Happy Leap Year!

I hope that you enjoyed your day off today! I am feeling a ton better, but still slept most of the day away. Oh well, at least I had the luxury of having that as an option. I ventured back to school yesterday because of the parent/ teacher conferences and saw the multiple messages wishing for candy. :-) And, of course, the side notes that you missed me too. Ha! I always knew the candy was a hit. Now everyone else realizes that is the only reason students stop by my office. :-) Just kidding. Thanks to everyone who left notes on my board. I missed you too.

I didn't have a chance to post a message last night after conferences, but yesterday was a significant day for our family. It was my grandmother's 85th birthday. My grandmother is quite a lady - she loves to shop and is full of spunk. We celebrated last weekend when everyone was in town and her friends took her to lunch today and then they had cake at the nursing home with my grandfather which made him happy. A random story for you, I call my grandmother, "Mugga." I don't know why exactly, but that is her name. Evidently when I was a baby I couldn't say grandma and I started calling her Mugga and they (my parents and grandparents) all liked it so it stuck. So, while I know she will never be on my blog to see this message - Happy Birthday Mugga! :-) This isn't the greatest picture of her, but it is my most recent one - she looks pretty good for 85, don't you think??

Enjoy your weekend!

Sick

I was out sick today, but at the moment am feeling slightly better. My fever broke late this morning which was a relief. I slept most of the day away and have not tried to see if I will be able to keep any food down. My plan is to see how things go tonight - if I can try to eat something and keep it down and if my fever doesn't come back, then I will try to head back to school tomorrow. I hear you had a crazy bell schedule at school after your 2 hour delay (hope you enjoyed it!) and the assembly. 25 minute classes must have been nice. :-) Have a good night and hopefully I will be back and will see you tomorrow!

Last Day for Changes Approaching

The last day for students to change a class from conventional grading (A, B, C, etc.) to Pass/ Fail grading is Tuesday, March 4th! The forms are in the counseling center and require a parent signature. If you plan to switch a class to pass/ fail, please be sure to pick up a form and return it before Tuesday!

March 4th is also the last day that students can drop a class without an F on their transcript. This is only possible if students have above the minimum number of classes required (5 for seniors and 6 for sophomores and juniors). And yes, it is too late to add a class.

Sorry I didn't get a posting on here last night, but I was worn out after parent/ teacher conferences. Tonight I am definitely not feeling well, so if I end up being out sick tomorrow - sorry, I will have to catch up with you Thursday. Don't forget, we don't have school Friday.

Carly & Cole

Any time Carly and Cole are in town for a visit I have a great time with lots of laughter. Cole is now becoming such a "big boy" and he is talking more and more so it is fun to figure out what he is trying to say. (Except at night when he talks in his sleep...) Today Carly and I went with one of my other friends, Isabelle, to Build-A-Bear at Easton. Carly made a pink sparkly bear which she dressed up in a wedding dress with high heeled gold shoes. Isabelle made a bunny for her sister, Maddie, that she dressed up like a baby. I think they had fun. I was so mad at myself because I completely forgot my camera so I don't have any pictures from our adventure. You might notice that I did NOT take Cole with me and I felt bad about ditching him, but seriously, I can only handle 2 kids at once. I will have to take him next time. I did get quite a few cute pictures of Carly and Cole from Saturday (when I thankfully remembered my camera) so I thought I would share a couple with you as my time with them was the highlight of my weekend. I hope you had a great weekend too. See you tomorrow for another 4-day week!

Congratulations and Good Luck!

In swimming and diving only the top 24 individuals for each event qualify for the state championships which are being held today. Phil Bunting is one of those individuals. Phil, along with Eugene Novikov, Nate Schott, and Troy Karski, are competing today in the 4 x 400 relay. Congratulations on making it to States and Good Luck today! I hope you enjoy your final time swimming for your senior year!

Another Snow Day!

I hope that you are enjoying your extra day off! We are getting spoiled with all of these long weekends - it's great! I am excited because my sister is coming to town with her husband and my niece and nephew. They were supposed to arrive last night, but had to postpone driving up due to the weather. Some of my friends from Pittsburgh are also coming into town today. So, all in all, I was really thankful to be able to sleep in today and I am looking forward to having a great weekend. I hope you do too!

