Grinnell-Newburg CSD

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Weekly Update: May 25, 2018

Dear Grinnell-Newburg Family and Friends,

As the year comes to a close for students and teachers, the district office staff and administration are gearing up for the Fall of 2018. We are working to plan opening day events, finalizing master schedules, registering students, setting up budgets, and preparing our welcome back newsletter. Although we are planning ahead, we also reflect back upon the 2017-18 school year to see how we can improve our communications, our outreach to families, and meeting the needs of our staff and students for next year. We welcome your input. Please feel free to reach out to me at janet.stutz@grinnell-k12.org at any time over the summer, as I would like to hear from you on what we can do better to serve our Grinnell-Newburg Families.

Below are some highlights of the week. Once again I would like to congratulate all of the graduates and wish them only the best as they move on into the next chapter.

Admin Meeting:

This week our admin team met with next year’s TAG teachers and our elementary instructional coaches who are also pursuing their TAG endorsement. The Grinnell-Newburg School District will have five staff members who will collaborate with staff to provide services to TAG students in a variety of ways. We discussed current practices, and how over the next few years we will redesign our evaluation process in order measure our progress through the use of data, student performance and potential surveys. Here are some of the highlights of what is happening at each level:

We begin at K-2 with a flexible model as students begin to grow and learn. At K-2 our Instructional Coaches collaborate with staff to assist them in providing resources, instructional practices, passion projects and strategies to work with identified students. At this age student needs vary. Therefore, through flexible groups, differentiation, workshop and guided reading and math groupings, students will be challenged with just the right learning so that students are not “waiting to learn.” Here are some activities for students and staff:
- WIN/enrichment groups, coaching cycles/using coaches as resources for extension or differentiation activities, core plus more in math, subject acceleration, workshop model in reading, writing, etc. (differentiation), passion projects.
At the 3-4th grade level, our instructional coach and TAG teacher will meet the needs of students in a variety of ways through support with the classroom teacher to provide strategies to meet the needs of our students, so once again our students are not waiting to learn. Our TAG teacher will also meet with students who need extension beyond the regular curriculum in a core plus more model. Here are some services that are provided:
- Pull out math and reading, pull out through the extended learning program (ELP- students will be identified at third grade for this services as needed), support, inquiry, making meaning extensions, subject acceleration in math, telescoping (more grade levels in academic year), constant pre-assessing and compacting, and RADAR.
As students enter the middle school, course selections begin to meet the majority of our students identified for enrichments, or TAG services. There are course selections for math, plus our TAG teacher will pull out students as needed to dive deeper into the concepts to meet student needs. Some services provided in 5th and 6th grade are: pull out math and reading with TAG teacher, pull out ELP with TAG teacher, push in math with TAG teacher and generalist, subject acceleration, and whole grade acceleration as needed.
Students who are in grades 7-12 will find that various courses will meet their needs with TAG teacher support. This year we welcome Alicia Carradus as our TAG instructor, who will support students in a variety of ways, plus:
- Encourage students to take dual credit in 9th and 10th grade, AP classes, course selection, extra-curricular areas, middle school WIN groups/passions projects, subject acceleration, etc.

Please know that it is important for all Parents/Guardians to contact your student’s classroom teacher if you have any questions regarding services. Identification of students for services will occur with your child’s teacher and grade level team, in collaboration with the instructional coaches, administration and TAG teachers. We want to ensure that students are not “waiting to learn”, and that our services are meeting your child’s needs so that their instructional needs are met all day. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions or concerns.

Lost & Found on the Bus

Missing something? All items left on a school bus during the school year have been sent over to Fairview Elementary. Please stop by Fairview if you believe you child left an item of clothing on the bus. All items unaccounted for will be shipped over to Second Mile over the summer.

Lunch & Learns

I had the opportunity to collaborate with staff at each of our school buildings to talk about the upcoming bond election scheduled for September 11, 2018. I am grateful to all of those staff members that provided some spectacular input on how to reach out further to our community. Great ideas were generated. Thank you to all of our staff for your support through this effort.

Board Meeting

This past week the Board of Education was recognized for their volunteer service to our community. Thank you to Helen Redmond, Meg Jones Bair, Barbara Brown, Stephen Sieck, Dustin Smith, Laurel Tuggle, Emily Guenther and student liaison Mairead Brownell, for serving your community as a Board Member. I am grateful for your time and dedication to our staff, students, and community. It is a pleasure working with all of you.

