April Dragon Digest

Dear DeSana Families,

I hope you all can unplug and enjoy some quality time with your child during the upcoming Spring Break! As the year is winding down, it is hard to believe that we only have about seven weeks of school left when we return after the break.

When we return from Spring Break, students and staff will have the chance to safely view the solar eclipse that takes place on Monday, April 8th. As a reminder, we will not allow student checkouts or vehicles to enter our campus from 2:45pm until 3:20pm. If you need to check your child out of school on Monday, April 8th, please plan accordingly.

Finally, I need your help with student drop offs in the morning. As you are pulling up to our campus to drop your child off for the school day, please pull forward filling in all available space up to the crosswalk adjacent to our handicap parking spaces. We are seeing significant delays to student drop-off with families wanting to drop their child off directly at the main entrance. During inclement weather days, this issue is compounded by the increased volume of traffic. I recognize you do not want your child to get wet, however, we can only fit one car at a time under our covered awning and with well over 300 families dropping their child off every day, this is creating a significant traffic jam. Please pull forward as far as you can! We appreciate your help.

Sincerely,

Keith Sargent

Principal

• April 1st - 5th: Spring Break
• April 2nd: World Autism Awareness Day
• April 4th: School Librarian Appreciation Day
• April 8th: Solar Eclipse
• April 10th: DeSana Hosted Track Meet
• April 11th: Spring Musical 7:00pm @ Denmark Theater
• April 12th: Denmark Community of Schools Spring Fling
• April 13th: Spring Musical @ 3:00pm and 7:00pm @ Denmark Theater
• April 18th: Foods Around the World Luncheon for staff
• April 22nd: Milestones Testing Begins

Spring is finally here. We have had much to celebrate this past month, as our students have been hard at work. Our sources of strength students got to enjoy some fun and games in our year end celebration complete with Kona ice.

Recently our band program, under direction of Mr. Mike Mitchell and Ms. Emily Atkeison traveled to Universal Studios for this year's band trip. With 162 students in tow, our directors led the students to compete in the MUSIC USA Competition and Festival. It was no surprise that our bands were awarded the Grand Champion award in competition. Congratulations to those amazing students.

Lastly, our ambassadors here at DeSana were able to load up with counselor Ms. Coats and travel to our feeder elementary schools for a brief ambassador tour. They shared their experiences with rising 6th graders and were able to answer questions while sharing a little bit about the middle school experience. Paired with our rising 6th grade and 7th/8th grade nights, we are looking forward to the future of our DeSana Dragons.

The next solar eclipse will take place on Monday, April 8th, beginning at 1:45pm and will last until 4:20pm. The solar eclipse will peak at 3:04pm and weather permitting, we will plan to allow students to view the solar eclipse with proper solar eclipse glasses. We are providing solar eclipse glasses for all students and staff to ensure safe viewing of this rare occurrence. Solar eclipse glasses will be distributed to all students and staff shortly before we plan to head outside to view the eclipse. We will not distribute solar eclipse glasses to any student or family before this event takes place and your child must be present during school on Monday, April 8th in order to receive his or her solar eclipse glasses. All solar eclipse glasses will be collected after the event. In addition, we will not allow any students to be checked out between 2:45pm and 3:20pm. This will allow us to close down our entrances to vehicle traffic to ensure the safety of both students and staff as they view the eclipse outside of our building.

Our end of the year state testing is coming soon! Please see the dates below to see when your child will be testing.

Milestones testing will take place from April 22nd - May 10th.

For questions related to extended absences and testing, please reach out to your child's grade level administrator. For other testing related questions, you may contact Assistant Principal Peyton Maddox.

We hope you will join us for this year’s musical, Schoolhouse Rock, Live! Jr.

Our multi-talented and hardworking students will entertain you with songs from the classic 1970s animated series, like “Conjunction Junction,” “I’m Just a Bill,” and many more!

Performances are at Denmark High School on Thursday, April 11th at 7pm, and Saturday, April 13th at 3pm and 7pm.

Tickets available on GoFan or at the door with cash or check

$10 for adults and $5 for students/children
Free admission for Forsyth County School employees

If you would like to request any changes, or add Chorus, **Advanced Art, or **Advanced Computer Programming you will need to complete the schedule request form located on our website by 4pm on April 19 ** 8th only

As a reminder, there is an 8th grade spring field trip opportunity on Monday, May 20th and we will be taking a group of students on a Welcome to Atlanta trip where we will visit the following locations:

• Sawnee Mountain
• College Football Hall of Fame
• Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial
• Ebenezer Baptist Church
• Jackson Street Bridge
• Old Fourth Ward

Students have been given information about the trip from their Social Studies teachers, which is who the permission slip should have been returned to. The total cost of the trip is $175. If you made the first payment of $87.50 by March 15th, the second payment of the same amount is due by April 26th. You can also pay the full amount by the April 26th deadline. Payments can be made on School Pay.