Summer School

Information about summer school was distributed in homerooms several weeks ago with the rest of your registration materials. Today we received feedback from the summer school directors that classes such as Phys Ed and Speech are filling up quickly. If you are planning on taking one of these classes during summer school, please be sure that you apply right away so that you don’t end up closed out of the class. In fact, if you needed the 9th grade PE class, it is closed for the high school sites for the first session – only Kilbourne Middle and Perry Middle School sites remain. As of now, there is still room at the high school for PE 9 during the 2nd session. PE 11 is currently still open for both sessions, but again, it seems to be filling up faster than normal.

If you failed a class during the 1st semester, you need to discuss signing up for summer school with your parents. The success rates for students who take summer school is very strong because you are only asked to focus on one subject at a time and it is a more relaxed environment.

This year summer school will be held at Thomas Worthington High School and most courses cost around $200. (Students on the free and reduced lunch program are allowed to attend for $50.)

If you have lost your summer school registration brochure, please stop in the Counseling Center and ask one of the secretaries for a new brochure.

Perhaps I will see you tomorrow... or not if we end up with a snow day. :-) I know lots of you are hoping for no school in the morning. We'll see what happens.

An Overview of the Scheduling Process

It has occured to me (through many of your questions) that most students don't really know or understand how the schedule is created. I thought it might be helpful if I give you a quick overview of the scheduling process. (I am saying quick because it is actually boring and is known to cause massive headaches for those trying to put it all together and make it work for every student.)

By now, nearly everyone has selected their classes using the online registration system. (And if you didn't enter in your requests, the secretaries are calling you in individually.) The counselors are meeting one-on-one with juniors. (Speaking of which, tomorrow is another day of junior and junior parent meetings for me so most of the day I will be locked away in my office in meetings.) During these meetings we are reviewing the courses selected for senior year and making certain that all requirements for graduation are being met. I have also started going through all of the registration requests submitted by "my" sophomores to make certain that the courses selected make sense based upon the previous classes and teacher recommendations. After I finish going through all of the sophomore requests I will meet personally with any sophomores for whom I have questions regarding the courses selected. I will also be reviewing my soon to be sophomores (current freshmen students that will transition to my caseload next year.) All of this needs to be finalized by the end of this month and officially given to the administration as the "final" registration requests.

Once the final requests are submitted by all of the counselors at the end of this month the administration (principal and assistant principals) will look at the numbers for all of the courses selected to determine what, if any, courses do not have enough students signed up to be able to offer the class. After they figure this out they will provide that information back to the counselors with a list of students impacted and we will work with those students and their alternates list to find a suitable replacement course.

The administration will also begin working to determine the total number of sections of each class (for example English 1's) needed to meet the demand. They will then work to create a schedule with computer services that will create the smallest number of conflicts possible. This is a MUCH bigger challenge than most people would imagine. For example, if a class like AP Computer Science is only offered 1 time in the day, then they have to figure out what students want to take that class and try to make sure that the time of day selected to offer the course will not conflict with any other classes - especially any other classes that are only offered once in a day.

Eventually they will create a schedule and "lock" it in place. When that happens they will then come back to the counselors with a list of all of the kids with conflicts in their schedules. In some cases, we are able to make minor adjustments - move a few classes around and make the schedule work. In other instances, we will have to work with the student to make tough decisions about what classes they do or do not want to take and use the alternates to find other courses that would work and still meet requirements toward graduation.

And that's it - we will ultimately get the schedule set just how we want it and hopefully all of you will pass all of your classes 2nd semester so that we don't have to go back and add anything into your schedule or change classes that you no longer meet the pre-requisites for, but all of those types of changes will happen after the final grades are submitted in June.

I hope that helps you to understand what is going on with the scheduling and registration process. It is a long and tedious process and I appreciate your patience.

Another 4-Day Week

I hope that you had a great long weekend and had a chance to relax and enjoy the extra day off. As you all know, I keep a candy jar in my office that I re-stock every day as a treat for everyone who stops by to say Hi and visit. I was running *really* low on candy last week, so this weekend the one thing I knew I must do was go shopping and buy more candy. No need for concern, I did, in fact, accomplish this item from my to do list. I bought 10 huge bags of candy, so hopefully it will last a little while. :-) See you tomorrow!

Introducing Justin...

