CWCS May 2008 ES Agenda

Please read the agenda, along with each of its links 

The agenda quiz must be completed in F.R.E.D. by 3:00 pm the day before the ES meeting.

 

CWCS Goals:

Improve student achievement in reading and writing

Improve student achievement in mathematics

Improve STAR attendance to 100 %

 

You are all fabulous!  The visit with the WASC team seemed to have gone very well.  They enjoyed meeting and talking to parents, students, and staff.  They seemed to be impressed with the fact that we have been working hard on the recommendations that were given to us by WASC three years ago. They said that it’s obvious that we haven’t been sitting on our hands!  Yes, we have all been working very hard!  They will probably have a few more recommendations for us when we receive their report in June. This just keeps us on our toes and improving!  

They liked our new facilities and some of the cutting edge things like our Elluminate classes that we are offering our students! They sat in and observed Jeni Richline’s English Elluminate class and were very impressed! They were amazed with our STAR participation numbers that we have been getting the last three years. As you know, we had a plan and have been following it. Our assessment team is awesome. They truly amaze me!

Congratulations to our assessment department, testing coordinators, and staff for reaching 99.9% STAR participation. This is incredible for a school like ours! You are all awesome!

 

Thank you,

Sherri Nelson

 

 

1) Dates to Remember and Dated Duties

a) May 6th and 7th: CAHSEE for 10, 11, and 12th graders:

*All 10th grade students that didn't test in February MUST test in May... no exceptions.

*Students in Grade 11 can only attempt two times per year so only those that have tested once this year already may attend.

*Students in Grade 12 may attempt at all test sessions, so any 12th graders that have not yet passed should attend. Unfortunately , March test scores will not be available until May 7th so they can go ahead and test if they choose, even though their scores are not back yet. Their passing scores will count no matter which session they tested and failed previously.

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b) May 13, 2008: 8th Grade Graduation (practice at 4:30 and graduation at 7:00 p.m. at the Waterford High School Gymnasium)

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c) May 15, 2008: Senior Graduation (practice at 4:30 and graduation at 7:00 p.m. at the Waterford High School Gymnasium)

Graduation Information for both ceremonies is posted on CWCS webpage.

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d) May 16, 2008: ESs please sign up your students for the LC and HQT classes in FRED by May 16th so that we will know if we have to add sections. (Moodle will be taking the place of Nicenet, we will still be using Elluminate. We will be using FRED to sign up for classes until we see if Moodle can accommodate a waiting list.)

*HQT Courses: Fall Calendar, English a-g Courses, English General Courses, Math Department, Science Department, Social Science Department

*Learning Center Prospective Classes: Modesto Learning Center and Ceres Learning Center (Most have been entered as CP classes for next year...remember to choose "Fall" classes.)

*Learning Center and Office Closing dates:

April 1-May 30-Summer School check out: Parent/ES must present their Summer School Request Form to check out books for summer school.
May 30- Book Return. Return all books that have been checked out from the libraries for inventory (unless for SS)
June 30, 2008: Ceres Learning Center closes. (Summer Hours)
July 11, 2008: Modesto Learning Center closes. (Summer Hours)
July 14-31, 2008: Waterford Office closed
August 4-5, 2008- Learning Centers open for new families & AESS (families or ES) to pick up materials
August 6, 2008- Learning Centers open to returning families
August 21- Back to school night at the Modesto Learning Center
September 15- All summer school books checked out must be returned

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e) Wednesday, August 13, 2008: All ESs are expected to return to work, (be available by phone and e-mail), by August 13th. All enrolled students need to have been provided with all necessary educational materials by this date so that they can begin school on August 13th. Remember the new notice on the student agreement, and make arrangements for how you'd like your families to contact you prior to the first day of school. (emails, phone messages, etc.)

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f) Monday, August 18, 2008: Fall All ES meeting at the San Joaquin Office of Education, 2707 Transworld Dr., Stockton. Mark your calendars now for this mandatory all-day meeting! There will be a two-day all ES meeting in February of next year, tentatively scheduled for February 19th and 20th.

