Parent News - Feb 15 - Greenup County School District

News You Can Use
Greenup County School District Newsle&er
ISSUE 5 February 2015
AES students celebrate 100 days of school.
Message from the Superintendent
this issue
Happy February Greenup County!
Did You Know? P.2
ACT Prep P.3
GAP P.5
The past month of activities has been a whirlwind in the GCSD. The
month of January seemed to fly by among the flurry of events taking
place in our school district.
One of the exciting events was the “United for Your Future” ACT
tutoring sessions for high school students. All three school districts
in Greenup County (Greenup, Raceland, and Russell) partnered to
provide our high school students two Saturdays of free ACT tutoring
to boost scores when students take the state test in March and to help increase scores for
student scholarship opportunities. ACTC was kind in providing our districts the use of
their building January 17 & 31 and area businesses provided food for the students. We
had close to 150 students the first Saturday and over 70 on the second Saturday. Teachers from the three districts provided the instruction and worked on valuable content and
tips for students to perform well on the ACT. This was a great opportunity for the children
of Greenup County and a demonstration of community collaboration to provide bright futures for our young people.
Another exciting community event was “Soup with the Supe” at GCSD central office January 28. Fifteen community leaders enjoyed lunch and productive conversation with me
and other district leaders. We talked about where our district is, where we are headed,
and how our community can join forces to provide more opportunities for success for our
children. It was very motivating to hear their input and offers of collaboration. It truly
takes a village to educate a child and this day demonstrated that Greenup County is a
village willing to step up and do what it takes to benefit our children.
I guess you could say it was “collaboration month” within the Greenup County School District during the month of January. We invited in three groups of people to visit and review
areas in our district to provide us with ideas for continued growth. We had an energy
team in to look at efficiency and further ways to conserve energy; we had a state group in
to visit schools and look at how we provide RTI interventions to individual students and
how we might get better results in this area; and we had a state group in to look at our
technology set up and implementation to provide a summary of where we are and how we
can grow in technology use. These visits provided us with valuable information on what
is working and avenues for continued improvement in serving our children.
I was not happy with the groundhog’s prediction of six more weeks of winter weather;
however, our year is actually moving along nicely. I for one am certainly looking forward
to spring weather without snow days and delays. I am excited to see what this semester
will bring for our students and staff at Greenup County Schools.
Upcoming Events
Feb 11—Mid-Term Progress Reports
Feb 12—AES Family Night—5:007:00
Feb 13—GAP Meeting—9:00-12:30
@ County Extension Office
Feb 16—Professional Learning—No
School
Feb 16—Girls Basketball Senior Night
Feb 20—Boys Basketball Senior Night
Feb 21—GCHS Snowball Dance—
8:00-11:00
March 3—State ACT Administration
Month 5 A endance
AES
93.43
WES
93.28
MMS
93.19
GES
92.88
MES
92.28
WMS
91.76
GCHS
91.30
District
92.58
Did You Know?
Six GCHS were recently inducted into the Spanish Honor Society. Students pictures are (l-r:
Samantha Massie, Malicka Kincer, Allison Arvin, Iralyn Hunt, Sarah Meadows, and Warren Lewis, Marissa Richardson was inducted but not pictured).
WMS assistant principal, Mr. Campbell, has been working with teachers
and students on how to effectively collaborate to promote student
achievement. Students recently participated in a tug-of-war activity to
work on positive and negative integers. Inside the classroom, Mrs.
Shannon was working with another group focusing on the rules and paper activities involved in this lesson.
MMS basketball teams finished their regular season play as OVC champions. Both teams defeated teams from Raceland in their final games to
secure the titles for the Bulldogs. 7th grader Drew Stultz contributed prior
to leaving the game with a broken arm. The Ohio Valley Conference is
made up of schools from Greenup, Boyd, Lawrence, Carter, and Lewis
counties. Go Bulldogs!