The Board also approved further in-class coaching training with our Apple Trainer next year. This model will be much different that the Vanguard training last year. This will assist us to continue to build capacity with all of our teachers as we engage students using methods to engage them to transform learning in a variety of ways.

Above and Beyond Recognitions:

Congratulations to all of our administrative assistants for being recognized at our last board meeting. Our administrative assistants wear many hats and they work tirelessly to take care of our families. Thank You!

Ahrens Playground:

Today the Ahrens Foundation hosted a ribbon cutting ceremony to open the new playground! Bailey Park students had the opportunity to join in on the fun! Thank you to those community groups and organizations for sponsoring this amazing playground! It looks fun!

State Track Results

Congratulations to all our track athletes who competed last week! It was so fun to see you compete!

Girls

3000m- Anjali Jones-17th- 11:18.93

HJ- Kylee Neighbors-4th- 5’3

LJ-Sienna Durr-2nd- 17-8

100m Hurdles- Sienna Durr-6th- 15.52

Kylee Neighbors-20th- 16.42

Shuttle Hurdle- Lexi Hart, Maddison Jones, Kylee Neighbors, Sienna Durr-7th- 1:07.87

4x400-Sienna Durr, Madison Luther, Daysi Harris, Addyson Petig-7th- 4:04.87

Boys

3200m- Trent O'Halloran- 6th- 10:00.94

4x800-Brett Gibson, Matthew Cunningham, Landon Steffen, Joe Simon- 5th- 8:11.26

4x400- Brett Gibson, Wyatt Hunter, Tanner Strand, Joe Simon- 17th- 3:32.10

800m- Joe Simon- 4th- 1:57.46

Matthew Cunningham- 22nd- 2:03.88

1600m- Thomas Clower- 22nd- 4:39.36

Honors Night

Congratulations to all of our hard working students!

Graduation Clap Off!

Our graduating seniors took a trip to all of our buildings this week, as our younger students clapped them off to graduation. These walkthroughs inspire our younger students to work hard to achieve the same goal. It was a fun afternoon for all!

Summer Workout Schedule for all 9th-12th graders: June 4- July 27 (No workouts week of July 1st - July 6th)

7:00-8:20 M, T, W, Th - Strength/Conditioning/Speed workouts (stations)

8:20-9:00 M, T, W, Th - Football Skill work

For the two above, there will be no cost to athletes. Those planning on attending please sign-up with Mr. Coffman or with Tracy Neighbors in high school office.

9:00-11:30 M, W, F- BB open gym

9:00-10:30 T, TH - VB open gym

5:00-5:45 Open Weight-room M, T, W, TH

Volleyball Camp July 9-13

Girls Basketball youth camp June 11-15

Coach Douma Shooting Camp June 7, 14, 21, 28 11:30-12:30

Youth Boys Basketball Camp Aug. 6 -10th at GMS

Hey Tiger Fans!

Do you like to shop online? Then here is an easy way to raise money for the Grinnell Activities Department while doing your online shopping. Go to www.gogrinnelltigers.com and click on the "shop" button on the top right or use the following link https://gogrinnelltigers.com/shop. You can shop at the numerous online stores and a percentage of your purchases gets donated to Grinnell Activities. Thanks for your support of Tiger Activities.

Snapshot of upcoming events: Visit the Calendar on our website for further details

May 23 - Fine Arts Awards Night

May 26 - Honors Night

May 27 - Commencement

May 28 - No School, Memorial Day

June 1 - Last Day of School

June 11 - SLICK begins

Don’t forget to visit the Virtual Backpack for new events! Summer Fest! Check it out!

Have a great weekend, and Happy Memorial Day!

Sincerely,

Janet

Dr. Janet M. Stutz

Superintendent

Grinnell-Newburg Schools

Weekly Events

Please view the events for the coming week as listed below for Grinnell High School & Middle School. If you find a discrepancy in this information; please contact Tracy Neighbors at (641) 236-2723 / tracy.neighbors@grinnell-k12.org or Chris Coffman at (641) 236-2695 / chris.coffman@grinnell-k12.org