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2024 - 2025 Academic Calendar Selection Information Session

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again thank you for joining us this evening we're going to be talking about our twenty-four twenty-five calendar options I am Eugene Bellamy Junior the digital platform coordinator for County School District and I was charged with cherry this committee this is the first of four virtual sessions that we will host I mean you will hear me reiterate throughout our time together that we do encourage all commute stakeholders weather's teachers parents I'm all the community-at-large because all of them have a voice in this decision to attend one of these information sessions prior to voting on the calendar option for next school year we we play some recording of this for those who can attend our who choose not to attend one of our open sessions will place a recording of this on our district website so that individuals can go and review the information that is shared so that we can make informed decisions about our calendar for next school year just a quick agenda we will do an about us a quick review I'm go over state requirements do a general overview of the options share how parents and Community stakeholders can help our students be successful and give some announcements and updates from the district until Jasper County School District is a Small World School District located in gas County Schools we have about 20 in Jasper County South Carolina we have about 2,700 students across two campuses both campuses are K-12 campuses with us having two elementary schools in 26 12 secondary campuses we also have a cake center located on originally campus that host 8 Pathways career Pathways and we still have our partnership with Beaufort County with bja that offers 14 Pathways for our schools elementary schools in the Middle School fax number secondary schools are Title One according to the 2020 census Jasper County has about 29,000 people and about 10300 households it is a pronoun Lee White County with a 5.8 white 40.88 black or African American 18 American Indian and Alaska neighbors and Asian when 1% native Hawaiian other Pacific Islander and 1.162 or more races of that population 13.9% are Hispanic or Latino Or Hispanic or Latino of any race and those who are 25 years plus when we talked about education level 81.8% have high school diplomas or higher and 17.8% have master's degrees or higher the vision statement and mission statement for Jasper County that was decided upon and the 2122 school year was Jasper Scholars today's Learners tomorrow's leaders and jcsd cultivates an environment of Excellence through innovation inspiration and opportunities in partnership with the community at that time the team who worked on the the vision and mission statement along with our strategic plan identify the following beliefs we believe that effective communication Jason and productive teamwork promote success we believe in building Community Partnerships for the growth and success of our students We Believe Excellence is the only option we believe in embracing diversity and meeting the needs for all and we believe that educating children is our most important work apparently this is our school board we are governed by nine board members Miss Priscilla green currently serves as I board chair and dr. Rochelle Anderson serves as our superintendent of schools currently in our schools Hardeeville elementary school has approximately 665 students Richland Elementary 744 Hardeeville junior senior High School 626 Ridgeland secondary Academy of Excellence 656 of that population 1111 approximately African-American approximately 1375 Hispanic smitley 190 Caucasian approximately 5 Asian and approximately 28 mixed race or the other and so we have in a Roman are between 269 and 2691 students in 2709 students of warehousing around at 2700 Walmart that we mentioned earlier inside one of the things that I wanted to do prior to talk about our academic options this year is revisit the shift to modified and the pro does that we went through to get to this space for choosing a modified calendar the first year that we did modify what's the 2122 school year and that was again the first year that we ship there and then we had 22-23 to modify calendar option so there was no traditional option at that time and at the time I board consistent pretty much of the same individuals with the exception that Miss Louise Rollins was serving in District Six edit time we review the requirements and considerations for my state department and also things that we thought about within our district as a related to State Testing program and the impact that it would have on our district we look. specific holidays and how many days he wanted to allocate to those Pacific holidays and we have much to discuss about that in creating those calendars we looked at our weather days and then we looked at the start. and to ensure that we were in compliance with state law which says we cannot start before the third Wednesday of the third Monday of August unless you are on a modified calendar and then we looked at personal preferences or a modified calendar things that we need to consider from traditional calendars that we needed to consider for a modified schedule incel we talked about what it meant to be modified and at that time South for South Carolina Greenwood 50 Kershaw Florence one Aiken and McCormick have moved to modify calendars already those were the only districts that have moved them to modify send it with several other dishes considering it including Jasper we shared at that time the pros and cons of a modified calendar based upon the research share facts vs Fiction with the biggest one being that students Were Somehow going to school more days on a modified calendar dinner traditional and so we sat at that time that both calendars have 180 days for students in 190 days teachers just how that looks over the course