Welcome back
Olivia Cloudman returns from maternity leave on Tuesday. Don't you worry, Abby Sprague, who filled in admirably in Olivia's absence, will be staying on with us to help support the academic side of the Bridge Program along with class coverage from time to time.
Job Skills
Juniors started job skills documents last week. The English Department is very thankful to the shops for all of their support with this cross-curricular project. Please reach out to Allie Provost with any job skills questions.
Documents: Students should have shared their documents with their related/shop teacher. Please provide feedback on the accuracy of their steps by 1/21. Don't worry about grammar or format. If you want to give feedback on other sections of their documents, you are welcome to do so.
Presentations: During the week of 1/18, juniors will need to prepare for their job skills presentations in shop. If students are able to present the skill in their English classroom, then they should prepare for that (gather supplies, build the board, etc). If students are performing a skill that requires tools/machines only available in shop, then they will record their skill on their phone during that week. The video should simply show the student demonstrating the skill; students should not talk about how to do the skill on the video. Students will explain the steps in English class, using the video as their visual.
Professional Development Schedule
- Tuesday, January 18th, Afternoon Faculty Meeting is canceled.
- Wednesday, January 19th, 2-hour delayed start
- 7:40 am to 8:30 am - Department Meeting Time
- Discussions topics might include common assessments, retake policies, safety testing
- 8:30 am to 9:00 am - Flex Time
- Subcommittee meetings, 1 on 1 meeting with administration, teacher prep time, meeting with students with their own transportation for extra help
Discuss in your department the purpose of assessment and grading. Please keep notes in your PLC agenda. Your input will be reviewed when the grading practices committee develops an SST definition.
Below are some starting points for your discussion:
The purpose of assessment is to:
Evaluate student progress on a given standard or set of clearly identified standards
Establish a routine for providing student feedback on progress on that/those standards
The purpose of grading is to:
Reflect current achievement
Communicate to the student, family, and school progress in the course curriculum
Communication to the student, family, and school the student's attitudes, attendance, and behaviors through a work habit grade.
To provide an overview of the student's progress in the course, both achievement and work habits
The purpose assessment is not:
To evaluate student attitudes, attendance or behaviors
Verify Grades in PowerSchool
When you log into PowerSchool after 2pm on Friday, Jan. 14 you will see a banner at the top of the home page:
Click the link “Verify these grades now”, and you will have a list of each of your courses with a “verify” and “view” button next to each one.
Clicking “Verify” will enable you to see the grades that are currently stored for each student. You will see 2 sets of columns for C1, A1 and W1. The first is the stored grade, the second is the grade currently in your grade book. If the 2 are different, the second column will have the grade highlighted in yellow and that is the grade that will get stored for that student.
If you see that one of the grades is NOT correct, you need to go to your grade book and update the grade for that student so that it is accurate in your grade book. After you do that and go back to the Verification screen, you will see the new/updated grade (highlighted in yellow) and then can click “Verify” for that course. The yellow-highlighted grade will be the one that gets stored. Do not click the verify button until you are sure all grades are accurate. If you do click verify and then find you need to make a change, email techsupport@ssvotech.org telling us which section needs to be unverified so that you'll be able to fix the grade in your grade book and then re-verify the changes. To ensure your request is responded to promptly please make sure you use the techsupport@ssvotech.org email address as opposed to emailing or calling a member of IT directly.
Make sure each of your classes has the Green “Verified” box next to it by 2pm on Tuesday, Jan. 25th.
Special Education Progress Reports: Assignments and instructions will be shared with assigned teachers this week. Progress reports are due on February 11, 2022.