April 4. 2021

KUDOS!!!!!!

HUGE shout out to Kurt Rummler for taking the lead and being a true GOOSE this past week as he lead the staff meeting around the importance of noticing microaggressions. As Kurt shared, he has been participating in our districts NEP (National Equity Project) team along with running our first SHARE Club at Karcher. Thank you all for taking the staff microaggression survey as we work to ensure all students and staff have a sense of belonging, feel valued, and are supported within BASD.
Thank you to Stacey Steeples and Pam Bauer for assisting with the drop off of all of the district tape needed for our district furniture moves! The end of the year is quickly approaching and the new building is almost done!!!
Thank you also to Pam Bauer for staying later this past week when we were doing screener interviews for the new Karcher principal. Stacey and Kim were also able to meet some of the candidates throughout the day. It is always fascinating to talk with Kim, Stacey, and Pam to get there first impression thoughts on each of the candidates!
Thank you to Jennifer Pelnar for the great idea of getting all the cafeteria tables down to the gym this past week so that our students could practice and get used to the "new" way of doing things as little A and B Day groups versus learning everything new come Tuesday! It takes a team and we sure do appreciate THIS team!
And... last but not least... I thought blog worthy... Katie Rummler (Kurt and Stephanie's daughter) played "Easter Bunny" for us this year as the girls were on to us! So... we made sure we both were with the girls so that upon our return eggs were hidden and baskets were placed! She did an amazing job!!! Still 3 eggs out there to be found that even mom and dad can't find!!!

Hopefully you all were able to enjoy time with family and/or friends this past weekend! It sure was beautiful outside for gatherings!

Information/Reminders

Information for: 6-8 KMS Staff (2021-2022):

Wednesday, April 7 - Round Two of Karcher MS Principal Interviews!

Screener interviews took place last week and the candidates were narrowed down to the top four to bring back this coming Wednesday! The candidates will all engage in an in-depth interview experience involving:

Interview team #1 focused on instruction questions.
Interview team #2 focused on cultural questions.
Tour of new Karcher
Simulation/Scenario with Annie Phillips
Writing prompt
One on one conversation with Jill (myself) as the out going principal.

Each candidate will be starting at the same time (3:30) and the order of their interview process will all be different so that each can circulate to all of the different "stations" at the same time.
The interviews will be taking place in the KMS main office, library, large conference room, and new building.
Those participating in the interviews please arrive by 3:00 and report to the Karcher LMC!

Dinner will be provided... Subway platters from Subway.
The anticipated end time for the candidates is approximately 7:00. Those assisting with the interviews will be asked to stay to debrief. Please keep your calendars open until 8:30-9:00. The goal is to be done by then but... you never know!
Thank you in advance!!!!!

2021-2022 Karcher Calendar

In order to keep myself organized (and to help the team stay organized) 7-8 has been used to using this calendar to locate items they may need. We have started adding any documents (links) to the first page that you might be looking for. Then, the 2021-2022 calendar is all shown below with correct dates, meetings, Open Houses, etc that we have finalized as of right now. As things continue to be finalized I will add them to this calendar - either as a link on page 1 or within the calendar if it relates to the actual school year. I am not sure how the new principal will want to operate but for now this is how we will roll, knowing, this will also help the new principal initially as well to find 6-8 information!

This week reminders:

HERE is the teacher schedules for the start of 5 days in-person on April 6. Please let your BLT member know if you see any errors, mistakes, or items missing!
Support Staff - your schedules will come from the special education department. If you have questions please see any of the special education teachers!

Reminders starting Tuesday:

All students will be eating in the gym from now on. Our hope is that we can spread out the tables more within the gym and/or move some outside to space students out. This also will help with supervision!
PE rotation:

Mon/Wed - A Day students will go to PE
Tu/Th - B Day students will go to PE
Fri - Every other Friday they will go to PE.
Since we are starting back on a Tuesday B Day students will start in PE because they have PE Tu/Th!
This week "A Day students will have PE on Friday since they will only have PE once otherwise on Wednesday this week!

