PSEO Program

The Post-Secondary Enrollment Options (PSEO) program is an opportunity for high school students to take college courses while still enrolled in high school. There are two alternatives for the PSEO program.

Option A is when students take courses at any college of their choice and pay for the courses on their own (often at a discounted rate) and are able to earn the credit for college credit only.

Option B is available in Central Ohio at Columbus State Community College, the Ohio State University, and Franklin University and is paid for by the school district. Students who participate in this option earn both high school and college credit.

There are a lot of details involved in participating in the PSEO program and it is not meant to replace or substitute for coursework available at the high school, but rather to enhance the educational opportunities available. Students must complete the paperwork by March 30th to indicate their intent to participate in the PSEO program in the following school year.

In order to explain all of the details of the program and to provide you with the forms necessary, all students and parents interested in participating in this program should attend the PSEO Information night on Thursday, March 3rd at 7:30pm in the WKHS auditorium.

I also wanted to mention a few other last minute reminders...

Tomorrow teachers will be turning in your interim grades, so be sure that you and your parents take the time to look at eSembler to gain a current perspective on where you stand with regards to your grades.

Seniors, as you have been hearing on announcements for the last few weeks, your senior pictures for the yearbook are due tomorrow. On Thursday afternoon Mrs. Mullen sent me a list of "my" students that haven't turned in photos and I was sad to see that over 40 seniors were included on the list. Please, turn your picture into Mrs. Mullen and, at the very least, talk to her about when you expect to be able to turn in your picture if you will not have it for her tomorrow!

Good Luck at States!

This weekend WKHS is being represented at the State Swimming and Diving Championships by 2 students and both happen to be "my" students. Keeler Callahan (right) is swimming in the 200-yd freestyle and Hunter Atha (left) is competing in diving. Congratulations Keeler and Hunter on qualifying for states! I am so proud of you both and wish you the best of luck at states!

Talent Show Rescheduled

The talent show, which was originally rescheduled for tonight, has been rescheduled for Tuesday night, March 1st. The talent show tickets will be on sale Monday and Tuesday (if there are still any available) during lunch periods. This event usually sells out so if you hope to attend, I'd strongly recommend getting your tickets as soon as possible. Hope you are enjoying your day off!

Closed

And now we are closed! So, enjoy the second 3-day weekend in a row... plus you have another 3-day weekend next week. Be safe this weekend and if you are out be careful on the roads.

Also, since many of you were planning on attending tonight's talent show, when I hear what the plan is for when it will be rescheduled I will add it to my blog. Have a great day!

2 Hour Delay

If you happen to be awake and checking my blog this morning I wanted to pass along that we have a 2 hour delay! Go back to sleep and enjoy the few extra hours off! :-)

Course Adjustment Deadline

Next week is the last chance for students to change a class from conventional grading (A, B, C, etc.) to Pass/ Fail grading! 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 next Thursday! (Since we do not have school on Friday.)

March 3rd 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.

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, I am in the process of calling you in individually.) The counselors are meeting one-on-one with juniors. (Thank you to all of the juniors and junior parents who made the time to come in and meet with me. I really enjoyed it and have been thrilled with all the "repeat" visits from the junior students since our meetings.) During these meetings we are reviewing the courses selected for senior year and making certain that all requirements for graduation are being met. We also met with all of the freshmen and sophomores to review the requested courses and to make certain that the courses selected make sense based upon your previous classes and teacher recommendations. Some of you still owe me your course recommendation forms signed by your counselors... please be sure to drop these off to me as soon as possible. All of the course selections to be finalized, ideally, by the end of this week and officially given to the administration as the "final" registration requests.

As you are aware, over the last few years we have lost many teachers due to budget cuts and we are expected to lose 3 more this year. This might not sound like a lot, but when consider that each teacher has 5 classes that means there are 15 more sections worth of classes that are not being offered next year that were there this year. Or, to put it another way, that is approximately 360 "seats" that won't be there next year. Why does this matter? Think about when you came in at the beginning of the 1st or 2nd semester asking to make changes to your schedule and how hard it was to find open classes that we could move you into. Now, take away 360 more seats and imagine how hard it will be to make any changes. I am not trying to be full of doom and gloom, but this is simply our reality. It is also why I cannot stress enough the importance of making sure you are confident in your 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 with computer services to create a schedule 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 (like Band, Choir, or AP Foreign Languages).

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.

Street Smart Presentation

The information in today's post is actually for your parents...

