Congress Cougars,

We are strapped in and ready to roll into May as we finish the month of April. Once we turn the corner, it's like we are on a roller coaster, anticipating the initial drop but loving the upside-down twirls and speed, causing our eyes to water and our stomachs to turn inside out. Our students are excited about all the past and upcoming field trips, All-School Lip-Dub Assemble, the 8th Grade Celebration, and our MAP incentive celebration. We have several important announcements. I will prepare a May newsletter, but I had to share some essential things before May.

Below you will see our MAP Testing schedule, and we need your help to provide your students with the necessities required to promote a prepared testing environment. We would love to offer our students snacks for those who missed breakfast or seem to be famished. At this time, we do not have the means to provide. However, if you want to donate towards MAP TESTINGS PREPAREDNESS, drop your contribution off at the school, and we will use it all.

Unfortunately, our students have struggled with inconsistencies in several content areas due to staffing absences. While we do not minimize or challenge the reason for the many absences, we look for opportunities to make up missed concepts but realize we may not get to each unit. I understand our students love their summer months to themselves and their families, but this year may be an excellent opportunity to take a summer school class. Please check the information below for more details.

Parents, as we enter the last month of school, please know we need your help communicating with your student's appropriate school behavior. We encourage our students to be self and peer advocates, and if they notice something or feel something needs to be reported, please see the Sprigeo information at the bottom of this newsletter on how to make a report.

Finally, thank you for all your support to Congress Middle School. We are excited about Staff Appreciation Week, sponsored by our wonderful PTA. If you still want to donate, please use the Sign-Up Gensis. Let us all find comfort in knowing that if we have the will to succeed, we can reach beyond the stars.

-Dr. Smith

The district Art Festival will be Saturday, April 22, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday, April 23, from noon to 4 p.m. at Park Hill South High School, inside the main and auxiliary gyms and cafeteria. Artwork from student artists from kindergarten through 12th grade across the district will be on display. Everyone is welcome to attend.

The festival includes a Scholarship Silent Auction featuring original works of art in a variety of media created by district art teachers and alums. All the proceeds from the auction go directly to the Park Hill Fine Arts Scholarship, which is presented to any Park Hill High, Park Hill South or LEAD student who is graduating and pursuing a degree in fine arts.

PHHS teachers Jamie Littich and Michael Sweney are coordinating this year’s event.

Have a case of the Mondays? Take making dinner off your list and head to Panda Express for Congress Day! 20% of sales goes back to the school from 11am-9pm today! You can order on pandaexpress.com or the App. Just enter code 349374. If you're going in person just show the flyer on your phone.

The staff at Congress Middle School go above and beyond every day, and this is our chance to show how much we appreciate all their hard work this year!

Please review the available slots and click on the button to sign up.

Please drop your donations off at the front office by the date specified for each slot.

Please drop off perishable items on the exact day specified. Thank you

Our PTA ROCKS!!.

We are sending our thoughts of encouragement to Ralph Yarl, his family, and the entire North Kansas City School District. Our students have watched, listened, talked about this incident, and expressed concern. Several students wanted to demonstrate advocacy on behalf of Ralph related to this unfortunate event.

Ralph Yarl formerly attended Gerner and Hawthorn Elementary, and if his family had remained in Park Hill School District, he would have attended Congress Middle School. He is currently attending Staley High School, and while we do not know his medical condition, we do know he has a long road to recovery, which we know could have been a different outcome!

Ralph has a strong circle of support from his family and our local community, with even national support. As updates become more widely available, we want to ensure that all of you know how to get help for yourselves and your students as needed. If any of our students report that they are overwhelmed, feel they need to be in a safe location or talk about the event, please know our Care Team will be available to meet with students.

We are looking for Ralph to overcome any injury associated with this situation and soon use his voice to share his testimony of how he made it over! Our media specialist, Marianne Curtis, reached out with a great idea to encourage Ralph. We purchased three cards for students to write encouraging messages of hope to Ralph as he is recovering. Please see the mile of love our students mailed to Ralph last week.

Congress Families,

In the upcoming weeks, May 1 - 18, your child will be taking the Missouri Assessment Program (MAP) End of Course Assessment (EOC). During this time frame, the district will be administering tests to students who have completed the courses of Algebra I, English Language Arts II, Biology, and Government. The specific tests taken by your student will depend on his/her enrolled course.

The EOC test will be given to students who have completed requisite courses and will be administered in-person completely online. The EOCs are challenging tests that measure whether students are learning what is expected of them in the defined courses. Performance on the EOC is used by the state and federal government to determine if schools are making progress toward their achievement goals, but state accountability is not the only reason Park Hill administers these assessments.