of the Year this is a little bit different we talked about why we were considering the modified for Jasper County at that time and again we we we spent more time talking about the differences between traditional and modified we gave an outline of what the brakes would look like for additional schedule versus a modified schedule and then we talked about our district initiatives and thinks that would be impacted from shifting to a traditional to a modified calendar then we had a frequently asked questions that year we were fortunate enough to be able to do some face-to-face sessions and as we were doing those sessions and the questions that we were asked we did post to our website questions that were asked in the district's response to those questions at the time I remember we were still coming out of covid at that time 22 23 would have been second four-year back in school for students and so there was still some things that we needed to consider and making that decision and so now it gets me to the place where we're going to talk about the academic calendar options for this for next school year for Jasper County we're going to review both calendar options share the impacts on our district stakeholders provide details regarding collecting survey data and future meetings again we're going to look both at the modified and traditional calendar mom and talk about that survey availability and next step before I did that I did want to share what I how I District calendar committee was comprised we did reach out to all of our principals and ask that they gather a combination of stakeholders to do the calendars prior to us presenting it to the public to ensure that we had several voices at the table prior to us presenting these calendars the bulk of our committee as you can see where students I'm within our school and they met with an administrator with in their building the administrative share the calendars with them and they have some great dialogue and and we have documented feedback from each of those sessions with students, does not a part of this presentation butter anybody would like to hear what I students had to say in our teachers and those individuals who met with us if you would like any feedback on what they had to say I'll be more than happy to provide that to anyone cuz we do have that transcribed but we had 90 pull in total participate on our calendar committee and I've included that list of names by school so that the community can see that we did have a subgroup of individuals within our district the two calendars and provide us feedback prior to presenting it to our public It's always important that we share the data that informs any decision that we make this is public information I can be found on our department of education's website but just wanted to share where I can schools currently are with the state report cards Hardeeville elementary school has a 40 which is below average risen Elementary a 45 which is the average party Junior High School at 52 which is good reason secondary Academy of Excellence the Middle School portion A35 which is below average Hardeeville Senior High School in 47 which is below average and reason secondary Academy of Excellence which is unsatisfactory as we are making decisions in our district we do have a strategic plan and they're seven tenets primarily of our strategic plan one focusing on kindergarten on Focus on Elementary by focusing on metal one on high one under gifted and talented program one on teacher and administrator quality and one on school climate and this specific document is available on our district website and various locations but these are the areas that we identified the 2122 school year as I areas of focus and if you are I go to a website and you pull out your teeth playing you can look at the specific goals that we have again for kindergarten for elementary which covers 1st 2nd 3rd 4th and 5th grade for Middle School which is grade 6 through 8 or high school which predominately focuses on ilc courses are College and Career Readiness and our graduation rate I gifted and talented program teacher and administrator quality school clothes what does pull directly from my state report card the district gold that was shared with the district by Dr Anderson at the beginning of the year during the week we PB when Jesus return was that there was going to be a focus on teaching and learning with the fact of questioning for improve student outcomes student engagement will be a focus with an emphasis on no less than 50% of students performing in the meets or exceeds category on SE red and of course exams stem with an intentional focus on the Arts targeted social emotional support all schools having an annual report card rating of good or excellent and all report card category will be at a minimum of average width Implement all district initiatives and programs with Fidelity we will not add additional instructional online computerised programs without proper bedding and approval by the superintendent and we will observe instruction give feedback Provide support and Implement needed Improvement plans Improvement is not consistent and so those have been our Focus areas for the year always want to share that the work that we do was a line to State mandate and state statute so what I have shared here is the state or a school calendar this is the school calendar checklist provided by the state I have added the link to the State Department of Education that hosted this particular document I've also added the contact for the state department you can contact about the process that districts are encouraged to take before choosing a calendar and the process that they suggest again recommending our state department only recommends they cannot dictate the message to which we use but they do make recommendations and so when we are looking at and I'm sure I'll get to if there any comments I will jump to those when we get closer to the end I'm cuz I can't see both I'm only