Tolenas Elementary School-PBIS

Mr. Soler met JP a second time to go over Tier 2 progress. The survey was handed out to teachers at the April staff meeting and results are being compiled. A report will be shared with teachers through the Staff Update. Next steps include refining Tier 1 and 2 interventions and preparing for Tier 3.

Tolenas Elementary School RTI Survey Completed.

The RTI Intervention Survey was completed on 5/2/2016.

Tolenas Elementary School Attendance Plan

Tolenas Elementary School will do the following to increase school attendance in the 2016-2017 school year:

1. Provide engaging lessons which include academic conversations, project based learning and writing.

2, Reward students for attending regularly through incentives such as perfect attendance pencils and certificates handed out at the Month Tiger Spin Assemblies.

3. Placard the standing item: Attendance Matters! on all communication between the school and home.

4. Provide assistance through the School's Attendance Liaison to families with habitual truancy issues.

Community Engagement: Cleo Gordon

On April 25, Sandie Lawler the director of The Leaven program came to visit Cleo Gordon. She provides after school tutoring to many of our students. She was very excited to see how engaged students were in their classrooms.  Cleo students were very happy to see Sandie and show off  their work.

Attendance and Honor Roll at GVMS

All students who have perfect attendance for the third quarter are posted on the windows in the library!  There are over 400 students who reached this goal!  We are so proud and have a plan to acknowledge them next year in a more effective way!

All certificates for Honor Roll will be given on Friday May 6th and pictures will be posted to all GVMS Social media sights.  For 16-17, we are going to have three different categories:  Principal's Award (4.0), Honor Roll (3.5-3.9) and Honorable Mention (3.0-3.4).  We plan to have more than just certificates for students as well!

Parent Engagement at GVMS

Thank you SO MUCH to all of our families and supporters for making the Spring Fling an AWESOME event!  It was SO MUCH fun and we are still working to calculate all of the money raised for our kids!  Thank you SO much again and again!  A special shout out to all of the people, families, and companies that came to support our students!

We have Sport O Rama coming up on May 20th from 5:30-7:30 and hope that all of our families will come out to support our students!

Parent Engagement

Sem Yeto is continually looking for ways to foster an environment of parent engagement. In the month of March, Sem Yeto Satellite put on a Family Art night for parents and relatives of our students. There was a student art competition as well as art classes for the entire family. The event was a huge success for our campus.

Task Force Tasks from Grange

Attendance: We will reach out to families of chronically absent students over summer and also send a letter to all students at the start of 16-17 about the importance of attendance (using the letters from Count Us In!). We will also continue our mentoring groups, check ins, and incentives for our chronically absent students.

Community Engagement: We have been working with Celebrations Church next door. We have tried to arrange a couple site visits but due to unforeseen circumstances had to reschedule. We look forward to a site visit from one of their youth pastors soon!.

We had Ernie from Solano County Office of Education come to walk our campus and interview one of our students who will be receiving an "Every Student Succeeds" award. We were thrilled to have him here.

Customer Service: It was a pleasure to see our customer service results. We shared the positive comments with our front office staff and discussed ways to improve our service.

PBIS: Teachers completed the School Assessment Survey during our staff meeting. Additionally, we are working on developing a PBIS handbook for teachers. Initially we were thinking flip chart of resources but then decided to try a blog to share this information!

Teach for Success: Data was shared at our March staff meeting with teachers. We decided to continue in our focus areas for next year. We also mad a draft action step in our SPSA.

T4S Instructional Practice

The PSA Sweeps results showed growth in almost every area during the 2015-2016 school year.  One of the areas of focus for our staff this year was Academic Discussions.  There was an overall increase in the number of Academic Discussions that were observed.  The staff has chosen to continue working on this instructional practice, with the plan of increasing the DOK level of conversations.  An action step is funding/release time for additional professional development, as well as release time for teachers to observe other classes on site and at other schools.

Writing Rubrics

PSA teachers are submitting samples of rubrics used to teach various forms of writing.  Several samples have been uploaded to the shared folder.  We will continue to add samples.

Attendance Incentive, and Plan for Improving Attendance Next Year

Attendance is a primary concern at Sem Yeto satellite. In an effort to encourage students to attend on a more frequent basis; any student attaining over a 90% attendance rate for a quarter is rewarded with a quarterly award party.

For the 2016/2017 school year, we will endeavor to improve on our attendance rates at both campuses by allotting a portion of our beginning of the school year orientation to talking with parents and students about the importance of attending school.  Any student identified by our staff as having attendance issues from the prior year (whether a returning  or incoming student), will receive a letter in the mail about the importance of attendance. We are in the process of designing an orientation checklist that must be completely filled out in order for students to receive their schedules.

During our orientation, identified students will meet with our attendance liaison, counselor, college and career technician, and mental health clinician to develop a plan for attending school everyday and charting a course for success in school and in life before receiving their schedule.

Customer Service at Sem Yeto

During a staff meeting, Sem Yeto administration discussed the results/findings of our customer service survey given out to parents who came in to our campus offices.  Overall, we had an 85% positive rating on the surveys taken at both campuses.  After reviewing the information, the staff shared the fact that they do not always see or hear about the positives interactions taking place on our campuses with families. 

Below are some of the comments parents and visitors stated on their survey's:

"Everyone from staff to students were polite and friendly. I didn't know what to expect but I was delighted."

"The staff has made every attempt to get my student on track. You can't help someone who doesn't want it! Thank you for all your efforts."

"Yes I am so happy. They help my son it mean the world to me. Thank you to everyone."

