The Cardinal Way

Last year, out staff members of the week were selected by our students. This year, we are looking for our staff members to nominate each other. If you think there is a staff member who deserves to get recognized, please be sure to fill out this Google Form. The form will be open throughout the year so please remember to nominate our amazing staff members when they go above and beyond!

You will quickly learn that I am a sucker for Simon Sinek clips. This one in particular struck a chord with me as we are starting the year and building new relationships - with each other, with our students, with their families, and perhaps with people outside of SHS. When we are forming these new relationships, the key is to establish trust. I appreciate that Simon states that it cannot be formed overnight. It takes a series of OUR ACTIONS to demonstrate that we can be vulnerable around each other and we are there to support each other. As we look to have our students TRUST us, remember that it will take time and that we will need to do the small actions every day in alignment with our beliefs in order to build that trust.

It is my hope that every single person at SHS can establish trusting relationships with the leadership team and that you know that we love you. Our goal is to make people our priority and to do the small things remarkably well so we can set that foundation of trust.

What are you doing to establish trusting relationships?

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Being a teacher is not just a profession or WHAT you do - it's a calling that requires passion, dedication, empathy, and a commitment to making a positive impace on the lives of others.

Thank you for all that you do for our students, staff, community, and each other!

Ignite-Connect-Empower

• The student services team for tackling dress code issues and setting the expectation early for students.
• The child nutrition staff for serving our students breakfast, lunch, and supper each day.
• All of our staff members and volunteers who helped setup and facilitate our back-to-school open house.
• Our band, athletic department, and James Thorpe for coordinating so we could host the DCI drum corps competition team this past week at SHS.

As part of our Title I work, SHS has partnered with the University of Chicago and the Network for College Success to create a Freshman Success Team. The framework focuses on supporting 9th grade students to improve their couse performance, grade-level on-track rates, and improve college readiness for students. The team attended training this summer to prepare for the work and will meet each Monday during their prep to discuss student data (academic, behavior, and social). We are excited about bulding connections with students and staff through this framework!

The teachers taking on this work are Emily Gearhart, Bri Osburn, Ashley Quinlin, and Tyler Weatherford. Supporting them in the work are Jake Fritz, Kathy Saum, Courtney Lapehn, Renee Buckel, and Matt Weimer.

On Tuesday after school, Jack Williams and Cathee Cullison shared an outstanding presentation on the 14-point grading scale. Their insights and expertise provided clarity on the appropriate usage of the multipliers within the grade scale. Teachers who attended found the presentation to be not only informative but also straightforward and easy to understand.

If anyone wants to talk through how they are utilizing the multipliers for their performance category in Skyward, Jack, Cathee, the instructional coaches, and administrators would be happy to talk through the process with you to ensure the implementation is what you are intending.

Thank you once again to Jack and Cathee for their time and for sharing their valuable knowledge with all our new teachers and instructional coaches.

This week our four instructional coaches, Courtney Worley, Jake Fritz, Ammie Hultman, and Tiffany Grant, began the NIET rubric review cycle for professional development. We reviewed the rubric by analyzing the areas with the highest and lowest scores for SHS last year. Staff members read the descriptors at the 5-level of the rubric to identify why they believed lessons were strong and needing improvement in those specific areas.

Along with the rubric, everyone was able to compete in the cell phone game!

On Thursday evening, SHS opened our doors to our students and their families. They were able to meet school counselors, teachers, our school nurses, administrators, and members of the PTSG and AABC. Families were also given free school supplies, were able to purchase items from the bookstore, received Skyward and Chromebook support, and connected with community partners such as PTEF, CIESC, and Invest Ed. They were also given information about school pictures, yearbook orders, and were assisted by the Cardinal Cadre volunteers.

Thank you to everyone who helped make this evening a successful family engagement event.

On Friday evening students who attended the BACI summer program at SHS had BACI's 13th Annual Research Presentations Day at the University of Indianapolis. At this event, student researchers from the Upward College Summer Scholars Program 2024, under the BACI’s Center for Research, Policy, and Innovation (CRPI – USA) presented their research findings and solution oriented policy action recommendations for stakeholders as the culmination of a 10-week intensive scientific PAR research project.

This year’s topics of research include:

1. College Going Rate Among Burmese-American Students

2. College Persistence Among Burmese-American Students

3. Community Political Participation: Community Status and Strength and Barriers

4. Global Climate Change: Community Awareness and Actions

5. Mental Health: Community's Status on Health and Awareness

6. Social Issue: Parenting Style and shifts in Family Dynamic

7. U.S. Refugee Resettlement Program and Secondary Migration: study of refugee's history, updates, migration processes and migratory patterns and population.

Website: https://www.perryschools.org/sh/
Location: 971 East Banta Road, Indianapolis, IN, USA
Phone: 317-789-4800
Twitter: @SHS_Cardinals