The Franklin County Sheriff's office will provide a presentation called Street Smarts on Wednesday, February 23rd at 7:00pm in the WKHS auditorium. This presentation is NOT open for students. Parents are invited and strongly encouraged to attend. I am disappointed that I will not be able to attend this presentation as I heard it several years ago and it was one of the best learning experiences that I have had and has continually helped me in my work with students. The aim of this presentation is to educate adults about the current drug related trends that our teens are being exposed to and often using. Even if your son/daughter does not have a drug problem, being aware of the different drugs currently being used with frequency in our community can be helpful as you interact with your kids and/or their friends. I hope you will make plans to attend this presentation!

Intramural Champions

At Friday's pep assembly the intramural championship team which included 2 of "my" students, Aaron Bardelang and Eric Barbe, took on and beat the staff team. To the best of my knowledge this is the first time that the student intramural team has won against the staff... which basically means that in the past the referees have cheated more to help the staff so that the staff could actually beat the students. :-) Congratulations Aaron and Eric!

I also wanted to recognize Chad Ellwood and Holly Klepek who were candidates for King and Queen of Hearts and worked for the last few weeks to raise money for Spina Bifida - this year's winter charity. Even though other students ended up raising more money, the entire effort made each of you winners in my opinion. I'm proud of you!

I'm pretty confident that you are already very well aware that we have two 4-day weeks ahead! It's hard to believe we are nearing the end of February already. Hope you had a nice weekend and I am looking forward to seeing you this week.

A Great Day

Photo courtesy of Andy Gottesman/ The Lantern

Today was such a great day! I had the opportunity to attend the UNC vs. OSU lacrosse game in the Ohio Stadium. One of my former students, Will Campbell, is now attending and playing lacrosse at UNC. Seeing him in his UNC uniform and knowing everything involved for him to achieve this goal was very special. Interestingly, because it was cool this morning, they warmed up in sweats, but as they ran onto the field it was still pretty easy to pick out which one was Will because of his distinct run. Unfortunately, UNC did not win, but I am still grateful that I had the chance to see Will and his teammates play in person.

To make it even more special, I also had a chance to catch up with another former student, Andy Gottesman, who is currently a student at OSU and is the Multimedia Editor for the Lantern, OSU's student newspaper. Andy was at the game to take pictures and so I was thrilled to be able to spend some time catching up with him too. Andy has incredible talent at capturing moments on film and he shared this picture of Will from today's game.

Truly, a great day!

Little Women

Congratulations to the cast and crew of tonight's Little Women performance! It was a great show. There is no doubt that you all put in a ton of time, energy and effort to reach your goal and you were certainly successful as it was a wonderful musical. A special congratulations to all of "my students" who were a part of the production: Josh Cook, Gina Badillo, Robbie Davidson, Daniela Deny, Jordan Birch, and Jey Bukkapatnam. And to those who worked behind the scenes tonight or in the weeks leading up to the show to help make it a successful musical: Robyn Du, Sarah Ahrens, Rima Beridze, Justin Anthony, Zoie Banes, and Ian Drieling. Congratulations also to the members of the orchestra: Rosalyn Chen, Jami Brunner and Matthew Cooperman.

There is one more show tomorrow night and to the best of my knowledge it is not sold out, so if you have the opportunity to attend the show and see what these students have put together, I truly believe you will not be disappointed.

Good Luck at Districts

Keeler Callahan was featured in a story in today's Columbus Dispatch called "Do or Dye Spirit." Keeler, along with Hunter Atha and Tanner Atha, will be competing in this weekend's swimming and diving district championships. Good luck!

Tomorrow we have a very different bell schedule than normal to allow for an afternoon pep assembly. In addition to recognizing the winter sports teams and wishing the Kilbourne basketball teams good luck against Thomas, this assembly will also allow for the crowning of the King and Queen of Hearts and the faculty vs intramural champions basketball game.

Here is tomorrow's bell schedule:

1st period: 7:45 - 8:25

2nd period: 8:30 - 9:10

3rd period: 9:15 - 9:55

WKHS News: 9:55 - 10:03

4th period: 10:08 - 10:48

5th period: 10:53 - 11:33

6th period: 11:38 - 12:18

7th period: 12:23 - 1:03

8th period: 1:08 - 1:48

Assembly: 1:55 - 3:05

Parent/ Teacher Conferences

I had intended to get this posted last night and apologize for the delay, but I wasn’t feeling well and sleep won over posting on my blog.