GCHS student, Brody Shoupe, attended the Under Armour All-American Baseball Showcase in
Phoenix, Arizona. He was among 390 players who were chosen from 10,000 applicants.
WMS teacher, Jay Krebs, was chosen to receive one of 25 Tri-State McDonald’s BAL Grants
worth $500. Mr. Krebs will use the funds for new PE equipment, help with the intramural program,
and for field day activities.
Students in Debbie Harbour’s seventh grade science classes at MMS studied
Newton’s Third Law of Motion: For every action, there is an equal, but opposite
reaction. Experimenting ensued and students engineered racers made from balloons, masking tape, wooden dowels, straws, string, and index cards. Students
competed with their projects and the “Best Engineered Racer Award” went to Alex Baker.
GCHS student, Kalee R Rusnak, has been named semifinalist in the National Beta Scholarship Program!
Students in Mrs. Derifield's STEM Investigation class researched, designed and
built cars to race. Students used the mathematical formula S=D/T to calculate
speed to determine the winners.
445 books were checked out during the GCHS Media Center’s “Sweet Blizzard of Books” Book
Fair. With over 1,000 new books purchased from the Dollar General Literacy Grant, about 40 - 50
books are being checked out from the library daily.
The Wurtland Middle School FPS team placed first at the District Governor's Cup competition against Russell, Raceland and McKell. Congrats!
Congrats All-District Band: David Stapleton, Cassie Morrelles (first chair) , and Amanda Burton. U of L
Honors Band: Cassie Morrelles, Kellie Adkins, Nick O’Conner
Students from all seven GCSD schools competed in the FIVCO/ACTC Science and Engineering Fair on
Friday, February 6. Each project represented at ACTC won the science fair at their respective schools.
The fair is designed to promote and recognize student achievement in science or engineering. Several
GC students placed in their individual categories. Congratulations!
NAEP
The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), also known as the Nation’s Report Card, is coming to Greenup County School District
This year, NAEP tests 4th- and 8th-grade students in reading, mathematics and science and compares each state’s performance with the rest of the nation. The window
for NAEP testing in Kentucky begins Jan. 26 and runs through March 6.
Specifically, in Greenup County, three schools were randomly selected to test as representatives for our state.
McKell Middle School –Feb. 17th
McKell Elementary School- Feb. 18th
Wurtland Elementary School- Feb. 25th
NAEP in a Nutshell
•
It is often called the gold standard of tests and has been around since 1969.
•
The subjects most frequently tested are math, reading, science, and writing.
•
Not every student or every school takes the test.
•
The results are anonymous and if your child is asked to take it, his or her grades
won’t be affected.
•
Accommodations are provided so that as many students as possible can participate.
While NAEP does not count for a grade or as part of our state accountability model, NAEP is important and will be used as a yardstick to measure Kentucky’s performance as compared with the rest of the nation for years to come! Kentucky improvement will be critical for our state to maintain our progressive education reform agenda
and for our students to continue to be among the top performers in the United
States.
County-Wide ACT Prep a Huge Success!
School districts in Greenup County united to sponsor two free ACT preparation courses for students
in the Greenup County, Raceland Independent and Russell Independent School Districts.
Sessions were offered on two separate dates (January 17 and 31) at ACTC and provided students
with needs-based sessions for all four components of the ACT. Teachers from each district with content expertise in specific subjects led courses in English, Reading, Math, and Science.
Approximately 220 students attended the sessions over the two days. Most (almost half) were
GCHS sophomores, juniors and seniors. Student response was overwhelmingly positive. They
learned new strategies to help raise scores, joined with peers in other districts, and were exposed to
teachers they may otherwise never meet. They also enjoyed free lunch provided by local restaurants.
A big thanks to GCHS teachers, Melissa Bowling, Amanda
Hensley, Sarah Laxton, Chris Mullins, David Wilkerson and
Cindy Collier for taking the time from their weekends to lead
our students.
It was a great experience for
everyone, and plans are
already underway for next
year’s event.