It is our aim to ensure that the education we provide results in high achievement for each of our students and schools. Teachers and administrators use results from these tests to help your child learn and to make critical classroom, school, and districtwide decisions that are intended to increase achievement for all students.

Congress Middle School will be testing the following days:

Please see our schedule below.

There are some things you can do to help your child do well on these tests including:

• Make sure your child is well rested and eats breakfast each day of testing.
• Make sure your child attends school and arrives on time on testing days.
• Please do not interrupt the testing environment with early pickups.
• Prepare your students to place cell and all electronics is there lockers during the test time.
• Speak positively about the test. Your attitude is contagious.
• Encourage your child to have a positive attitude about tests and to listen closely to test instructions.
• Other parent information put out by the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education about the EOC can be found at: https://dese.mo.gov/college-career readiness/assessment/end-course

Results of the assessments will be shared with parents when the district receives them. If you have questions concerning these assessments, please contact your child’s counselor.

Our annual online verification and residency process for returning students opens today. Using our quick and easy online application system, parents of returning students will verify their students' demographic, health, emergency contact and residency information.

And like last year, enrollment in our summer school programming will be available through the online verification and residency process.

It's here! Congress PTA's Panda Express DAY! From 11am-9pm 20% of sales goes back to our school! Plan on a yummy dinner you don't have to make and consider spreading the word around your office too since this offer is good through lunch time! You can order on pandaexpress.com or the App. Just enter code 349374. If you're going in person just show the flyer on your phone.

8th grade Families:

We are looking forward to a beautiful 8th-grade celebration on May 22nd. We also look forward to our 8th-grade students enjoying themselves with an educational day at Worlds of Fun. We understand a few parents have concerns with the recent Worlds of Fun activity, which is unfortunate, but we are heading to the park with peace, knowing that our students will be on their best behavior.

We know that it is not the objective of Worlds of Fun to encourage unsafe behaviors, and just like going to any other public place, we all have a responsibility to conduct ourselves accordingly. As soon as we get our final count of students participating, we will provide our families with the ratio of students to chaperone.

Parents cannot attend this trip with their students, and the park will be closed to the public. Students must be checked out at the school to ensure the safety of all. If students have appointments, they should refrain from participating, as we will not release them early from the park.

Park admission tickets will not be sold at the door. Tuesday morning, we will purchase the tickets for our students. If you have yet to submit the information for your student, we have no choice but to assume your student will not participate in the Worlds of Fun experience.

Finally, Suppose a student fails to conduct themselves accordingly and needs to be removed. In that case, a school administrator or designee will pick the student up from the park and return to Congress.

We will frequently use our social media to send out reminders about important events and to share important information. Please like our Facebook page and follow us on Twitter for updates.

Dear Congress Familiy,

Summer school registration is now open! This is a quick reminder that guardians can register their incoming kindergarten through eighth grade students for summer school through the same process used to complete online verification and residency. Incoming high schoolers can enroll in summer school using the form on our website.

Park Hill Summer School is an excellent opportunity for your child during the summer. Our summer school program gives students a free, fun, caring place to continue learning. Find all the details, including dates, times and locations on our website: https://www.parkhill.k12.mo.us/families/summer-school.

Thank you for considering being part of our Park Hill summer programming!

Our employees are the reason we are so successful here at Congress Middle School and the Park Hill School District, and the Park Hill School District would like to recognize us for all we do for our students.

The Park Hill Star award is awarded monthly to any staff member in the school district. Anyone can nominate an employee for this award by using the form below. In addition, please send a note of encouragement to our Congress Staff, letting them know you care.

Sometimes, negative comments are made directly to our staff members or posted on social media. We want to change that narrative! We want the positive vibes to outweigh the negative vibes. Please vote for one of our staff members or send a kind note to staff members for the entire month of December.

We created Sprigeo so people would feel safer at school. When a person really needs help or there is a safety threat at school we hope you will step up and send in a report. Sending in a false report makes it harder for your school to help the people who really need it. If necessary you can contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255. You can find out more about Sprigeo and the School District Safety Evaluation at Sprigeo.com. Thanks for using Sprigeo!

If you feel unsafe or know someone who feels unsafe, please report it here. After you fill out the form below, Sprigeo sends an email to a school administrator with all of the details from your report. You can also download one of our apps from the Apple Store or the Android Marketplace to submit a report.

Please report:

• Safety threats, bullying, harassment or intimidation at school
• Safety threats, bullying, harassment or intimidation outside of school
• Cyberbullying; Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, etc.
• Fights, drugs, alcohol or weapons at school
• Friends who talk about hurting themselves