Parent/ Teacher conferences will be held on the evenings of Monday, February 28 and Thursday, March 3. This year there is a new online system to allow parents to set up appointments to meet with teachers.

To access the system, visit the portal at http://www.worthington-portal.org/ and log in using the same parent e-mail address and password that is used to access grades through e-Sembler. Click on menu, go up to “My Account” and then “Child Records Access.” Select the high school student you wish to schedule and under applications, choose student options and press the “Launch” button. You will then click on “Schedule Teacher Conference.”

Select the day you wish to schedule the conference. (Active tab is white.) The day you are scheduling is listed about the course names. All available times have a button in the time slot which will allow you to select it. Select the time by course and teacher that you wish to schedule and click the “Schedule Teacher Conference” tab.

Your scheduled conferences will appear in a list below. You will also have the option of deleting or printing your conferences.

I realize that the directions sound confusing, but having seen the system, I promise you that it is not nearly as confusing as it sounds. Conference times are available on a first-come, first-serve basis so I strongly encourage you to log in and schedule your appointments as soon as possible.

If you do not have a valid e-mail address, please call the Counseling Center at 883-2590 for assistance. If you cannot recall your password to access the system, please go to the portal and click the “Request Password” option in the bottom left of the log in screen. Your password will be emailed to you from Computer Services within the hour if the e-mail you submit matches the email in the student’s profile.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day! When I was growing up my mom always had this tradition of giving us a small heart shaped box filled with m&m's. It would be sitting at "our spot" at the kitchen table on Valentine's Day morning. Often I think she would also have another little gift with it such as a coloring book, but it is the heart-shaped box of m&m's that I associate with valentine's day. Even though I am old, this weekend while my mom was in town she dropped off m&m's to go in the heart shaped box (which has remained at my house). It is a small tradition, but it means so much. I hope that you have traditions in your family whether related to valentine's day or some other day that remind you of the love that is shared. And, although I do not tell you often enough, I hope you know what a pleasure and an honor it is for me to work with all of you each day! I hope you have a wonderful Valentine's day and that your heart is filled with love and joy!

Changes in College Admissions

As I continue meeting with junior students and their parents one of the most common comments I hear from the parents is how surprised they are to see how much the college application process and the selectivity of schools such as OSU have changed since they were applying to college. The reality is that it is a constantly changing process and even in the last year it has changed. US News & World Report wrote this article about the 8 Big Changes to College Admissions in 2010 and 2011. I think you will be interested in reading about the changes such as the decrease in time spent reviewing student applications (which can be both humbling and scary considering how much time, energy and effort you put into the applications), earlier deadlines, less emphasis on recommendations and class rank, more emphasis on high school course rigor, application essay, and the student's senior year as well as an increase in colleges fact checking to verify that the information contained in the application is accurate and honest.

Tomorrow and Thursday I will continue to meet with junior students and their parents so catching me will be tough on those days, but Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday I will be more accessible. Thanks for being patient as I know it is hard to wait while I try to meet with every student individually. Thursday you will also have the potential of seeing a teaser for the musical during 8th period and on Friday there will be an afternoon assembly so keep in mind that you will have a different bell schedule that day.

Good Luck

Tomorrow morning many juniors will be starting the "fun" of college admissions tests. Good luck if you are taking the ACT in the morning. (And, since I am posting this later than I had hoped, please quit procrastinating and go to bed so you get a decent night sleep!)

For those of you (juniors) who have not yet signed up to take an ACT or SAT, please keep in mind that this is something I strongly recommend that you do this spring. Visit the ACT or SAT websites to see the upcoming test dates, deadlines, and to register for the tests. While you are on their websites it would also be worthwhile to complete the practice questions and familiarize yourself with the tests and the differences between the tests.

Once again, good luck to all of you who will be testing tomorrow!

Congratulations!

Many of my students impress me with their academic, athletic, or musical talents. Today I am applauding one of these fine young men, Ethan Dixius, for being recognized as a National Merit Finalist.

Students qualify to be named as a National Merit Semifinalist because of their PSAT scores taken during their junior year. The seminfinalists are then entered into a nationwide competition for scholarships based upon their academic successes.

Congratulations Ethan! I’m very proud of you!

Where do you sit?