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g) Thursday, August 21, 2008: Back to School Night

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h) 2009 CWCS Paperwork Timetable: A yearly timetable of generalized duties for your reference. Reminders are put into the ES agendas monthly, but this is good for reference and for planning your new school year.

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2) Things to Do

a) Fall 2009 Student Agreement Reminders:

*Mail: Please mail in your Fall 2009 Student Agreements and Assessment Confirmations. We would like all Student Agreements mailed to the IEM Office by May 12th. However, we understand that those families that test at the MLC site at the last week of testing, may not be able to meet that deadline. We do not expect you to plan an extra meeting in order to meet the deadline. Late Reports will be run on May 14th as a courtesy reminder.
*Kindergarten Retention Forms: Contact your Advisor first if you have any Kindergartners that are being retained, and submit any kindergarten retention forms with the Fall Student Agreements.
*Grade Placement: The 2009 Grade Level Placement chart has been posted for use in making any needed corrections to grade levels. Remember, according to policy, “students can be placed "at grade level" or below grade level at teacher/parent discretion, but never above grade level”. (Unless placed at a higher level at a previous school when they transfer to us).
*New line to be called to your families’ attention when they sign. Parent and student are required to contact student’s ES by the first day of each semester to confirm student’s enrollment. Failure to do so will nullify this agreement, and school will assign student’s enrollment to another student on the school enrollment waiting list. Make arrangements with your parents for them to contact you by phone or email prior to the first day of school.
*Potential Grads who have failed the CAHSEE: If you have a potential graduate who failed the CAHSEE, and intends to continue school with CWCS next Fall, please remember to complete a Student Agreement.
*(Remember to have ALL high school students sign the Enrollment Contract and place it in your student's files.)

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b) ES Checkout:

*Please read carefully through the ES Checkout Procedure. (Note that the 9-12th grade report card task now states “report cards sent and given to parents”, the High School Enrollment Contract has been added to the checklist, and there is now a statement about arranging for parents to contact you at the first of the year, and a statement just for this year regarding scheduling a Ceniom appointment for transferring your mail system to the new Microsoft Exchange Server... see IT below.)
*Mail to IEM c/o Shara Langford:
1) your completed ES checkout pages (two pages printed and completed from FRED (view ES Detail, yellow button on General tab)
2) your signed and sealed ES evaluation that you will receive in the mail (send all pages, not just the signature page)
3) a copy of your “all clear” email from your ES Advisor
*Mail to IEM c/o HR
4) A signed CWCS Employment Agreement that you will receive in the mail.
5) if applicable, resignation letter (#4 not required if resigning)

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c) Summer Reminders:

-Summer Grads: If you have a student planning on graduating at the end of summer school, you MUST inform the summer school ES. Upon enrollment in summer school, you will receive an email from student assignments informing you of the summer school ES’s name and email. Please alert the summer school ES that the student is planning on graduating at the end of summer school. Regular ESes will need to collect all materials from their Summer Grads, except those materials which will be used for summer school, which the summer school ES will collect.
-Summer School Report Cards: Remember, when registering your current students for summer school (SS), after completing the SS request form, you will need to create a high school or grade school summer school report card in FRED. Be sure to select semester 3/2008, and the courses that the student needs to take in summer school according to the supplemental program they have signed up for.  Also include the number of credits (for HS) the student is attempting for each course. Do not add the grades at this time--the summer school ES will complete the grades at the end of summer school. Summer School ESes will email the regular ES to verify that assigned credits were completed and materials were collected.
-Summer Centralized Intake: Please e-mail stuassign@ieminc.org to let the office know if you will be able to contact new students during the months of June and July as we will only assign them to ESes that will be able to meet with them without delay according to the initial student assignment policy. Include in the email the dates that you will be available, and when you will not be available. If we do not receive an e-mail from you, we will assume that you are not available to sign up meet with families until August 13th. Centralized Intake will start May 19, 2008 and continue through July 11, 2008. The assigned ES will receive an e-mail notifying them about the student assignment. The assigned ES will call the family within 24 hours of the time that the email was sent, and make arrangements to meet with the family to provide them with curriculum and guidance before the first day of school. (If the family wants to meet sooner, the ES must accommodate that need). This policy is for Summer School intake only. During the regular school year the ES must meet with the family within 7-10 school days. The following line has been added to the ES checkout page: “I have notified Student Assignments of the dates I will accept prospective students this summer. I will be available to check e-mails daily and contact families within 24 hours of notification, and will notify student assignments if I am not available. (if applicable).”
Students that go through intake at this time will need to have their Scantron testing completed in the Fall when the school year begins in order to meet the requirements of our Scantron testing window for the '09 school year. Please note the Fall Prospective all ES email that was sent in April.
Centralized Intake Curriculum will be available for ESs or families to pick up at the Modesto Learning Center in August.
-Summer drops: If any students drop during the summer, remember to submit the drop in FRED and e-mail stuassign@ieminc.org right away if you need a replacement. If you have POs placed for them, they are NOT automatically cancelled, so be sure to submit a request to have the POs cancelled. If the orders have already arrived, make arrangements to “sell” them to another family or ES. Use your ES group to network about this!
-Fall Orders: Remember that any items that you have ordered for families for the Fall, will be arriving during the summer. If you are going to be away from your home, make sure that you have someone collecting your mail. Please mark items in as received right away so that we can pay the vendors!

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d) Purchase Order Reminders

-Backordered Items: When marking POs complete, remember to mark all backordered items that have come in as received.
-"Incomplete" POs.  An easy way to view which POs need your attention is to go to FRED ”View/POs” and  scan for those not marked with an “X” in the completed column on the right side of the list. Send a note to PO Inquiries to have a problem PO researched or cancelled. You will need to clear up all of these before ES Checkout, so now would be an excellent time to start this process. As stated in the Spring and Summer PO Requests, accounting will delete any POs that are still incomplete by June 15th. If your families have important items that they were hoping to receive from this year's budget, be sure to let them know about this cutoff. No exceptions will be made.
-Unused Educational Activity Checks: ESes must collect any unused Educational Activity checks from their families at their last learning record visit.
-POs for Fall: If you haven’t done so already, please remember to mark your POs for Fall “done” now. They will then be processed by VR when the funding is placed into the parents’ accounts this summer.

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e) Items to Share with Your Parents:

-April and May CWCS Newsletters

-CWCS 2009 Calendar

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f) ES Survey: The traditional end of school year ES Support Survey is available for your input . We would like all ESs to complete the survey by ES Checkout.  This is your time to give the support department input as to what we can do to serve you better as you serve your students. Unfortunately, the “other” boxes for some of the questions only allow 50 spaces for typing text. If you have additional comments that exceed this limit, please add them in questions #12 and #13…the large text boxes can accommodate up to 200 spaces. (This has been a frustration expressed by some in the past).

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g) Yearly print out of Standards: Each growth area of the student's learning record has a yellow button on the top right labeled "print yearly standards". Print a copy, (or pdf a copy for your computer files), of the yearly student standards for each student in each growth area where learning occurred, and keep in student's file.This is also on the ES Checkout Checklist.

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h) Graduation Requirements Agreement: Additions have been made to the Graduation Requirements Agreement in FRED. Please be sure that you complete this form and enter information into FRED for all incoming HS students and new 9th graders.

-I understand that beginning with the graduation class of 2012, Education and Career Planning will be a Life Skills Graduation Requirement.
-I understand that if during the 9th grade, my student scores below basic or far below basic on the STAR, they must do the CAHSEE Intensive Plan in the 10th grade.

*Talk to all of your 9th graders (those that will be 10th graders next year) and let them know in a positive way how we will help them to pass the CAHSEE if their STAR results show that they may need extra help. Have all of them sign the newly updated Graduation Requirements Agreement, and note that the Education and Career Planning course will not be a requirement until the class of 2012.