As you likely recall, two years ago I went on an educator's conference to Parris Island to learn about the Marine Corps. While there I had a chance to meet a few of the young men working to become Marines. Justin Jones was one of those individuals. Justin has been stationed in Hawaii and today I received an e-mail from his mom letting me know that he deployed to Iraq about a month ago and will be there through September or October. While in Iraq it is challenging to deal with feeling homesick so it is helpful to give any glimpses of home. I am going to put together a care package to send to Justin and would love it if you want to jot down a quick note that I can include with the package I send to him. You can drop your note off to me at school and I will be sure it gets mailed to him. Thanks for helping to brighten Justin's day!



(FYI: In the picture above Justin is the Marine on the left closer to me and he is also pictured to the left.)

Running at OWU

Congratulations to John Batchelder who committed to run at Ohio Wesleyan University. John participated in a "signing" ceremony after school on Wednesday with two other students who were committing to their own colleges of choice. John was joined by his parents for this recognition and was surrounded by other supporters including his brother, Coach Deisher, teammates and friends. Even some of his future teammates from OWU attended to show their support and to welcome John to their team. Congratulations John! We are proud of you!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day! I had a great day today and I hope you did too. Thanks to all of my students who took care of getting registered on time and who remembered to turn in the recommendation forms and (if applicable) the early release/ late arrival forms. I appreciate it! Tomorrow is already Friday - Yeah!

February Socratic Society

I got so caught up in the excitement of having a snow day that I have neglected to recognize the students inducted into the Socratic Society during February.

Students are selected for the Socratic Society based upon their display of the Socratic Core Virtues - scholarship, lifelong learning, compassion, integrity, and personal effort. Previously students could receive this recognition up to once a school year, but that policy changed and students are now only eligible to receive this award once throughout their entire high school career.

Two of "my" students - Russell Blevins (far left) and Ben Brown (far right) were among the students inducted into the Socratic Society. Pictured in the middle is Nathaniel Gardner and not pictured is Dan Petke who Mrs. Stamm and I co-nominated for their dedication and commitment to creating the video outlining the registration process for next school year. So, even though they are not my students they deserve to be included in the blog. (The very bottom picture is the only one I have of Dan, but I love it just the same - it is after Kilbourne beat Thomas on Senior Night in Hockey and Dan scored three in a row - a "Hat Trick.") Thanks again Nathaniel and Dan and Congratulations once again to Russell and Ben! I am proud of you!

Snow Day!

Yeah!! I am happy - enjoy your day off!

Let it Snow!

For the record, I *really* want a snow day tomorrow! My mom, who works at a school in Northeastern Ohio, called me last night at 10pm to let me know that she had a "cold" day for today. Obviously I was jealous, but I'm not giving up hope that we will have a snow day of our own for tomorrow.

Hope you had a good day today and that we will all get to sleep in tomorrow! :-)

Boys Basketball Senior Night

Friday night was Senior night for the Boys Basketball team. Six seniors were recognized before the game including two of "my" students - Adam Baybutt and Kevin Anthony. Other seniors included Chris M, David S, Goran L, and Kyle L. The cheerleaders made a cute sign to recognize the seniors.

The fans were involved and had a good time in the stands. In particular, a large group of senior guys were feeling festive in their costumes. Four of "my" students were dressed up - Brian Blum, Matt Bobson, Mitch Dickson, and Nick Beattie.

It's No Excuse, But...

I know that it is no excuse for not updating, but seriously, I have been *so* tired these last few days. I loved sleeping in this morning and accomplished little to nothing today. :-)

Thursday's junior meetings went well and I was happy to have a chance to meet more of the parents. Friday was chaotic trying to catch up with everyone that I had "neglected" on Thursday by being in meetings all day. (The candy jar was untouched by kids on Thursday and nearly emptied on Friday! LOL!)Just to add to the fun - Monday is Day 3 of the Junior meetings, but the actual school day isn't as crazy as the after school times. I think I am in meetings about 1/2 of the school day so if you need to meet with me stop down and if I am in a meeting go ahead and leave a pass and I will do my best to find you during your off period and between my meetings. (Otherwise we will have to connect on Tuesday.)

For my Sophomores and Juniors - hopefully you were all able to get online and register. If you didn't please do it this weekend!

It seems to me that time is flying - did you know that it is nearly time for 3rd quarter interims? This is your last week before interim grades come out so make sure you are taking care of everything needed in your classes. Seniors, please, no senioritis - not yet! Also, if you know that your parents want to schedule conferences with any of your teachers let them know that they can start scheduling their appointments on Monday by calling Mrs. King in the Counseling Center. (883-2590)

Hope you are having a relaxing and enjoyable weekend.

