April 2019 Superintendent Monthly Update
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BLUE RIDGE CUSD 18 SUPERINTENDENT’S MONTHLY UPDATE Issue # 7 Blue Ridge CUSD 18 Superintendent’s Monthly Update 1ST GRADERS GAVE WEATHER REPORTS USING A “GREEN SCREEN” BACKDROP APRIL 2019 New Members of BR Board of Education UPCOMING EVENS 4/26 Progressst Reports go home 19Congratulations End of 1st Quarter to newly elected 19 End of 1 Quarter BR Board members Chelsie 4/28 FFA Awards Banquet, Moore 26 Report cards go home 26 Report cards go home Leffelman and Carlos Burton, and Gym, 6 p.m. 26re Picture-elected Retake; Board PBIS member Gotcha Party Dale 4/2926 Picture Special Reta Boardke; PBIS Meeting Gotcha to UPDATED CALENDARS seatParty the new board members, 6:30 31Schneman. Halloween Parade, Maureen 9 a.m.; Gilbert Parties, 2:00filled p.m. the additional vacancy created by The 2018-19 school calendar has pm31 Halloween Parade, 9 a.m.; Parties, Justin Otto’s resignation been updated and is posted 5/22:00 BRHS p.m. Honors Night, 7 pm, at http://5il.co/2uv7. As of now, New Gym Maureen was seated on the Board June 4 is the last day of school, 5/4 Prom at the April 17 meeting, and will June 5 is Teacher Institute, and we 5/7 Tri-School Band Festival fill the remaining 2-years of have 1 emergency day left. @BRIJHS; Tri-School Concert, 7 Justin’s term. Chelsie and Carlos p.m. will be seated at a special meeting The 2019-20 school calendar is 5/14 Seniors’ Last Day on April 29 at 6:30 p.m. for 4-year posted at http://5il.co/2uv8 5/19 BRHS Graduation, 2 pm terms. New officers will be elected 6/4 Last Day of School (as of at that time. now) 6/5 Teacher Institute We are grateful for the service of 6/6 Remaining emergency Day outgoing Board members, Justin Otto, Curtis Homann, and Matt Althaus! Thank you! Congratulations to Carlos Burton for induction into B-N Officials Hall of Fame. Burton officiated high school football, basketball & baseball for 40 years, working state finals in football & girls’ basketball. He officiated wheelchair basketball for many years & was named IHSA Girls Basketball Official of the Year in 2002. Burton is a member of the Illinois Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame. Carlos was recently elected to the BR Board of Education for a 4-year term. BLUE RIDGE CUSD 18 SUPERINTENDENT’S MONTHLY UPDATE 2 Partial List of Actions/ Information-April 17 School Board Meeting Maureen Gilbert took the oath of office to fill the open position on the BOE The following individuals were hired: Kristine Coy – School Counselor; Richele Miller – BRHS Biology; Doug Kramer and Mason Phillips – Summer Technology Help District Librarian Amy Brokaw and students Lori Weiss, Ivy Whitehouse, Kaleb Forrest, Sierra Watterson, Braxden Soliday, Spencer Johnson, RJ Coffey, Fallon Armstrong, and Caleb Hirschman presented to the Board many of the great projects facilitated by the library program (pictured at right). Students are learning to code, completing interactive reports, and learning to do research. See the student presentation at https://5il.co/7bvo. The 2018-19 Library Report is posted at https://5il.co/7bvn. Adopted new curriculum for sex ed at grades 4-8 (https://5il.co/7bb9) and abduction prevention at grades K-3 (https://5il.co/7bb5). Approved fees and meal costs for 2019-2020 (https://5il.co/7bhr). Increased substitute teacher pay to $110/day for 2019-2020 (https://5il.co/7c35). Received quarterly financial report for April (https://5il.co/7brg), and the quarterly update on progress toward Strategic Planning Goals (https://5il.co/7bi4). Approved demolition of garage/shed by JH baseball field Approved renovation of district offices Approved going out for bids on Energy Efficiency Project for BRHS Reviewed Budget Projections (https://5il.co/7bvg) Curriculum Update English/Language Arts: Secured July 26 date for K-8 Quick Start Conference- Lucy Calkins Writing Units of Study Mathematics: BRHS math teachers continue to develop the new transitional math course. BR is collaborating with Champaign Unit 4 to share math training with BR JH and HS Faculty Science: Don’t miss the BRIJHS Science Expo/Book Fair in May. Highlights will include U of I Extension rocket launching, and the Culminating Event for our after school enrichment program, “Lights, Camera, Cook!” BLUE RIDGE CUSD 18 SUPERINTENDENT’S MONTHLY UPDATE 3 Other: After-school enrichment classes, “Farm to Table II” and “Lights, Camera, Cook!” are underway at Schneider and BRIJHS, respectively Dr. Stanifer will represent 4H with a Cupcake Decorating Station at Schneider Book Fair Lots of summer professional development work is planned for the Blue Ridge teachers for this summer. Stay tuned! On our upcoming School Improvement Day, BR will host the Illinois Teacher of the Year, Susan Converse! All BR Faculty, staff, PSRPs, administration and