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i) Student Council: Please encourage your 7th - 12th graders to attend a formative meeting to start the process of setting up a Student Government. The meeting will be on Friday, May 2nd at the Modesto Learning Center at 10 AM (with refreshments!). Students who wish to run for office must complete an election contract which is due at the Waterford Office or either Learning Centers by Friday August 22, 2008 at 3:40 PM. The offices of President, Vice President, Secretary and Treasurer are reserved for 9th-12th graders only. Contact Judy Orr at jorr@connectingwaters.org with any questions or suggestions.

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3) Training Items

a) CWCS Materials: Remind your parents when you give them materials, that all material is school property and must be returned after the student leaves our school. This is listed on the Student Agreement and also during Intake. ESes are responsible for keeping track of all materials that they check out to their families If you need a CWCS stamp, please email cwcs@connectingwaters.org.  Remember, for computers, to keep a Computer Equipment Tracking Form in your files. This form is to be printed from FRED.

Coming next year! FRED will have a page to help you track all of your CWCS materials, not just those over $350.00.

No more handwritten paper trails! More training to come in the Fall.

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b) CWCS HQT Department Courses:

-Summer School HQT Access Courses: Summer School Courses are posted on the CWCS HQT password protected site.

- 2008/2009 HQT Courses (texts and times) are now posted to both the Curriculum Page and the HQT Page
The Math Department Course page includes courses that will be taught at the learning centers.

- HQT Access: When signing up students for HQT Access in the Fall, please be sure that the student will use the access and will not “drop”, as there will be no refunds of instructional funding unless the instructor approves.

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c) CWCS 2009 Paperwork Timetable

Please note: These are ES deadlines. In order to meet the expected deadlines, ESs will need to give their parents sufficient notice so that any required information or documents can be collected from parents at an earlier date set by the ES.

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d) AESS Reminder: ESs must create a new AESS contract each year for their AESS students. Please review the AESS guidelines and remember that with option A, the parent must be provided with appropriate materials so that work can be graded, and that with option B the ES must both make the assignments and collect the daily work, grading the tests and quizzes.

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e) Learning Record Meetings: ESes are expected to meet in a student’s home unless previous arrangements have been made.

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f) Report Card/Transcript Deletions: The directions found in the Transcript directions as well as the Create HS report card directions in the ES manual have been changed to include the new process for adding and deleting courses from a High School report card.

If a course needs to be added to the transcript: The ES should add the course to the bottom of the existing report card for the correct semester/year. When you have finished adding all additional courses and are satisfied with your work, mark the course as “Ready” and click the green “Send” button. Student records will then process the report card again, sending only the classes which have not been previously sent to the transcript. It may take a day or two for this to be processed and show up on the transcript. Important: do not create a second report card for the same student for the same year and semester. If a course needs to be removed or corrected, it must first be deleted from the existing transcript and then resubmitted through the above report card process.

To delete an existing transcript item: FRED will allow an ES to delete a course from a report card AND have it deleted from the transcript.

1) if it is for the current school year and

2) If it is a course assigned by that ES

To do this, go to view “high school report card”; click on “view/edit”; click on the button that says “go to report card lines”. Click on the red “x” by the title of the course you would like to delete. If the course can be deleted (meeting above requirements), it will…if it is a course from a previous school year or from another ES, clicking on the button will generate an automatic email that will be sent to your advisor asking for their assistance in removing the course. Specific information about the course/semester/year will be included in the email. If you accidentally click the wrong box, and want to remove your request, you may click the “delete” box to uncheck it.

If there is an error on the transcript for a continuing charter school student created by their previous ES, and the previous ES is currently employed/available, contact the ES for information and possible changes to the transcript.  If the previous ES is no longer employed by the school, contact your Advisor for assistance. Advisors will do a mini-training on this concept at the ES meetings.

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g) Professional Growth Hours: Although it is no longer a requirement for credential renewal, some ESes may like to have a certificate acknowledging their professional growth hours from CWCS for the 2007/2008 school year. If you would like a certificate, please email cmiller@connectingwaters.org.

