The Key Notes : August 2023

Leadership Team & K-2

We are excited for Alex to be welcoming the new addition to her family soon. Alex will be going on maternity leave on Monday. While she is away taking care of Karson, the leadership team has divided up her direct reports amongst us. See below for our additional assignments. We look forward to working closely with the K-2 team!

· Y5s & Kindergarten Teachers-Jorvonna

· Y5s & Kindergarten Paras-Stacey

· 1^st Grade-Robyn

· 2^nd Grade-Tameka

Family Connections

Family connections for new students is due Friday, September 8, and family connections for returning students is due Friday, September 15.

We are asking that you have an actual conversation with 100% of your families. This can be accomplished with two attempts. If you are unable to reach a family by phone, send them a follow-up email to schedule another time to talk. Please download and complete this Excel sheet when making these phone calls. You will bring the sheet to your O3 the week of September 18 to discuss with your dean.

I am asking that everyone please complete this task with integrity. Please do not mark that you spoke to a family if you did not. Instead, you can show the follow-up email to your dean which lets us know that the family was unresponsive to both your attempts (the phone call AND email).

Thank you for taking the time to make connections and build relationships with our families. This supports several Core Values and our attrition goal.

School Goals-Attrition

As you know, one of our MICIP and ABCDE goals is to “decrease our attrition rate through yearlong family engagement events.” One of the action steps is for teachers to capture a creative lesson or activity from their classrooms with 2-3 pictures that will be posted and shared with families on our social media pages: Facebook and Instagram.

Please make sure that you email me the pictures and a small blurb (2-3 sentences) of the activity by the deadline below. I will get them on our social media pages. Thank you for your contribution to our attrition and school goal. We couldn’t accomplish this without you!

Grade Level	Deadline
Y5/Kinder	September 29
1^st	October 31
2^nd	November 30
3^rd	December 22
4^th	January 31
5^th	February 29
6^th	March 22
7^th	April 30
8^th	May 31

Leadership Observations

Starting next week, the leadership team will be doing collaborative observations; all of us observing teachers together. The purpose of the observations are to provide consistency with our expectations and further our development as leaders.

We will try to notify you in advance if the entire leadership team is coming into your classroom, but it may not always be possible.

We will be observing the Classroom Culture competency from the Framework until September 15.

Please review the “look fors” in this document to provide you with some insight on what we are looking for when we observe you in action. Don’t hesitate to reach out if you have any questions regarding the expectations.

Meet With Other Grade Levels PLCs

We are seeking your feedback regarding our “Meet with Other Grade Levels” PLC. Please take this 3-question survey to determine if you still desire to have these PLCs this school year. We need everyone to take this survey. Thank you!

Affirmations

Keystone Staff for a great start to the new school year. Thank you for making every child feel valued and important.

Stefanie, Stacey Ramirez, Robyn, Tameka, Stacey Reed, and Alex for making a lot of phone calls on the first day of school to support our enrollment.

Lisa, Theresa, Kim, and Sandy for staying late this week ensuring that dismissal for our kindergarteners went smoothly.

Robyn, Tameka, and Kayla for getting Chromebooks distributed. I appreciate the countless hours that you have spent ensuring that all students receive a Chromebook.

Andria, Ellen, Jen D, Jen S, Dennis, Cindy, Alex, Tameka, Stacey Reed, and Robyn for taking on extra arrival and dismissal duties this week.

Alex for the morning assembly schedule and seating chart. Thank you for bringing our school back together again.

Tracy for seeing a problem and finding a solution. Thank you for going above and beyond to give our students the best possible sports experience.

Ja’Rayl for offering our students basketball camp this summer. Thank you for volunteering your personal time for our students.

Steve and Tracy for organizing the middle school locker combinations. I can only imagine how many hours you spent completing this task, but it is greatly appreciated.

This Week

Monday, September 4:

· No School-Labor Day

Tuesday: September 5:

· SLT Meeting 3:50 (MS ELA room)

Wednesday, September 6:

· Leadership Catalog Due

· Sign Up for Grade Level Event Due

Thursday, September 7:

· GL Intervention Team Meetings

Friday, September 8:

· Payday Breakfast-Interventions & ABSS

· New Family Connections Due

· Morning Assembly Presentation Due (Constitution Day)-August

Important Dates

September 11: Interventions Begins

September 11-29: K-8 Fall NWEA

September 12: Staff Meeting

September 12: Staff Meeting Snacks-Interventions & ABSS

September 14: C&I Full Day Visit

September 14: Education Benefit Form Due

September 15: Morning Assembly Presentation Due (Hispanic-Latino Month)-Cheng

September 15: Family Connections Due

September 15: Jorvonna Out of the Building-Robyn Acting Principal

September 15: Title 1 Parent Meeting 8:15

September 15: Dress Down Day $1

September 15: Social Contract Posted

September 18-22: 1-2 Fall Math Numeracy

September 18: Extra Prep Begins

September 19: Education Benefit Dress Down Day

September 20: Fall Picture Day

September 20: SpEd Open House

September 22: Morning Assembly Presentation Due (Hispanic-Latino Month)-Sneed

September 22: Substitute Binder Due

September 22: Payday Breakfast-2^nd Grade

September 25: Ashley’s Birthday

September 26: PLC Meetings

September 29: Spirit Day $1.00 and Popcorn $1.00

September 29: Y5/Kinder Social Media Post Due to Jorvonna

September 29: Keystone 20 Year Anniversary 1:00-2:30 PM

*If you have an event to add or something has been forgotten, please let me know!

