Harmony Newsletter

Feb 18 - PTA Meeting @5:45 PM

Feb 18 - 6th Grade Cornerstone Awards Night (7 PM)

Feb 19 - 7th Grade Cornerstone Awards Night (7 PM)

Feb 19 - WHS Curriculum Night for current 8th grade (7 PM)

Feb 19 - 8th Grade Cornerstone Awards Night (8 PM)

March 19 - 8th Grade to WHS to Visit (9:30 to 1:30)

School Website Link

Please periodically review these "Safety Scenarios" with your children. Contact names are below for any questions.

• School Security Officer, (SSO), Josh Stillwell (joshua.stillwell@lcps.org)
• School Resource Office (SRO), Loudoun County Deputy Chris Salter (christopher.salter@loudoun.gov)
• 7th Grade Dean and School Safety Contact, Justin Dailey (justin.dailey@lcps.org)
• Principal, Eric Stewart (eric.stewart@lcps.org)

School Phone is 540-751-2500 (then dial zero to reach the main office)

Three Harmony teachers received the below communication from the president of the Virginia Middle School Association (VMSA):

"Thank you so much for submitting a proposal to VMSA for our conference. We are excited to share that your proposal has been accepted. All session this year will be breakout sessions (40-45 minutes)."

Congratulations Lynne Gianelos, Emily Eden, and Julie Thompson.

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Week of: Feb 10

Parents,

New apps and other resources are becoming more and more available. As educators work on guidelines for using AI for students and staff, we also hope parents can be educating themselves as to what is already available, especially if kids have their own phones. They can do A LOT. Check some out if interested.

• “Napkin AI” – type this name in your laptop and paste some work you’ve done. Then use the tools to convert content into a graphic organizer. An example to help you visualize is that you can paste in a "meeting agenda" and it will create an organized picture from it.

• Claude, Copilot, Gemini, ChatGPT, and others can help make lesson plans, assessments, and find and compare information.

• “Beautiful AI” – creates slide decks and fancy presentations.

• “NotebookLM” has the ability to create a podcast.

• Chat GPT now has the ability to do an immediate (real time) language translator.

• In Chat GPT – There is a new “Canvas Functionality” that allows you to target key words or paragraphs and then let’s ChatGPT comment on it. A sample is writing a research paper on any subject and asking ChatGPT to review it “as if you were a college professor.” It will then highlight certain areas and offer suggestions. You can then go back and change your paper to improve. That has use for staff and students.

• Maybe the most amazing, ChatGPT has a new feature where it can watch you through your phone and give you real time advice on techniques and such. An example is someone said they didn’t know how to make coffee. They set up the video on their phone, shared the view with others at that tables and then they all had a live coffee making class, basically facilitated by ChatGPT. That was amazing. The real person even asked for specific feedback which was immediately answered.
• We hope us adults can master these as the kids are so we can help them make good choices.

Update of our hockey team: From last game, "It was a nail biter! They were up 2-0 in the 1st period and things looked good. A few penalties let in a couple goals and the battle back and forth in the 3rd began. Ultimately, they lost 4-3 in the last minute of the game. We’ll get ‘em next game."

They are now 2 - 3 - 1 this season and remaining games are:

February 21 - 7:00 PM @ Ion

February 28 - 9:20 PM @- Ashburn Ice

March 3 - 8:00 PM @ Ashburn Ice

March 6 - 8:20 PM @ Ashburn Ice

She was 1 of 18 selected from across the Commonwealth.

Many kids and staff have noticed the beautiful and educational bulletin boards for Black History Month in the hallway, decorated by our Equity Contact, Ms. Chelsey Mattingley. One staff member said, "I was wondering who’s been doing these AWESOME bulletin boards in the halls. Just learned it’s Chelsey Mattingley! I didn’t know she was that artistic. What a labor of love. She definitely deserves a shout-out in your next newsletter."

Thank you for sharing Cori and thank you for the great job Chelsey on the bulletin boards.

Here is a slideshow of photos from the Student vs. Staff basketball game. It has also been showing on the small TV in the library.

In the photo inset, Makayla had just sunk a 3-pointer and look how happy she and her teammate (Cayden) were. 😊

Recently, the school had an Accountability Audit as part of the National School Lunch Program Accountability Review. Congratulations on our success. Much can be attributed to the accurate procedures from our cafeteria staff and manager, Nancy James.

The comments included this rewarding compliance quote, "Nancy and her team do a great job. All inventory (was) dated, FIFO (are) followed, and temperature logs are up to date."

We love feel good stories and just found out that 6th grader, Liam Bundick, is being coached by Harmony alum and older brother, "DJ."'

DJ is coaching Liam and other students from Harmony for the 6th Grade Travel Basketball team as its Head Coach. He gave up his senior year of playing basketball at WHS to coach the 6th grade travel boys and they are currently ranked 2nd in the league.

This weekend they play cross town rival Blue Ridge MS.The game is this Sunday. DJ, by the way, has been accepted to PSU, JMU, UNCW, VT, Shepherd and CNU!

Next month is Youth Art Month! Save the date for Family Arts Night on March 19 from 6-8 PM.

In preparation for our annual art show, the Art Department is looking for parent volunteers to help during the school day the last week of February with mounting and displaying student artwork throughout the school building. We will be showcasing hundreds of artworks in celebration of Youth Art Month. Please see the attached link to volunteer with the art show display:

Volunteer Sign-Up. https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0F4BA8AF28A0F85-artshow#/

Parents, if you are an artist and are interested in participating as a guest artist at our event on March 19, please respond to this email for more information. Volunteers will also be needed at Family Arts Night; a Signup Genius will be emailed out closer to the date.

Allie Eicholtz made the USA Softball 15U National Team and she’ll have the opportunity to represent the USA in Mexico in the Pan American Championship Games and the WBSC World Cup in Italy. There are only 16 girls across the country at this age group who made the team, so this is unique!

USA! USA! USA! USA!

Last weekend, over 50 Harmony students attended the All District Chorus event at Rock Ridge HS. They spent the day Friday learning songs and getting tips and ideas from a special choral director (this year from Texas).

Together, with students from other Loudoun County Middle Schools, our kids practiced several songs for one finale performance on Saturday that parent, Mr. Todd Buterbaugh, said was "outstanding." Kids had fun and were tired but learned a lot. What a wonderful opportunity for them. Thank you teachers, Ms. Lisa Washington and Mr. Hart Wells.