ADMINISTRATOR MONTHLY BOARD REPORT

 

Memorial School                                                         K   72

Donna Beeley                                                              Gr. 1   81

Sept. 24, 2008                                                             Gr. 2   77

                                                                                    Total 230

 

TOPICS OF INTEREST FOR THE MONTH

 

Memorial School opened the year with an enrollment of 225 students. Since then we added a few more students to grade 1. We now have 230 students. Our children are off to a great start. They were happy to see each other and even our Kindergartners have had an easy transition so far.

 

Memorial School had an Open House night on Sept. 15^th. Several hundred people attended this event. We had a terrific event on a wonderful evening for an Open House night at school. Needless to say our students and families had a wonderful time on the playground.

 

Teachers received the new math materials. They have already begun to use some of these materials. Although there will be a learning curve, we are excited to have the updated version of Investigations. We look forward to the results at the end of the year.

 

I would like to recognize our custodial staff and our school secretary, Cindy Leavitt.

They did a wonderful job preparing for the opening of school this year. The school looks terrific and we were well prepared for the opening.

 

A volunteer training will be held on Sept. 25^th. This will be for anyone interested in volunteering at Memorial this year. All names will be given to central office for background checks.

 

Our school will have school pictures taken on September 25^th.

 

We are preparing for a visit in early October from children’s book author, Fred Lipp.

Mr. Lipp has published several children’s books. We will offer a book signing for “Bread Song” and also for “Running Shoes”. Mr. Lipp is also the grandfather of two of our students. Funding from the PTSA supports this event. Thank you once again PTSA!

 

Our students will participate in the pumpkin carving event at the Cumberland Fair.

This is an effort to have our school name listed in the Book of Records for the most pumpkins lit at once on Oct. 4^th at the Cumberland Fair. I am told the last record was for 31,000 lit pumpkins at one time. Our students will carve pumpkins next week and enter them in the contest along with lots of other people of course.

 

Mrs. Thornton and Ms. Croteau are preparing our school for the student mock election to be held the end of October. We plan to participate in this national event, the results of which will be tallied nationwide. Our student presidential election will be held the end of October.

 

 

SUCCESSES

 

Mrs. Austin, Mrs. Spruill, Mrs. Mc Kinney, Mrs. Bartlett, Ms. Wallace and I attended the Aimsweb training in August. These teachers will take the leadership role in training the remainder of the teachers in Aimsweb testing. Our Aimsweb leaders have already administered the testing to their own students. They are now underway with the remainder of the classes. We look forward to seeing the data and having the opportunity to discuss how to better serve all of our students. The initial reaction to the data has been very positive.

 

On Early Release this month our teachers had the chance to learn a little more about Aimsweb and Professional Learning communities. After an introduction, teachers broke in to grade level meetings to determine some of the norms they will use for running their PLC work on two Wednesdays each month. The focus of our PLC work will change significantly from last year.

 

Several Memorial teachers will pilot a new reading program called “Treasures” published by McGraw Hill. The first comments I have heard from staff have been very positive since this program appears to be very comprehensive. Ms. Wallace, Mrs. Haymon, Mrs. Leask and Mrs. Ledger will be using the program with their classes this year.

 

Our school will recognize students this year through a program called “Good Apple Awards”. Students are given a paper apple to hang on the wall in the school hallway.

The Apple Awards are tied to our trimester goals. The goal this trimester is to abide by school rules. Students will be recognized periodically. We connected this award to an assembly that we held in observance of Constitution Day, Sept. 17^th.

 

CHALLENGES

 

Some of the teachers have expressed concern about managing their time so that they can learn about new materials and administer new testing for Aimsweb. Nonetheless we are excited to have the opportunity to implement the reading pilot, the Aimsweb system and the new Investigations materials.

 

EMERGING/CURRENT LONG TERM GOALS

 

Become adept at using Aimsweb, administer the testing and utilize the data to inform teaching practices and improve testing scores.

 

Gain greater knowledge of Treasures and evaluate the program to determine if this is the correct program for our needs in language arts.