Chagrin Falls PTO

Art by Julia Englehart, Grade 8. Presented at the 2010 Art Show.

The Middle School report was read by Gwenn Klose.

• Art Show Winners – Congratulations to the high school and middle school art departments for organizing the art show at Hamlet.  Our students had amazing pieces in that show.  Congratulations to Dana Savakis, our middle school purchase award winner, and Devon Riegel, our honorable mention.

• Power of the Pen– Congratulations to Devon Riegel and Samantha Spear who will be representing Chagrin Falls Middle School in state Power of the Pen competition.  Larry Richmond has served as their coach this year and the students have done a great job.

• Achievement testing – Middle school students participated in statewide testing during the last week of April.  All our students worked very hard.  Thank you to the PTO and the board of education for providing ice cream sundaes as a reward for the students’ hard work.  The middle school also sponsored a skating party as a celebration for completing the week of testing.

• Class trips – Our eighth graders traveled to Washington, DC on May 10-12.  The trip was a great experience for all the students and the behavior was exceptional.  Seventh grade students traveled to Cleveland on May 13 for an extended day trip.  We visited the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, science museum, took a tour on Lolley the Trolley, and spent the evening at the playhouse watching “Grease”.

• Rolling Thunder – A group of Vietnam Veterans visited our eighth grade classes on May 14 to discuss the war in Vietnam and their experiences as soldiers and veterans.  This was a follow up activity of our trip to DC.

• New Staff Members – Welcome to Mr. Curtis Howell who will be moving from Gurney to the middle school next year.  He will be teaching science and math.  We are currently interviewing for a new Algebra I teacher who will be splitting their time between the high school and the middle school.  We are so excited about the new additions to our already great staff!!

• Literacy Day – We are looking forward to our Literacy Day on May 25.  We have two visiting authors presenting that day.  The students are currently working on books to present to Gurney book buddies.  Gurney 2^nd and 3^rd graders will be traveling to the middle school in the morning.  Each of our students will read their book to the elementary students and the elementary students will read their favorite book to our middle school students.

• Congratulations to Mr. Todd Thombs who has been given the Outstanding Mathematics Professional Award by the Greater Cleveland Council of Teachers of Mathematics.

• A big thank you to the PTO for the great luncheon during Teacher Appreciation Week.

• A huge thank you to Mary Donley, Laura Fricke, and Becky Borden for being the middle school PTO reps this year.  They have done an outstanding job and we have all benefited from their work!!

The Middle School report was presented by Laura Fricke.

• We held an after- OAT Sundae Celebration this month.
  • Held on Wed., April 28^th
  • Thanks to our guest scoopers Board of Education members Mary Kay O’Toole, Anne Thomas, Karen Wise &  Liz O’ Neil

• Teacher Appreciation
  • MS Hospitality provided a Fiesta lunch on Friday, May 7^th
  • Many thanks to our AWESOME Hospitality co-chairs Karen Ostanek & Jill Andrews and their committee members for a great year!

• Internet Safety Presentation/Discussion
  • Thursday May 20^th, 7:00pm in the MS library
  • Encore presentation to the parents of what their MS student recently learned
  • Open to all Chagrin parents

• MS Literacy Day
  • Tuesday May 25, 2010
    • 8:20-10:50 am
    • Gurney 2^nd & 3^rd graders will visit the MS and share a book & snack with a 7^th/8^th grader
  • Organized by the MS Library Staff, Lori & Amy
  • Volunteer support provided by PTO

• 8^th Grade Promotion
  • Ice Cream Social, DVD and Dance Committees are hard at work
  • Large photos featuring 8^th grade students will be for sale by silent auction at promotion. You can preview these photos here on the PTO website.

More art from the Spring Art Show. Hope you didn't miss it!

The Intermediate School report was presented by Amy Acton.

• Thank-you to the PTO for the teacher appreciation lunches and for the financial grants to help the school.

• Sarah Reed has been nominated for Rotary Teacher of the Year.  Good luck!

• It is our hope that all parents will use Progress Book as an aid in communication about assignments, homework and student grades.  Please take the time to look at Progress Book on a regular basis.  If you have any questions, please contact your teacher or Mr. Murphy.