We are united for the future
of all Greenup County students!
21st Century
Spring Calendar
The 2st Century Spring session will
run February 9—April 23, 2015.
The program offers tutoring and
enrichment activities every Monday through Thursday after school.
Snack is provided. Wednesdays
are Family Fitness Nights. Limited
transportation is provided Monday,
Tuesday and Thursday of each
week.
There are no sessions the week of
March 30-April 3.
Want to know more or enroll your
child? Contact Kerri Stambaugh at
932.3221.
“Soup with the Supe”
Superintendent Horsley is committed to moving the Greenup County
School district from “good” to
“great”. A key piece of that movement is a connection and commitment from all stakeholders, including community leaders. To
strengthen that connection, and
garner valuable input, Ms. Horsley
hosted “Soup with the Supe” on
January 28.
Ms. Horsley, who made three types
of soup for the event, shared information about where we are and
where we’re going as a district.
She also took time to ask questions and seek feedback about
ways our district can improve.
The conversation was the first in a
series of events to create a true
partnership with members of the
Greenup County community.
Thanks to everyone who participated!
Grace Morgan's kindergarten class at MES just completed an airport-STEM project. Ms. Morgan is part of the Early Learning
Through Leadership Network. The students studied airports and learned about piloting from two guest speakers, Tyler Stidham
and Gareth Bussa, local high school students who are also pilots.
Northeast GAP
Join us for the next “Guardians As Parents” session!
What: Communication Styles - “Mean Girls”, and Strengthening Families - Active Parenting!
When: February 13th, 2015 9:00 AM - NOON
Where: Greenup County Extension Office, 35 Wurtland Avenue, Wurtland, KY
Speakers: Geri Willis, MSW - Ashland FRC and Marci McDaniels, Med, LPCA - Pathways
Lunch Provided! Great Door Prizes!
For more information and to register, please call Tammy Steele, Greenup Co McKinney-Vento Program, at (606) 473.1447.
In the event of inclement weather closing the GCSD, this session will be rescheduled to a later date!
Resources for Understanding Kentucky Core Academic Standards—From KDE
As Kentucky’s students continue learning under the Kentucky Core Academic Standards, many parents may find themselves
struggling to help their children with homework, particularly in mathematics. Under the standards, students are taught several ways of solving a problem and are required not just to know the answer, but to be able to explain how they arrived at the
answer. The Kentucky Department of Education and several other organizations have tools available to help (click on hyperlinks to access information):
• Kentucky Core Academic Standards: The minimum required standards that all Kentucky students should have the opportunity to learn before graduating from Kentucky high schools. The standards address what is to be learned, but do not address how learning experiences are to be designed or what resources should be used.
• Parents’ Guides to Student Success from the National PTA: A gradeby-grade guide explaining key items children should
be learning in English and math, featuring at-home activities and questions parents can ask their child’s teacher.
• Parents’ Guides to Assessments in Kentucky: Includes testing timelines, sample test questions, impacts on students, new
accountability systems and ways for parents to get involved and support their child’s learning at home.
• Common Core Video Series: Designed to educate parents on the Common Core State Standards and empower them to
support the transition at school and at home. The video series includes a video on math and the Common Core.
• Parent Road Maps: Detailed information about the expectations of the Common Core in Mathematics. These road maps
include examples of grade-level focus in the content area using parent-friendly language, sample progressions of learning
across three grade levels in the Common Core, and tips to parents on communicating with teachers about their child’s work
and how to support student learning at home.
2015 national Champs
The GCHS Varsity Cheerleaders are a force! First, they took the state title. Then, they took the national partner stunt championship. And, finally, the team traveled to Orlando, Florida to compete in the Universal Cheerleaders Association National
Championship. Once again, our girls brought it home, winning the competition for the 15th (yes, that’s 15th) time!
Congratulations to coach Candy Berry and her squad. There’s nothing like bringing home that white jacket!
#15in15