School Board members are invited to attend this very special presentation. Educational Technology Check out these super cute Kindergarten students giving weather reports in Mrs. Ward’s class. She used a green screen and app to set the “scene” for the weather they were reporting. What fun! Did you hear about the new Schneider makerspace? A makerspace is a collaborative work space for making, learning, exploring and sharing that uses high tech to no tech tools. Miss Brokaw plans to pilot these items with 2nd grade first. The unboxing has begun! Items were paid for with a Blue Ridge Education Foundation grant. This will be an exciting addition to library skills classes. Other Technology News: Door Access control system has been upgraded to the new system and fobs have been distributed System inventory is progressing at the High School and Schneider Phone System will have some new software features added as a result of training and a free system upgrade. Two BACC students are completing hours at BRHS helping to assist with readying donated equipment from State Farm The computer-based Illinois Assessment of Readiness test was completed at BRIJHS and Schneider State Reporting has been ongoing to ensure all items are ready for the Spring deadline mid-month BLUE RIDGE CUSD 18 SUPERINTENDENT’S MONTHLY UPDATE 4 Upcoming Technology Developments: Continued plans are being made for network structure changes during the summer utilizing existing hardware and software. Donated systems from State Farm will be distributed to employees with subpar machines as replacements RevTrak, our online fee payment portal in Qmlativ, will also be able to be used for on-site payments at the three campuses Exploring a new service option called Bark for Schools. This is a free program that will add another layer to school safety The computer-based Illinois Science Assessment will take place for 5th, 8th, and 9th grade students News from Schneider School Kids Heart Challenge: We were awarded a total of $1,200 from the American Heart Association. New items were provided for the P.E. program including tennis racket sets, putting golf sets, basketballs, volleyballs, soccer balls, parachutes and various storage items for all our new equipment. $150 was awarded to Mrs. Burns’ classroom for being the top earning class. This equipment will help bring a more diverse curriculum to our K-3rd students and enrich our P.E. program! CARE Team: Our CARE team has been working with Officer Davis and the BABES program to create a Trusted Adult and Abduction Prevention Curriculum. The Abduction Prevention Curriculum is a required unit of instruction in grades K-8 and will be presented in May. Pre-K Parent Nights: Our Pre-K program hosted our parent education night April 4th. This parent education night focused on meal prepping for families. In addition to creating and leaving with meals for their families, parents learned about nutrition and budgeting. Parents also got the opportunity to network and discuss other topics related to education. At Really Readiculous on April 16 families experienced a fun night of literacy and seeing books come to life. Illinois Assessment of Readiness: Our third grade staff and students have completed our three scheduled days of IAR testing. We still have a few make-up tests that need to be completed due to absences. Thank you to Mrs. Rumple, Mr. Moore and Mrs. Sproat for their work preparing our third graders this school year. Also, thank you to Mrs. Weedman for being available during testing to help with technology issues and P.I.E. for donating snacks and drinks during our testing days. Reading Buddies: Many classrooms across the building participate in reading buddies. This activity involves older students in our building, second and third graders, reading with the younger students in our building, Kindergarten and first grade students. This is a great opportunity for students to practice their literacy skills, listen to peer models and build relationships with peers across different grade levels. BLUE RIDGE CUSD 18 SUPERINTENDENT’S MONTHLY UPDATE 5 Attendance: We had 97 students with perfect attendance in March. This is a great improvement from 60 students last month. Behavior: 95% of our students are ticket free during the month of March. This is above our 80% target and school wide expectation. PBIS Gotcha Party - Last month several high school students came to Schneider to perform “Sneetches”. Thank you to Ms. Eubank and our high school helpers for this fun production. News from Blue Ridge Intermediate & Junior High PBIS Rewards: Our 3rd Quarter PBIS Reward was Minute-to-Win-It games (pictured at right). The PBIS committee planned a great selection of games for students to play with a championship round. Students with 2 or less behavior referrals, no suspensions, and no Saturday Schools are able to participate.