on one screen and so I want to try to get through the presentation and then I will honor any questions that you have at that time and so when we're looking at the two calendars that we've created we have gone through the team has gone through to ensure both calendar a and calendar be checks off all the boxes for the state requirement in mandates one of bit of information that I just happened to find as I was looking for those expectations for calendars all the checklist what's the current breakdown in the state of South Carolina for schools and so they are currently sick four districts in the state that are on a modified calendar and let me jump out I see a lot of comments coming through all right there 64 districts on the modify calendar in 12 districts on the traditional calendar for the 2324 school year out of 76 total district and I just wanted to add a reminder that when we shifted to modify my 20 21 22 there were only 1 2 3 4 5 of The District's who were at modified at that time so that number has gone wrong just in two years from 5 to 64 districts throughout the state and again so everybody can have the data to look at themselves I have added the link that you can go to the find the composite school calendars for our entire State and within that document it does have on the each district weather now they are modified and if they are not modified of course that word is not written there but they are currently 64 districts on the modify calendar in 12 District on traditional calendar in our state so now I'm 24. Bob that's what will provide to calendar options a modified and a traditional calendar option our first option is a modify calendar that calendar will range from July 24th to June 4th and I'm sure this is pretty small on your screen but what we have tried to do with this calendar those small numbers on the right side of each calendar is how many instructional days are actually within that week or that Mom and so if add all of those days together you should come up with 180 days the Sark on the the squares around the numbers it's the beginning of a quarter the circles are the end of quarters the circle that look targets are those inclement weather makeup days that are required by the state and then our royal blue numbers are when entering reports will be issue the students the teal numbers are half days for students purple numbers are work days for staff and the gray number with the white lettering is the date that the report cards will be issued the two weeks that were yellow or are weeks of intercession and then the pinkish blocks with the red numbering those are our holidays peace that we have highlighted with in that dish in that key is at the bottom but I did want to share that with you on phase two of that calendar you will see those days those important dates highlighted that primarily are lying to house play the intersection days those report card days the beginning of the quarter the end of the quarter parent teacher conferences PD days those are the days that are specifically outlined option two is a traditional calendar and that runs from August 19th through June 6th and again we have the same color configuration for both calendars the days to shift in this calendar because it is starting later and it excludes intersection dates and then get on Pace to it breaks down important days that are highlighted in color coded within the calendar and so earlier I thought it was important for us to go I can talk about all of the information we review prior to shifting to a modify calendar likewise I think it's important that as we are going are considering shifting back to a traditional calendar and it will be the vote of the community we do talk about some of the pros and cons that will impact our district should we decide to move away from a modified calendar and go back to a traditional calendar so the impact on students and families will be minimal as you know it's just the responsibilities of a to ensure that students are registered and that they start on day one so whether that is the modify calendar in July or the traditional calendar in August that is the extent of the impact on families the other impact I should say on families is that this year if we should back to traditional families will experience a longer summer vacation because they are picking back up to three weeks are two weeks that they currently I'm on the modify calendar are they let me know if they lose I want to change my language the two weeks that are currently embedded within the school year through intercession weeks will now be added back to the end of the calendar for faculty and staff do that does mean that there will be a financial impact as with the modified calendar there is a specific specific dates that are already in our system for the pay. Going back to a traditional calendar means that I found is that will receive their final check for this school year in July the end of July and because we are starting potentially the third week of August on a traditional calendar the next time I faxed and staff will be paid will be sometime in August so there will be nearly a month Gap in pay for our teachers because of how the financial system is structured and if we need more information about that I need to include that in future presentation will be more than happy to meet with our director Finance misses Zimmerman to get the specifics about that but there will be a financial impact on our Falcon staff again in terms of the benefits they will to pick up those additional weeks in summer because they will now shift from intercession to the summer but those are the impacts on our students family stops being staffed again the start of the school year will be slightly different being that modify starts in July and the traditional will start in August and the go with the traditional calendar was to provide an option that was more in line with Beaufort County School District we have heard that Beaufort County is considering the