Hello USD116 family and friends! 2020 is off to a great start and there are many new memories in the making as we get closer to the end of an epic school year.
Before we discuss any upcoming events, I’d like to thank everyone who came out to Urbana High School for the Course Selection Information Night and the Incoming Freshman Orientation Night. Many families took advantage of the opportunity to meet and speak with counselors and UHS staff. We hope these events provided helpful information to support smooth transitions for our incoming 8th graders and current UHS students.
As Black History Month gets off to a strong start, there are several Black History events upcoming across the District. The first is National African American Parent Involvement Day (NAAPID) this Monday, February 10. NAAPID is a day set aside for parents to visit their children’s schools, volunteer, talk with teachers, or just be there to support their children’s experiences. I hope to see many of you as I travel around to each school throughout the day! Across the District, our schools will be filled with volunteers from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) as they engage in activities with parents and students. Our schools will also be hosting family-centered events, like Pastries with Parents, parent involvement luncheons, and performances. To view the full list of activities happening during NAAPID, please click here!
On February 14, 2020, USD116 will also be hosting our annual Winter Institute, a day for our staff to gather and attend staff development sessions. It is a time for us to sharpen our skills to support the professional growth of our teachers, support staff, and administrators through open discussions, collaboration, and advice from professionals in our field. For this year’s Winter Institute, on Valentine’s Day, our guest speakers include many of our very own staff as well as several outside guest speakers. Our main guest speaker this year is Dr. Todd Whitaker, author of “Teaching Matters,” and several other educational publications. He is one of the nation’s leading authorities on motivation and leadership effectiveness and a professor of educational leadership at Indiana State University. While our Winter Institute is typically closed to the public, we will be going live on Facebook that morning to broadcast Dr. Whitaker’s session. We have also invited our “Better Together” partners to join us for Dr. Whitaker’s keynote address about motivating and inspiring yourself. We could all use an uplifting message about being our best, so make sure you stay plugged into our social media for the live details!
In the next few weeks, we will also be kicking off our first strategic planning engagement opportunity! We will continue to utilize a digital tool called ThoughtExchange to help us gather your confidential thoughts. With ThoughtExchange, all of you will be able to take part in our strategic planning process from the comfort of your own home. This month, I will send out a link via email and our social media platforms that you can click to get started. The link will allow you to share your thoughts, see the thoughts of others and rate them so we can determine what thoughts/opinions are most important to the USD116 community. These confidential thoughts will allow us to prioritize as we move forward in our planning. I am excited about moving forward with this process so please be on the lookout for the ThoughtExchange link and take a few minutes to participate.
Before I close out this month’s blog as always, I’d like to shoutout to some outstanding students and student groups who’ve done great things. UHS Theatre has been awarded by the International Thespian Festival produced by the Educational Theatre Association for their achievement in performing arts! The group is looking to join nearly 5000 high school drama students this summer in a week-long workshop led by industry leaders and Broadway professionals. To get there, the students are accepting donations through Venmo and GoFundMe, so please show your support! I’d also like to shoutout UHS student and girls basketball player from the Lady Tigers, Chian Scott for eclipsing the 1,000 point total in January. Several UHS students were awarded scholarships for being outstanding young leaders and innovators in their community during the annual Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Celebration at Krannert. Congrats to the many elementary students recognized by the University of Illinois at the MLK Creative Writing contest. Thank you to you all for constantly raising the bar and making Urbana the best place to be!
Have an amazing February and thank you for helping make #UrbanaBetterTogether!