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h) CWCS Approved Tutors: The CWCS Approved Tutors list has been updated. New additions include:

 Sue Jamison, service vendor, suejamison@clearwire.net or (209) 848-1020, CAHSEE Prep, Math or English, all of Stanislaus County, South San Joaquin County, and Western Tuolumne County

Mark Perez, Contract Programs, (209)756-9671, Merced, Atwater, Los Banos

Matt Cavanaugh, Contract Programs, (209)247-8930, Turlock area

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i) March Agenda Compilation

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j) CWCS 2008 Yearbook Information

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k) Student Computers:

Computer Recycling at Learning Centers: Computer Recycling policies and procedures. Please use the Recycling form.

Damaged Computers: The following has been added to the transfer/drop checklist for when a student is dropped. “(If a computer is returned, it should be checked at this time to see if it is working.)”

 Instructions have been added for clarification to the Computer ordering/tracking document

“When a student drops from the school, the computer must be checked to see if it is in working order, and the ES should follow the directions in Ordered Materials and Missing Materials, and consult with their Advisor, if the computer is not working.” And the missing Materials Document now states:

“If the family is returning a school computer, it should be checked to see if it is in working order. If it is not, and it appears to have been willfully damaged, consult your advisor and fill out a missing materials form.”-

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4) Messages from School Departments

ASSESSMENT NEWS from Leita Barlow and Jodi Leonardo

*CAHSEE Info

*Scantron post-testing must be completed before ES checkout. Please check in edperformance.com to make sure each student completed all three sections. An email will be sent to ESes who may have Scantron testing to complete. A Scantron LC Schedule has been posted to the Assessment page. This is for late enrollees.

*STAR(Standardized Testing and Reporting Program)99.9% OF OUR STUDENTS TESTED!! CONGRATULATIONS EVERYONE AND THANK YOU!! Scores will be mailed out to students in September and uploaded into Edusoft.

*WRAT: When doing your WRAT Assessments, remember to enter the information into FRED. Assessment will be running a report on which students still need the WRAT completed and entered.

CURRICULUM NEWS from Lori Freeman

*May Curriculum News

*CAHSEE Intensive Updated

*Talk to all of your 9th graders (those that will be 10th graders next year) and let them know in a positive way how we will help them to pass the CAHSEE if their STAR results show that they may need extra help. Have all of them sign the newly updated Graduation Requirements Agreement, and note that the Education and Career Planning course will not be a requirement until the class of 2012.Present this as a positive opportunity to help them pass the CAHSEE the first time that they take it!
*Global Student Network: Updates have been made to the Global Student Network link. Thank you ES Shoni Johnson.

 

GUIDANCE NEWS from Mary Halter and Melissa Cripe

*Academic Probation - starting this fall, Academic Probation will be for continuing students as well as new enrollees. If you have a student that you think will need to be placed on Academic Probation for 08-09 school year, please notify the Guidance Department at guidancecounselor@connectingwaters.org

* Career Education and Planning: Information on the required 9th grade Career and Education Planning course has been posted to both the Curriculum page and the Guidance page. Please note and inform your students about the changes to the times for the Fall. A new section has been created for 11th and 12th graders who are interested in taking the course for first semester and the internship course second semester. We have added the required course to the Graduation Requirements Menu, the Suggested 4 year HS Schedule, and have requested that a statement be added to the Graduation Requirement Agreement (printed from FRED).

*MJC StartSmart - please share MJC StartSmart with your graduating Seniors, Class of 2008

*High School Catalog: The High School Catalog is now posted on the Guidance webpage.

*Reminder about Student Placement Recommendations: IT has developed a new process for the Guidance Department to enter newly enrolled high school students' placement recommendations. When you receive an email that you have a new high school student, you may view the Guidance Department's Placement Recommendations by going to the Student Detail, clicking on the Graduation button, and then the Placement Recommendation button. This form will be blank for any currently enrolled HS students, but will be filled out for any new enrollees starting February 20, 2008.

MATH NEWS from Debbie Kutz

*May Math News

LANGUAGE ARTS NEW from Terry Souza

*Directions for using the Houghton Mifflin Reading Placement Assessment are posted on the Assessment page in the ES manual.

