 1 month, 3 month, 6 month and year end meetings.
Be a Teacher or Administrator for the Day
One of my teachers came up with this fundraiser, which is actually "Be a Teacher or Administrator for a Day." The positive consequences of this day are rewarding for both students and staff. These students carried our keys and radios, and we put them to work at lunch duty, walking through classrooms, and giving out student and staff of the week accolades. They gained a new perspective of our work, and we built relationships with them as administrators.
SGA Quarterly Luncheon
At each progress reporting period we have a luncheon with our Student Government Officers from every grade level 6-12. The students meet with us and offer ideas about our school, give suggestions, and ask questions. It provides an opportunity for them to share their voices. They have prompted us to make changes to our school, and when that happens they get to see the power that their voices have.
Comprehensive Needs Assessment
Our District has 3 Key Priorities: High Impact Instruction, Data Driven Decisions, and Collaborative Culture. We have a CNA visit near the end of each year which drives our goal setting. We compile all of our data within these three categories and this is what drives our goal setting for the year ahead. Our theme is derived from these thoughts.
Admin Summer Action Plan
This is a to-do list I have compiled over the years. I updated it every summer as admin responsibilities shift. This helps keep our admin team on track through the summer months and gives them a list to check repeatedly to make sure everything gets done!
AP for a Day
I require our Leadership team members to participate in being an AP for a Day. I also offer this to teachers who are interested in or are pursuing their Ed. Leadership degree. I use these teachers when my Administrators are off campus for meetings. My teachers put in for a temporary duty day and assume the role of administration. This breaks down barriers between admin & teachers, and offers a look at the big picture of running a school.
Contact Information
Email: canettle@pasco.k12.fl.us
Website: ccmhs.pasco.k12.fl.us
Location: 8701 Old Pasco Road, Wesley Chapel, FL, USA
Phone: 813-346-4400
Facebook: facebook.com/CypressCreek
Twitter: @TheCoyoteWay