Registration Reminder

Just a few quick reminders...

Tomorrow (Thursday) is the 2nd day of Junior meetings. I will be meeting with the Juniors and Junior Parents in 30 minute appointments all day long. If you need something from me - please plan to stop in on Friday.

Also, the deadline for course registration is on Friday! Please be sure you have registered for your classes for next year using the online system this week. Yes, this also means that the Juniors who have meetings scheduled with me for the 11th or the 20th still need to register for classes this week. We will be able to change your courses later, but having them in the system is critical to moving the registration process along.

If you have selected courses and then changed your mind and want to go back into the computer to change them it was *supposed* to allow you to do that through Friday, but I have heard from a few students that the courses appear "frozen" or "locked." If that is the case, simply let me know and I will unfreeze them for you so that you can make edits this week. After this week I will have to make the changes for you.

(Yes, I am aware that this update is very similar to past updates this week, but these are the questions I am getting all day long at school - so it bears repeating. Thanks for being patient.)

Finding Balance

Hopefully you are ready to register for your classes (or have already done so) online. When you are considering which classes you want to take it is really important to try to find a balance. You want to challenge yourself with courses that will push you and help prepare you for the future. At the same time you want to remember that it is high school and you need to be realistic about your expectations of yourself. There is a balance that should be sought - between too many "easy" classes and too many "hard" classes. You know yourself best and what you can handle so while it is an honor to have every teacher recommend you for AP classes it doesn't mean that it would be the ideal situation to load your schedule with all AP classes. If you are struggling to find that balance, please talk to your parents about the classes you are considering and stop down to see me so that we can discuss it.

Thanks to the Juniors who came in to meet with me and your parents today. Hopefully it wasn't *too* painful. :-) I am looking forward to getting to know you all even better in the next year.

Planning Ahead

I wanted to give you all a heads up that this week starts the craziness of my individual meetings with every Junior and their parents. Tomorrow and Thursday I have meetings beginning at 7am and don't end until 9pm. The meetings are scheduled every 30 minutes which means that catching me on these days will be tough. Please try to plan accordingly. There will be a few blocks of time that I am open on Tuesday and Thursday, but in general, you are going to have a much easier time of finding me on Wednesday or Friday. In case you are *really* looking ahead, I have these same types of meetings next Monday the 11th and the following Wednesday, February 20th.

How are you all doing with the new online registration? Have you been able to log on and request your classes without any problems? If you are having difficulty, please be sure to let me know so that I can figure it out. In case you need it, you will register at http://www.worthington-portal.org/ using your student id and password. Please don't forget to register by this Friday!

On a totally separate note, I went to the Kilbourne Singer's concert tonight - WOW! It was amazing. They performed the pieces they will be performing at an Ohio Music Educators Association meeting later this week and I am confident after seeing/ hearing them tonight that they will do awesome and will impress everyone in attendance! Congratulations on a great night!

Traditions in Sports

I admit it, I love traditions in sports. Different teams have their own unique traditions and I just love watching those moments. One of the more common traditions is honoring seniors during senior night. Usually this honors the accomplishments and contributions the seniors have provided with their participation and leadership by recognizing them with their parents. Some of Kilbourne's teams also have other traditions like Senior Tackle for football. On Friday night I had the chance to see the guys and girls swimming and diving team's senior night. Rather than just a normal swim meet their tradition is to end with a "fun" meet of unique events that were all relays. Some of the relays were combinations of guys and girls and at the end of the evning there was even a relay with parents. A special congratulations to "my" senior swimmers - Brian Blum, Phil Bunting, Rolando Contreras, and Joe Pfeifer.

I Admit It...

I admit it... I was totally jealous, full of envy, and wishing that I was you today. But no, *you* were lucky enough to have the day off... which means that *we* (your teachers/ counselors) didn't get a snow day or even a delayed start. :-( Now, let me assure you that I REALLY want a snow day this year and I am not giving up hope, but today may have been my best shot and it was lost. And, to make matters worse, do you know what we spent the day doing today? Sitting through meetings - lots of long meetings. Oh well. I guess I'll just keep hoping for a snow day. :-)

In all sincerity, I hope that you enjoyed your day off and that you are ready to enjoy your long weekend.