• Concert Season/Art Show:   Our staff and students did an outstanding job with this year’s spring concerts and art show.  Ms. Riley with the help of many volunteers, thank you, had a beautiful art show for everyone to enjoy.  Our fifth and sixth grade band, orchestra and select choir sounded great under the direction of Pay Haynish, Kathy Shoenfelt and David Clare.  (Editor’s note:  See an excerpt from a concert in the short video above.  They sounded great!)

• Candy Grams :  PAWS (People Always Willing to Serve) which is our student service learning group just finished a project called Candygrams.  The Candygram sale raised $392.75 for Autism Speaks.  PAWS also sold tie dye shirts during the art show. This sale raised $680, which will be donated to the Red Cross for Haiti relief.

• Science Days
  • Barb Currey sponsored and organized a 4th and 5^th Grade Science Day on two different days.  Thank you to all the parent volunteers for coming in and helping.  It was amazing!  Students did a variety of activities and experiments to investigate sound, electricity, pressure, motion, and physical and chemical changes.  The children learned a lot and it was a ton of fun!

• End of Year Activities :  Thank you for all your help with the following end of year activities:   Talent Show, Cook out,  Field Day,  Awards Assembly,  Clap-out,  Slide Show
• Assembly:  Thank you for the whole school assembly on May 11 in the morning with the dance company from New York.  It was a very entertaining and motivating for our students.  It was important for them to see the tie between the arts and academics.
• Student Council:  Student council is organizing a blood drive in conjunction with the American Red Cross.  We had our kick-off assembly on April 30 and the drive is May 21, 2010.

• The City Project:  The Acton/McHugh annual City project for their 4^th grade classes in well underway. You can check it out at our city project online.

• Upcoming Dates
  • May 20: Grades 5-12 Strings
  • Festival in PAC
  • • May 26: 6th Grade Visits Middle
  • School in AM, Career Day in PM
  • • May 28: NO SCHOOL for K-6
  • ONLY
  • • May 31: Memorial Day
  • NO SCHOOL
  • June 3: Third Graders visit CFIS
  • • June 4: Fifth Grade goes bowling
  • 11:00 AM-2:00 PM
  • Sixth Grade Dance
  • 7:00-9:30 PM
  • • June 7: Field Day & Slide Show
  • • June 8: Last Day of School
  • 1:15 Dismissal
  • Awards Assembly/Talent
  • Show/Cookout

CFIS PTO Report

The Intermediate School report was presented by Jen Bencko.

• We will be distributing the spirit wear orders on Wed. May 26^th from 6-8 at the REC center.  This is a change in date due to the delay in the delivery of a couple of items.  All that ordered were notified via email and phone calls of the change.  We had an additional 30 orders this sale.  Some items are still available to purchase-contact Debbie Weber with questions
• Field day and the end-of-the-year cookout are right around the corner.  We’re looking for tricycles- contact Lorna Nafzinger if you have one to donate/ let us borrow.
• On May 11^th the IS students were treated to performance by the Jim Linehan Dance Group.  The performance was very well received by the kids.  Would definitely consider this group again and recommend it to others. (You can see video of this group in last month’s CFIS PTO report.)
• The IS celebrated teacher appreciation day on May 5^th.  Jill Andrews pulled together yet another wonderful luncheon.  Thank you Jill.
• Volunteer forms for beginning of the year help (CFIS) (104) and committee chairs for 2010-2011 (CFIS) (181) were sent in the most recent newsletter and hard copies followed the following week.  Responses are very slow in coming back.  We will resend the electronic copy in this month’s newsletter.   Download and send them in to school OR by email if you can scan and attach.   (Editor’s Note:   If you are computer savvy, you can help us test our new online form system at the Acrobat.com site by downloading and filling out our Beginning of the Year Help At CFIS form.  Once you have downloaded the form to your computer, you can fill it out and submit your responses to our PTO account electronically.   All you need is any version of an acrobat reader on your computer.  Give it a try.  If this works, it could help us limit paper forms. )