Are you looking for strategies to help you retain more information in your classes? Being able to recall the information covered by your teacher in class is essential in helping students excel in classes. One aspect you may not be aware of is that where you sit in class has a significant impact on your retention rates. Multiple research studies have shown that if you sit in the front row you have better retention rate than those who sit in the back rows. Additionally, the closer to the center you sit the better your retention rates. So, if you have the choice of a seat in a class, try to select the front row and middle of the room (assuming that is where your teacher stands as you want to be seated close to the speaker). If you cannot be front and center, then your second choice should still be the front row just out from the center. Your next choices from that point would be to continue sitting in the center seats as close to the front as possible, but definitely in the middle. The places to avoid would be the back rows on the outside edges as retention rates in those areas are significantly decreased. In many ways I suspect this probably seems obvious to you as when you are sitting in the front and center, right in front of your teacher, you are less likely to be working on assignments for other classes or to get distracted and doodle or daydream. Even if your teachers assign your seats, if you have trouble paying attention and want to improve your retention rates, consider picking a seat to maximize your retention rates. Also, when you are picking your seat, don’t forget to try to pick a seat that will create additional distractions because it is near your friends.

Summer School

Brochures for the 2011 Worthington Summer School are now available in the counseling center. I believe they will also be distributed to students on Wednesday during homeroom.

There are a lot of changes in store for this year’s summer school. The primary difference is that many courses are no longer being offered in a traditional setting. The only “standard” courses that will be offered will be Speech, Algebra 1, Algebra 2, Geometry, Health, and Wellness 4 Life Level 1 & Level 2. Please be aware that the physical education and speech classes tend to fill up very fast, so if you are interested in taking one of those classes, I strongly recommend signing up soon.

So, if you want or need to take an English, Science, or Social Studies class in summer school, you will need to take it through the online e-school option. Worthington summer school will have this option available for students and you will still attend summer school as you would have previously, but instead of having a teacher stand in front of the class lecturing on the course content, you will now work online to complete the coursework. Teachers will be available to help you as you work through the class.

Summer school will once again take place at Worthington Kilbourne High School and will have two terms – the first term is June 20 to July 8th, with no class on the 4th of July, and the second term will run from July 11 to July 28th. Depending on the class, the time of the class varies from starting at 7:40 and ending at Noon to starting at 8 and ending at 12:30. Please check the summer school brochure for additional information. The cost of summer school is $200.

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.

Each year people ask questions about taking summer school through other schools or districts and this is an option. You can explore the offerings available at other districts or online schools, but please make sure that they are an accredited school as that is the one aspect that is needed in order to have the credits accepted by Worthington.

February Socratic Society

This past Friday 38 Kilbourne students were inducted into the Socratic Society. Students are selected for the Socratic Society based upon their display of the Socratic Core Virtues - scholarship, lifelong learning, compassion, integrity, and personal effort. Students are only eligible to receive this award once throughout their entire high school career. 9 of "my" students were among those honored. Pictured above (Left to Right): Sarah Bechtel, Robbie Davidson, Katy Deibel, Nick Ambrozich, Charlie Bassani, Joey Cipicchio, and Dillon Castelli. Not pictured are Chandler Bridges and Michael Dillow. Congratulations to each of you! I am proud of you!

News and Notes

Hopefully you have all completed your online course selection. If you have not already done so, please login NOW and complete your registration as tomorrow is the final day to select your courses.

If you are not sure how to register, please visit http://www.worthington-portal.org/ and login using your student id and password. You will go to menu, up to my accounts and over to my requests 2011-2012 courses. That will bring up the drop-down boxes for you to be able to pick the classes you want to take next year. Also, don’t forget that you need to select at least 3 alternates in case your first-choice requests do not work.

There will still be time available this month for me to make adjustments and changes to your requests if you change your mind about a class. Additionally, this week I will be meeting individually with each of my freshmen students on February 9th during your global history classes and I will meet with each of my sophomores on February 10th during your BESS classes. Please make sure you bring your completed course recommendation forms with you to these meetings and, if you are going to be a junior next year and would like to request an early release or late arrival, you need to bring your signed release authorization form with you to our meeting.

Don’t forget that we have a late-start day tomorrow… so you get to enjoy sleeping in again! :-) Looking ahead at the week, we will be on a 3A/ 3B assembly schedule on Tuesday. Wednesday and Thursday I will be booked all day with the individual meetings with freshmen and sophomores and Friday I will be out of the building all day for a meeting at central office that was re-scheduled from the ice days.

Speaking of the ice days, the 2nd look day that was scheduled for students to make another visit to the Delaware Area Career Center has been rescheduled for this Thursday, February 10th. Please see Mrs. King in the counseling center if you have any questions about the field trip.