VENDOR RELATIONS

* Vendor Instructor Policy: IEM has updated their Vendor Instructor Policy. A few ESes have asked to see a vendor approval packet. The Vendor Agreement is a legal contract between the school & vendor. The agreement covers a lot of items such as: vendor's contact info, agreement to accept school PO’s, submission of W9, fingerprinting, provision of a business license (or DBA) if they teach in a private residence or teach Driver’s training, and if they’re not incorporated they must answer 20 IRS type questions, etc. VR has recently added a view in the database for the ES to see each step of the vendor approval process. They would like to stress that the ES is not to attempt to handle the ‘business side’ of approving vendors. This is why you have VR… There are legalities and requirements that they specifically train their staff on to complete this process for you. So, as to not blur the two separate responsibilities:

ESes should ensure that: 1)The prospective vendor is interested in working w/CW. and 2)Complete the Vendor Request thoroughly.And that’s basically it… they'll take it from there!
* Six Flags Discovery Kingdom (formerly known as Marine World) no longer accepts checks generated from individual service POs. It has now been changed to “GEA only” status at the vendor's request. This information has been updated on the Theme Park Guidelines page, as well as in the vendor notes section of FRED.

 

IT

*New Microsoft Exchange System: We are presently migrating all our email users to our 2007 Microsoft Exchange System. We are currently migrating new employees and those current employees as opportunity allows. The exchange system will have many advantages to our current one, especially when all the users are migrated over. A few of those advantages are; the ability to access a detailed view of your email from any computer equal to your view in Outlook 2003; Increased speed and storage capacity; Automatic update of your inbox; And when all users are connected the ability to share documents and calendars.

All ESes are required to contact Ceniom to schedule an appointment as part of their ES checkout. The appointment will be to transfer your current mail system to the new server prior to August 1st. You may either archive all of your current Outlook folders and have them start a new account on the exchange server, or you may ask that your current Outlook program be loaded onto the new server. If you’re not sure what you want, Ceniom will help you figure that out. You need to have this done by August 1st to insure that your current mail program will still work when the new school year begins. If you have any problems, use Ceniom for tech support. If you are having problems with Ceniom, please contact Gary Clark gclark@ieminc.org.

*Apple Computers are now available on the Student Computer Information page.

*FRED Zoom: When in FRED, if you want the text to appear larger, you may click on the small, jagged “mountain” on the bottom left of the page. The larger of the two “mountains” will zoom in, and the smaller will zoom out.

* The Parent Detail Screen has been updated. The new screen has all the elements that were on the old screen, just organized into tabs and tidied up. Also, a new tab for "POs" is there with a button to print POs for that ES/Family.

* The CP Course Approval form now allows you to choose to print only your students if desired.

 

 

5) ES Networking

a) Curriculum swap

-Bring any materials that might be able to be used by other families, to trade or “sell” to other ESs for their families to use. Money is not actually exchanged, but funding transfers from budgets can occur if desired using the transfer of funds form. Since only $150 of next year’s funding can be spent prior to the start of the school year, this is an excellent opportunity to obtain needed curriculum for your students needs.

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b) Meeting Dates for 2008:

-Your Area Facilitator will be coordinating the times and dates for next year’s ES meetings. These will then be posted for your review. If you need to change to a different ES group for next year, please email cmiller@connectingwaters.org prior to ES Checkout.

-The Escalon Group has been split into two groups. The new Area Facilitator will be Carol Adams. Congratulations Carol!

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c) All ES Meeting Topics: Please network amongst your group and send your top five suggestions in your AF meeting summary for consideration for our All ES meetings. The August meeting is pretty packed, but we'd like to incorporate as many as possible in that meeting as well as in our February meeting.

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d) ES Checkout Tips: If you would like to network about ES checkout tips, and/or were unable to attend the workshop at the February meeting, there will be a time available after the meeting to network and share with any other ESes that would either like to ask questions and/or demonstrate their own organization tips.