WATERFORD WEEKLY
August 25, 2017
Mission
Vision
Our Week in Review
Diction Dog
Teacher Goodie Bags
NWEA Testing
Safe Telescope Viewing
Mrs. Kauffman's 3rd Graders
Guided Reading Begins
Salt Dough Maps
Learning Lab
Van and Vanna - 4/5 Cluster this week
ILT (Instructional Leadership Team) Meeting Update
Who Am I?
This is a new section of the Waterford Weekly. This section will highlight one person on the staff each week. The first person to guess who the individual is wins a $5.00 gift card each week. (Compliments of Katrina)
Note: You are not eligible to compete the week you are the person of the week. You can email me with the correct response or see me in person.
Our first person of the week is someone who:
- Enters the lawnmower races at the Elkhart County Fair each year
- Just bought a new camper and "tried it out."
Discover - "E" Portion of the Science Adoption
On Saturday, September 16th, Discovery Education will be training for the "E" portion of the Science Adoption. Each building needs to send a Primary and Intermediate representative who can be trained and then train the building staff on this portion of the science adoption. If you are interested in being the "trainer," please send me an email so that I can send you name to Tracey Noe. The training will be from 8-3 and you will be paid $100.00 for the day of training.
Please ask if you have questions.
TAP Portal
Within the next two weeks, you will need to log into EEPASS, the new TAP portal. In the future, you will be entering your self-scores from your lesson evaluations through EEPASS. You received an email over the summer (or maybe three emails) with your user name and log in.
Go to this website: EEPASS.org...“Log in” is in the top left corner.
NOTE: Enter your school email as your user name and click “forgot password” if you do NOT still have the email from this summer.
Cluster Reminder
Staffing Updates
Kimber Stone has been hired as our new Special Education Teacher. She has 17 years of experience and will be working towards getting her Special Education certification over the next year. She has worked for the South Bend Community Schools Corporation for the last thirteen years and another four years with the Diocese of Fort Wayne. Kimber has experience with Guided Reading and Fundations and has taught grades 2,3, 4, and 5. She is excited to begin a new journey in her educational career. We hope that she may be starting on Monday. I will keep you posted.
Abigail Martinez has been hired as a new para. Abigail has experience working with special needs students and speaks Spanish. She is excited about her new position and to be working at Waterford. Please welcome her to the Waterford Family. We hope that she will be starting on Monday.
Next Week and Beyond
Monday 8/28: Delay Day - Good to Great, Part I - All teachers meets in the Library from 7:20-8:05 a.m.
Staff Meeting 3:05-4:05
Tuesday 8/29:
IDEA Meeting in Conference Room 12:30-1:30 p.m.
K/1 Cluster 2:15-3:15
Wed. 8/30:
Cultural Committee Meeting 3:30-4:00 - Conference Room
2/3 Cluster 2:15-3:15
Thurs. 8/31:
David Teall will be here with his coffee cart in the a.m. as a special treat! He represents the AXA-Financial Group
4/5 Cluster 2:15-3:15
ILT 3:30-4:45
Fri. 9/1:
Upcoming Dates:
Mon. 8/28:
School Board Meeting 6:00 p.m. - Board Room
Mon. 9/4:
Labor Day - No School
Martins Supermarket Grants
As a new school year begins, we want to take the opportunity to remind you of our “One School at a Time” program which provides the opportunity for a school in your district to earn a $1,000 grant from Martin’s Super Markets.
We understand schools and teachers are finding creative ways to improve learning with limited resources.
NewsCenter 16 and Martin’s Super Markets continue to support those efforts with “One School at a Time.”
Anyone educator in your district can fill out a grant application at WNDU.com and tell us what makes your school special. If chosen, your school will appear on NewsCenter 16 and receive a one-thousand-dollar grant.
Every month, our committee of judges will go through all entries that have been submitted and pick one grant proposal that will be awarded a one-thousand dollar grant. The grant money will be awarded directly to the school by Martin's Super Markets. If your grant proposal is not selected, you don’t need to resubmit. Once you enter your grant idea, it’s up for consideration each month.
We wish you all the best in the coming year and look forward to reviewing your entry.
News from Central Office
From Tracey: FYI - I wanted to confirm that your teachers know when ordering their living materials using the certificates, to make sure they specify their needs.
As an example: ENVIRONMENTS calls for mealworm larvae, but unless you specify they may send you adult mealworms. And unless specified, instead of getting 25-Pillbugs and 25-Sowbugs, you may get 50 of one or the other.
So please have them review the lesson plans to see what they need and then be specific when ordering.
TAP District-wide Leadership Meetings: Tentative dates have been set! More details will be coming soon, but please mark your calendars:
Wednesday, September 27th from 8:30 – 10:30 a.m. in the Board Room (Masters and Administrators together!)
Wednesday, October 25th
Wednesday, November 29th
Wednesday, January 17th
Wednesday, February 21st
Wednesday, March 21st
It is likely that some months we will include all administrators and master teachers together, some will be separate meetings for masters and administrators, and for some topics we may separate elementary from secondary. As we finalize the times and topics, we will send you more information.
NIET Site Reviews: This year, we will be slightly changing the site review process by creating a school rotation, alternating years. The following schools will be participating in the traditional On-Site Reviews (per our past practice): Chandler, Model, GMS, Prairie View and Merit. The remaining schools will participate in “desk-top” site reviews which means that all of the data and information will be provided electronically, with no ‘on-site’ visit from the NIET reviewer. If your school has an “on-site” review in 2018, you will be on the rotation for a “desk top” review in 2019. All schools will receive written feedback as in the past. This is one way in which we can sustain our fidelity to TAP, while reducing some related expenses.
The Mizuni data warehouse project continues to move forward with a goal of providing access to teachers this school year. While the system has many data points to view already, if you have needs that the system does not currently address, please be in communication with Dave Snyder or Tim Drescher. We anticipate setting up further trainings on Mizuni, so please take advantage of these opportunities.
Please make your staff aware, if they are not already, that in order to best address their technology issues, they need to use the Help Desk system. TRCs have been given the guidance to direct staff to “put in a ticket” rather than accepting email or verbal requests. There are pros and cons to using an electronic system, but the main goal is to make our technology and communication as reliable as they can be with the resources we have.
About Us
Email: koverton@goshenschools.org
Website: http://waterford.goshenschools.org/
Location: 65560 S.R. 15 Goshen, IN 46526
Phone: 574-533-6811
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/waterford.elementary
Twitter: @WaterfordElem