Time Out Signal

As discussed during August PD, we want to be consistent with our behavior expectations. Therefore, we will be using a schoolwide “time out” signal. When any staff member says, “time out,” all students should respond by forming a “T” over their heads. You can still use other attention signals, but there should be only ONE time out signal. We will be utilizing this as a whole school during our first assembly, so please practice in your classroom prior to Thursday.

ABCDE Goals

As I mentioned during August PD, we are not starting anything new for the ABC of the ABCDE goals. Instead, we will continue to strengthen our effective initiatives. You are a critical component of us achieving our first goal to increase our daily attendance rate using a variety of recognition and celebration initiatives.

The first step is to engage your families by providing weekly updates in your classroom newsletters. Please feel free to create an “attendance” section where you highlight your classroom progress. For example, you could say, “Families, we had no tardies, absences, nor early dismissals for two days this week earning us the “H” and “E” from the word “HERE.” Once we spell the complete word, students will earn a celebration. Please help us achieve this goal by avoiding absences, tardies and early dismissals when possible. Thank you for your partnership.”

I will be communicating all our attendance initiatives to families in my September 3 Sunday Night Email.

BWC-Core Values

One of our Core Values is “Behave with Care.” We want everyone to focus on building positive relationships with students and classroom routines/procedures during the first few weeks of school.

One way to build positive relationships with your students is to greet your students. We expect all teachers to greet their students at the door every morning starting at 7:40. This will assist with safety by monitoring our students in the hallways. But most importantly, it helps you to gauge your students’ moods so you can be proactive instead of reactive.

Please position yourself in a way that you can still see inside your classroom and have a Do Now posted to avoid unwanted behaviors from occurring within the classroom.

Technology

As you know, we believe in the “whole” child and want to provide our students with the opportunity to socially interact. The majority of their day is spent listening and learning, so whenever it’s possible (lunch, recess, engagement strategies during lessons, etc.) we want them to use their social skills. Therefore, students are not allowed on technology (Chromebooks, movies, etc.) during lunch or dismissal. Students can have the option of technology during indoor recess, but it should be an option among other things, not the only choice.

Substitutes

As you know, we provide our new teachers with less than 3 years of experience, an additional 30 hours of professional development throughout the school year. To provide this PD, we utilized all our substitutes on those days. Consequently, we cannot approve time off on the following days due to all subs being utilized: October 18, 19, 24, & 25; December 5, 7, 12, & 14; and Jan 30, February 1, 6 & 8. Please don’t hesitate to contact me if this causes an issue.

Affirmations

Keystone Staff for your participation, engagement, and enthusiasm during August PD. I’m always proud to be a part of the Keystone team!

Alex, Robyn, Stacey Reed, and Tameka thank you for everything! I am beyond thankful for all the things that you have done to help us prepare for this upcoming school year. No one can imagine the number of hours, days, and effort it takes to plan and prepare for the upcoming school year because you all make it look so easy. I would truly be lost without you. Thank you for always being willing to do whatever, whenever!

Jen H. for taking care of our staff t-shirts and the concessions at our Family Fun Night. I love how I can give you something and never worry about it.

Megan, Tameka, Robyn, Stacey Reed, and Alex for creating content and leading sessions during August PD. I appreciate your leadership.

Stacey Ramirez for handling all enrollment situations. You go beyond what’s asked.

Kaylee, Corey, Kyle and Gary for making our school clean and ready for the first day of school.

Stefanie for all your support with three enrollment events in two weeks. You do so much to assist us with achieving full enrollment.

Stephanie for ALL the things that you have done the past month to make sure that our August PD went smoothly. From the countless phone calls, purchase orders, and errands –our PD would not be successful without you.

Stacey Ramirez for always going above and beyond to help me with so many things. You do a lot of behind-the-scenes things that no one even knows. My vision and your creativity are unmatched. We do great things together!

Jeanne for jumping in and assisting with concessions. I appreciate you volunteering to help and clean.

Diane, Emma, Josie, and Nikki for spending an evening with our new families. I appreciate you volunteering time during the summer to support our enrollment efforts.

Nikki, Diane, Tameka, Robyn, Stacey, and Teri for representing Keystone at Belleville’s Lake Fest. This event occurred right after school got out and you still volunteered to attend. I am truly grateful.

This Week

Monday, August 28:

· First Day of School

· PTO Boo Hoo/Yahoo Parent Breakfast

· Y5-8 ORF Benchmark 1 (8/28-9/5)

Tuesday: August 29:

· Andria’s Birthday

Thursday, August 31:

· Morning Assembly

· Staff Reference Guide Acknowledgement Form Due

· Morning Assembly Presentation Due (Schoolwide Procedures)-Kaminski

Friday, September 1:

· No School-Labor Day Weekend

Saturday, September 2:

· Flo’s Birthday

Happy Birthday

Andria: August 29

Flo: September 2

Happy Belated Birthday

Jen S: July 1

Katherine: July 4

Teri: July 8

Josie: July 10

Stacey Reed: July 12

Mark: July 22

Sam: July 23

Jeanne: August 1

Cindy: August 10

Diane: August 14

Stephanie: August 17

Tracy: August 20

Christina: August 25

There is a special gift in the mailboxes of all the people who celebrate their birthdays in July, August & September.