Creating Good

Did you see today's Columbus Dispatch? On the front page of the Arts/ Life section there is a story written by Cathy Corcoran. Cathy is Ben Corcoran's mom. As you likely recall, Ben was a 2010 WKHS graduate who died on October 19th. His mom has been working to create good out of her family's personal tragedy. Nothing will bring back her son, but she is striving to reach out to others with Ben's story so that other families do not have to experience the same pain and heartache that she has endured. Take a moment to read the story and remember that if you or one of your friends is in need of help, please come and talk to me or another adult that you trust.

Welcome Mrs. Day

Some of you have already had the opportunity to meet Mrs. Day, but I wanted to officially welcome her to the WKHS Counseling Center team. Mrs. Day has started this semester as a counseling intern. She will be working in our department with the Kilbourne students, parents, and staff for the next year. Initially she will be at WKHS one day a week (Tuesdays) and then, before the year ends and next fall, she will be in the building most days. She is excited to meet and work with you and because it is such a joy and an honor to work with all of you each day, I know that she will have a great experience at Kilbourne. I hope you will join me in welcoming Mrs. Day!

Sleep In!

As you have hopefully already heard, we have a 2 hour delay tomorrow. They have had a difficult time trying to get the ice off the parking lots and sidewalks. I hear that some of you are still without power and that makes me cold just thinking about it. I hope you are staying warm and that you are doing OK with the power outages. Please be careful when you do venture back to school tomorrow!

Co-curricular Eligibility

As you selection your courses online, please be sure that you double check and make sure you are taking enough classes to be eligible to participate in athletics and other co-curricular activities. (Remember, any school sponsored activity that involves competition requires you to be eligible. So this includes band, choir groups, Mock Trial, In the Know, Dance Team, etc.)

All freshman, sophomore, and junior students should plan to take at least 6 classes each semester. All seniors that are on track for meeting their graduation requirements can decrease the total number of courses each semester due to the demands of other requirements such as college and scholarship applications, but should still plan to take at least 5 classes each semester.

In order to be eligible you must PASS at least 5 of the half credit courses each quarter. If you are signing up to take a Wellness for Life (formerly Phys Ed) course, you need to remember that these classes are only worth .25 credits so they do not count in the courses needed for co-curricular eligibility.

If you have questions about eligibility, please stop in the co-curricular office or to see me for additional clarification.

No School Again

We have another day off due to the icy weather! Enjoy being able to sleep in and please be careful today if you venture out to scrape off your car or if you have to go anywhere. Remember, you can be productive today by completing your online registration for next year's classes. Also, in case you were curious, the Curriculum Night which was supposed to be last night, has been rescheduled for tomorrow night, Thursday, February 3rd.

Financial Aid Help

Don't forget that deadlines are real - especially regarding college applications and scholarship/ financial aid deadlines. Most schools have FAFSA deadlines of February 15 to March 1st. (Some will be earlier - for example, Vanderbilt's deadline is February 5th and some will be later, like Duquesne's May 1st deadline.) Be sure to check with your college(s) of choice to make sure that you submit your FAFSA before their deadline.

Completing the FAFSA forms can be intimidating for some students and their families. I wanted to be sure that you were aware that free help is available. College Goal Sunday is a free workshop where you will have expert help from Ohio college financial aid representatives to complete and submit your FAFSA forms. Ohio College Goal Sunday is held across the nation on Sunday, February 13th. Sign in starts at 1:30 and the workshop begins at 2:00. There are three locations in Franklin County - DeVry University, OSU, and Gahanna Lincoln High School. It is also being held in Delaware County at the OSU-Delaware Center. You will be working on the computers and completing the actual online FAFSA forms during these workshops. It is necessary to register in advance. The list of materials you should bring with you include: Your IRS 1040 tax return and W-2’s, your parent’s IRS 1040 tax return and W-2’s, your social security card and driver’s license, and any other benefit and income information.

In addition, OSU is offering FAFSA Completion Workshops to assist students and families and you do NOT need to be considering or applying to OSU to attend one of these sessions. These sessions are being offered at the OSU-Delaware Center for an hour and can be scheduled between 5:30 and 8:30pm. Available dates for these sessions are Monday, February 7th, Wednesday, February 9th and Sunday February 13th. Advance registration is required and you can register by visiting the OSU Marion website or calling them at 740-725-6242.

Ice Day!

No school today due to the weather! :-) Enjoy the day off!