Lassiter’s Liberator!
Week beginning January 28, 2008
Good evening, visitors to www.southernleecavs.com! We have just begun our second semester of the 2007-2008 school year, and Wednesday, January 29, 2008 is THE BIG DAY! That’s right-student report cards from the first semester 2008 will be distributed to students during their second period class! When your student comes home from school, PLEASE hold out your hand and ask for your child’s report card that will, in good detail, summarize their performance in class along the following lines:
• First nine weeks academic average
• Second nine weeks academic average
• Final exam grade
• Final semester grade
• Any comments relative to academic performance, conduct, attendance, etc.
• At the top of the report card, you will see your student’s academic average and the number of credits they have earned.
If you have any questions or comments about the report card, a grade, a comment, absences, or just want to schedule a conference, please do not hesitate to telephone the school and we will schedule a conference involving you, your student(s), the teacher(s), and a student services representative.
The new semester started at Southern Lee on January 24, with 1,200 students and a few new faces on the faculty. We were pleased to welcome Ms. Christina McDermott to our faculty, who will teach Spanish Heritage Language and Spanish 1 this semester. We also welcomed Mrs. Bernice Hight and Mrs. Sandra Duty to our staff, as they joined our Exceptional Children’s department and will serve as inclusion teachers in math, English, and in any other academic area as deemed necessary. Prior to the semester break, we welcomed Mr. Vincent Hunt, math teacher, Mrs. Laura Newman, art teacher, and Mr. Peter Norman, math teacher. We are fully staffed, and we believe with the combination of focused and determined teachers, focused and determined students, focused and determined parents and guardians, a safe, caring, and orderly environment, and an environment that is conducive to effective teaching and learning, we can have a dynamic year!
This edition of the Lassiter’s Liberator Blog will ask for your continued support and for your support and involvement in yet another attempt and effort to shape and polish our PTA. I will go to the national PTA website (www.pta.org), get us registered, and do it! The school needs your support in the following areas:
1) Test proctors
2) Study buddies
3) Lunch buddies/lunchroom monitors
4) Classroom volunteers
5) Motivational speakers, using your life and professional experiences to inspire our students that achievement is within reach!
I also wish to spend a little time in this edition chatting about one of the fights we’re having at Southern Lee: Electronic device drama.
Under school rules and board of education policy, cell phones and electronic devices such as IPods and MP3 players are prohibited. We ask that students refrain from bringing these to school, as they constitute unnecessary objects unessential to the teaching and learning process. This is stated in our student handbook, yet students bring them anyway. When they are seen, the student is asked to put the object away or it is confiscated. If the item is confiscated, on the first offense, we will notify the parent and return the object at the end of the day. On the second offense, we notify the parent, and the principal returns the object at the end of the day with a warning. If there is a third offense, parents are notified, and the object is given only to the parent. If there is a fourth offense, more stringent disciplinary action is taken. I realize that this is the 21st century, and that parents have an interest in communicating with their children, but cell phone/electronic device use during the instructional day just isn’t part of the program.
Our school is also preparing for the North Carolina Writing Test for Grade 10. This evaluation of our sophomore’s writing skill will be on Tuesday, March 4, 2008, and we have been doing some Drop Everything and Write (DEW) activities each month to get our students ready. The desired outcome of the DEW activities was to give us an idea of where our students were in their reading comprehension and responsive writing skills, and then teach accordingly. We will see if our efforts to assist in the development of quality writing were successful in about 5 weeks.
All in all, I would say that we are having a pretty good year. We’ve had some blips on the screen and some bumps in the road regarding some long-term suspensions I have had to recommend for some who just could not (or would not) meet behavioral expectations. Be it for drugs, disruptive behavior, repeated violations of our student code of conduct, or a combination of these, we have to do what is right to maintain that safe, orderly, and caring environment we always talk about. We even applied for Super Safe School status from the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction this year. Our application, we found out, was incomplete, as our committee did not view the back of a page that represented a section worth 20 points. Up to that point, our application had a score of 76, with a score of 90 constituting a Triple S school. We were disappointed that this cost us this recognition, but we know to look for the entire application next time.
Blips on the screen and bumps in the road. They happen frequently everywhere, and they’re frustrating. Addressing the issues, and overcoming the obstacles that confront us make up part of our goal to get where we want to be as a school. Working together, the blips and bumps can become less frequent and more time can be spent by all parties associated with our school on teaching, learning, supporting, and encouraging rather than chasing and disciplining.
Look for more information on how YOU can help!
Til next edition,
HDLassiter
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