modified next school year so it will be interesting to see how this is that Dynamic does play out as we move forward but right now Buford one of the 12 districts that still want to do this no calendar whereas we have shifted to modify the end of the school year I put a week difference within a couple days or a few days difference in the end of the school year for our students between the traditional and modified calendars into days will only be available for the modified calendar they do not exist in the traditional calendar which means there's a greater. Of time between breaks for our students faculty and staff holiday these are the same for both calendars and then the days before and after winter break and that significant primarily for a high school one of the major things that was brought up when we shifted the modified was ensuring that the first semester and prior to winter break for our high schools on a modified calendar we are able to do that will have 90 days before winter break 90 days after winter break however on the traditional calendar we are not afforded the opportunity to do that because of when we start the school year there will be 81 days of first semester prior to winter break 9 days after winter break and then we have the 90 days of second semester and so those are the big pros and cons of each am I that should be considered in the impacts on our stakeholders change is the only constant in life one's ability to adapt to those changes will determine your success and life and so our goal is to ensure that our students are successful and so how can we help our children be academically successful we have computer-based programs that our students can work on at home we have paper tutoring that's available to all of our students 24/7 for school tutoring after school programs during school interventions and MC assessment on my access writing as well as scheduling conferences with your child's teachers to figure out where they are academically and how you can support them at home if you have not already done we are done this we are encouraging all parents to ensure you have access to parent portal and that you are aware that we have shifted from schoology to my Saltines for assignments and grades and that you are familiar with the classlink Launchpad which is where our students access all of their online tools and resources similarly our teachers are highly encouraged to use might as well for access to all of the programs that we are using within the district this is the dashboard that students and teachers C weekly with class-leading it is single sign-on someone students login to the desktops or laptops they have access to all of their apps with one username and password again we encourage you to be familiar with our get familiar with Microsoft teams PowerSchool Parent Portal as these are places where Grey's in a salmon supposed for students and where you can keep up with your child's academic progress announcements and Updates this week we kicked off the winter diagnostic for already I think that goes through November 30th November 6th through 10th we are having semester 1 High School DLC benchmarks Thursday November 9th 2 to interim report will be issued Monday November 13th and I'm sorry that needs to be changed the board meeting is actually tomorrow night November 8th at the County council chambers in Ridgeland South Carolina again the board the board meeting is actually tomorrow night Wednesday November 8th at the County council chambers Wednesday November 15th at 3 p.m. and Thursday November 16th so that's why we were originally supposed to have our meetings I miss this you know charge it to my mom not to my heart this is are originally we were going to have some Community meetings face-to-face but due to some scheduling conflicts we had to ship them all to Virtual so those meetings on Wednesday November 15th and 16th will be virtual at 3 p.m. again. 5216 they will be virtual at 3 p.m. this coming Thursday we will have another 6 p.m. meeting November 20th through the 24th is our Thanksgiving holiday break for all faculty staff and students November 28th and 30th original Heidi did elementary schools will be going through that car cognia diagnostic reviews November 27th through December 14th we have fountas and Pinnell testing in November 27th through December 4th we have DLC testing for a high school's please contact your child's school for testing calendars also we want to employ you if you are not currently a part of either the school Improvement Council all the parent teacher student Organization for your child School William Floyd to join one or both of those organization so that you can stay in the know on what's happening at your child's School the most important piece for me is I want to say thank you for those who join and I am going to jump out momentarily again in bed any questions that I can respond to but I do want to say thank you for your continued support of Jasper County School District the survey will be posted tomorrow to start accepting votes for next school year again I do in curry those of you who are joining before anybody both have them watch the video once we posted our join us Thursday night or next Wednesday or Thursday afternoon to make an informed decision because the decision that we make doesn't pay all of our stakeholders in various ways I don't want to make sure that we're making the absolute best decision for our Scholars as stated our next meeting will be Thursday November 9th 2023 virtually and the survey will close on December 1st 2023 I know in the past the survey has been kept open for maybe a week or two but this year we want to ensure that we capture as many boys as possible so we're going to keep it up almost to Kohl's and get on December 1st thank you and again stay informed with what's going on in Jasper County for this time I'm going to stop sharing my screen and I am also going to stop recording

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