Everyone needs to continue wearing masks throughout the school day.

Monday, April 5 - Inservice Day (8:00-4:00)

8:00 - 11:30 is teacher work time
11:30-12:30 lunch on your own
12:30-1:30 - Building Level Time

Focus on looking at our Microaggression Staff Survey Data to see themes, trends, and discuss next steps.
Gain information on how we will tag items for the move to new Karcher.

1:30-4:00 - Teacher Work Time

This is a great time to start taping items (with PINK tape) that should go to new Karcher

The process was explained to the BLT team to pass along to their teams. If there are questions we will have a few minutes to discuss this at the end of our staff meeting (12:30-1:30)

Tuesday, April 6 - Election Day!

Forward Testing for 7-8:

Tuesday, April 20 - 7th grade students only

ELA Session 2 (15 min) during their ELA classes.

Thursday, April 22 - 7th - 10th grade testing day.

All 11-12th grade students will have a virtual learning day.
HERE is the schedule as to which assessments will be tested on April 22 and which are tested on other days.

This plan is also on the Karcher Calendar on April 22 as a link!
All 7th grade students should be done testing by the end of April 22 (we hope)!!!
Therefore, after April 22 7th grade can resume to a normal school day while being quiet and mindful of the below testing days for 8th grade the following week.

April 26-29 - Continued 8th Grade Forward Testing for sessions needed outside of those tested on April 22nd. Assessments will be taken during their content area class period. So... Social Studies during their Social Studies class, etc:

Monday, April 26 - Social Studies - Session 1 (35 min)
Tuesday, April 27 - Social Studies - Session 2 (35 min)
Wednesday, April 28

Science - Session 1 (30 min)
ELA Session 2 (15 min)

Thursday, April 29 - Science - Session 2 (30 min)
Friday, April 30 - Science - Session 3 (30 min)

iReady Testing

The iReady Spring Diagnostic can start on May 3rd. ELA and Math teachers, please discuss who will be taking the May 3rd week and who will be taking the May 10th week.

Once determined, please add your plans to the Karcher Calendar!

End of the year:

Thursday, May 20 - 8th Grade Recognition

In the past BLT has asked to move the recognition to an evening time. This is the year to do it, especially given that so many families have most likely missed work numerous times due to COVID. Therefore, we will be holding our 8th grade recognition Thursday night starting at 7:00pm.
It is the expectation that all 8th grade advisory teachers and staff for musical performances are in attendance.
Those who would like to come but don't have an 8th grade advisory we will have a set section for you to sit in.

Friday, May 21 - Last day of school!!!

No school for 8th graders
Early release @ 12:00 for our 7th graders.
This would be a great day to use as a team building day, transition day (in the future), etc.

We will not be able to take students over to the new school for the transition piece at this time.

May 24th and May 25th

There have been questions about May 24th and 25th when it comes to expectations and the "why".
May 24th is an inservice day where the focus of that day will be checkout - you won't be able to check out on Friday, May 21st. The second thing we will be focusing on for the 24th is ensuring everything is ready for all of the moves that have to happen across the school district.

Section 12.03, page 52 of the employee handbook states that personal leave days will not be granted during the first or last week of a semester, on a parent-teacher conference day, or on an inservice day.

May 25th is a comp day for certified staff. There are always two comp days built into the calendar - one 1st semester (was the Wednesday before Thanksgiving Break) and for 2nd semester it will be May 25th. These comp days are put in place for the 8 hours of parent/teacher conference time used within the semester. So, because you are attending those times for conferences you get a day off, which, in this case is the 25th.

Picture from this past week!

Students in Burlington Connected with Barb Berezowitz for Science! Every virtual student was present!

7th graders engaged in a gallery walk in Ms. Murphy and Ms. Fulton's ELA class working to analyze text to look for extreme language used by the author to bring attention to the reader.