"Always get the info I need from staff!"

"I really appreciate how friendly the staff was and happy to sit down with me right away to work with my son."

Technology Vision

At Sem Yeto, we are striving to provide a learning environment where all students have access to some of the latest technological tools and resources in all of their classes.

We recognize that technology is just a tool; therefore, we are continuing to explore professional development opportunities that will enable our teachers to be more effective in facilitating the use of this new technology in their classrooms( e.g. SAMR Model).

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Continuing to Foster Community Partnerships

At Sem Yeto, we are continually looking for ways to partner with our community to find ways to support our students in being successful in school and life. John Lamell a local business owner in our community visited with our administration to tour our newly opened College and Career Center at Sem Yeto Satellite. 

Mr. Lamell is excited for the opportunity to educate students on the possibility and benefits of attaining a barbers licence, and eventually owning their own business in the barbering career field.

RHS T4S Instructional Practice

After looking at the new T4S instrument, analyzing sweeps data, and discussing the data with staff we have decided to put our attention on the instructional practice of academic conversations. We see this as a critical area that will increase the rigor happening in our high school classrooms.

Throughout our 2016 -17 SPSA we have created action steps to bring more knowledge and practice in the area of academic conversations. Professional development, peer collaboration and observation, and materials are all attached to the goals of Mathematics, Science, English Language Arts, Professional Development, The hope is that our focus on academic conversations across the curriculum will engage our students with rigorous standards and improve upon the other components of the T4S instrument.

A Dual Vision

At Fairfield High we cannot have a vision for Academics without a vision for Educational Technology. Conversely, we cannot have a vision for Educational Technology without a vision for Academics. After reflecting back on our year so far we have focused on two very important areas for the end of the 2015-2016 school year and for the 2016-2017 school year. We want to see teachers regularly using technology in instruction with the goal of reaching DOK 2 or higher and SAMR: Augmentation or above

Our Ed Tech Vision: "At FHS we see that educational technology will be a quintessential and indispensable part of the teaching and learning process; teachers will use edtech as facilitators of learning relevant to the students' lives, and students will use edtech to become empowered, self-directed learners who realize their potential to impact their community and the wider world."

Community Partnerships that are STRONG

Fairfield High continues to partner with Liberty Church. Liberty Church has worked hard to provide ongoing academic tutors for our math classes at FHS. Additionally, FHS has used the Liberty Church facility for several events: NEU Doug Curry presentation, DUI court for our seniors, and our AFJROTC awards assembly.  We have in turn been able to support Liberty Church by providing the use of our facility. Liberty was able to hold their Easter Service celebration on our campus and hold a massive egg hunt on our football field!

Carl's Junior is also an ongoing supporter of academics at Fairfield High. Carls' Junior donates lunch monthly for our students and staff members of the month. Each month's donation is worth over $250.

Parent and community member, Mr. Bass visits FHS regularly on Friday's and brings warm donuts for the office staff. Each time he comes it is with a smile and a thank you for all that everyone does. Mr. Bass is also a strong supporter of our basketball team and his son!

NEU Doug Curry presentation @Liberty Church 

Mr. Bass with Dianna and Rosanne

AFJROTC Awards Ceremony @Liberty Church

AFJROTC Awards Ceremony @Liberty Church 

Seniors at the DUI court @Liberty Church

Perfect Attendance @FHS

At Fairfield High we recognize the importance of acknowledging and reinforcing student accomplishments. On April 15th all students that had perfect attendance for the month of March were awarded a certificate, an early out to lunch pass, and an otter pop at the "Perfect Attendance Station." Student helpers were working the otter pop station and commented that they really liked the idea of recognizing perfect attendance. The 103 students that were recognized had not missed a day of school for March and were not tardy to any classes for the entire month.

Looking into the 2016-2017 school year we are going to provide incentives monthly for students that demonstrate both perfect attendance and improved attendance. We are also going to be incorporating incentives for students that attend school events such as games and rallies. We feel that with more student spirit and camaraderie, our attendance rates will also improve. We will continue to work closely with our attendance liaison and develop attendance plans for each of our chronically absent students. Identifying and meeting with the students and parents early in the year will help counteract the truancy problems.

Connecting all 9th grade students with a senior buddy through Link Crew is another process we will be implementing for the 2016-2017 school year.

Military Month at PSA

April was Military Month at PSA, and each week, we hosted visitors from different branches of the military.  The representatives held Q & A sessions in the College and Career Center during lunch, visited the Public Safety classes and put the cadets through PT drills (physical training), and coordinated a variety of lunchtime activities, such as push-up, rowing, and pull-up contests, obstacle courses, etc.  The men from Travis Air Force Base (pictured here) were invited to assist with our weekly uniform inspections.  They were so impressed that they stayed an extra hour to tour the campus and visit classrooms.  Kudos to our College and Career Tech, Markie Gilmore, for coordinating a fantastic Military Month and bringing in many visitors.

Attendance "Game Plan" for 2016-2017

Our liaison, Yesenia Pantoja, met with our attendance clerk, Elizabeth Gore, and administration to develop a plan for improving attendance for the 2016-2017 school year.  We all agreed that meeting individually with students who had been "chronically absent" made a difference in their overall attendance, so that is one thing that will be done again when we return to school in August and throughout the school year.  Our current incentives focus mainly on perfect attendance, so the incentive program will be expanded to include improved attendance, as well.  Administration will continue to communicate the importance of good attendance and the impact of absenteeism through the weekly blog and social media.