The current digital landscape is ever-changing, so it is always helpful to discuss responsible use of technology with your child, such as their digital footprint, online safety, and a screen time habits. Please visit our district website to find parent resources that may help. You can also access digital citizenship tools for families by clicking here.

Dragon Academy is a great way for students to get additional help after school and make up missed assignments. Please reach out to your child's classroom teacher(s) to inquire about future Dragon Academy dates.

Dragon Lore supplies are running out! Purchase your 23-24 memory before they run out!

To order: https://www.yearbookordercenter.com/job/25646

Your Yearbook Staff are hoping that you will enjoy the Yearbook - it’s always an exciting day, flicking through the pages to look for your student and their friends!

Next year’s staff have started their training and can’t wait to brainstorm the next year’s theme and content!

Life is always busy in the Media and Learning Center!

📚 Thank you for supporting Book Fair!

📚 We sold $6,463.61 worth of books and toys!

🛒We purchased $835.32 worth of books for the MLC

🎁 We donated $110.88 worth of books from our teacher lists

🎟️We gave away $102.90 worth of books to Lollipop Board Winners!

💸We made $1,026.36 in profit after all of our books and giveaways!

🍭 We made $1,552.13 at the Lollipop Board 🥳

🥰 Thank you to our wonderful parent volunteers - I hope you enjoyed your discount!

🛍️ A very heartfelt thank you to those who purchased items for the lollipop board - it makes ALL the difference! The Fall Book Fair request link is already ready HERE!

💪 Teacher winners were Ms. Asp and Ms. West 🎉🎉🎉

🙏 Thank you to all of you who purchased books for teachers

📚Missing Books!

• We are missing a lot of books! Please help your student to check backpack and bedroom to help us out. You are not charged a book until marked as ‘lost’, but students can check their account by visiting Destiny and looking in their Back Office.

📚 April Events

• Reading Punch Cards for the second quarter have started. For every book read, students have their card ‘punched’. When it is full, they are invited to our next Breakfast with Books along with our top March and April readers.

• National Library Week is April 7-13. We will be celebrating our library workers, our love of reading, and more. Tell your students to listen to announcements and watch for Flextime events all week!

📚Aide & Committee applications for next school year will be requested soon. This year, we will be doing digital forms! If your student loves the MLC, please encourage them to apply!

📚New for Volunteers! We have been truly grateful for all the help we have received this year and hope for even more community support next year. If you know that you will be interested in being on the MLC team next school year, please join the crew by completing this survey. If you would like to start immediately, we always embrace the help! Please email Bridget Bryson at bbryson@forsythk.k12.ga.us

Reading Updates School for March

Books Checked out in March: 4,538

Books Checked out year-to-date: 41,796

Top MLC Supporters in March

Top Five Homerooms (average circulation per student)

1. Steffensen, Gina

2. McClelland, Tara

3. Masson, Gina

4. Lowie, Mary

5. Mullins, Cassie

6. Noyes, Christina Marie

7. Bacon, Lindsay

8. Whitley, Jacqueline

9. Pearre, Nichole

10. Yarber, Hannah

Top 5 Student Readers:

1. Aditya

2. Aditya

3. Arav

4. Akshath

5. Sai

Thank you for Supporting the MLC!

Attention all 6th grade families! Please begin making plans with your physician to ensure that your child's immunizations are up to date before the beginning of their 7th grade year. Current 6th graders are required to have been vaccinated with Tdap and meningococcal vaccines before the 24-25 school year. We wanted to communicate this information early and often to our 6th grade families to avoid any disruption at the beginning of next school year.

All parents/guardians of 6th grade students are responsible for ensuring that their students’ immunizations are updated prior to attending middle school next year (24-25)

• Rising 7th grade students are required to have been vaccinated with Tdap and meningococcal vaccines.

• Remember that your child will NOT be able to attend school next year until an updated immunization form (3231) is on file.

• Please check with the school nurse or your physician if you are not sure that your child’s immunizations are current.

Recommended vaccinations according to the CDC:
English version
Spanish version

• The Desana Dragons PTO have some upcoming volunteer opportunities available and would love your help! A link to sign-up will be sent out in the coming weeks:
• 8th Grade Dance
  The 8th Grade Dance will be Friday, May 10th. We are in need of several volunteers to help with Set-Up for the dance on Thursday., May 9th, as well as Break-Down for the dance, on Friday evening, May 10th. Only decorating and cleanup volunteers are needed -- dance chaperones will be covered by administration only.
  
  
• 8th Grade Field Day
  The 8th Grade Field Day will be on the afternoon of Tuesday, May 21st. We are in need of volunteers to help with concessions during the picnic.
  
  
• Interested in serving as a DeSsana Dragons PTO Board Member or Chairperson for the 2024-2025 School Year?
  We are excited to announce opportunities for the upcoming school year, including:
• President
• Vice President
• Secretary
• Fundraising Chair
• Membership Chair

If you are interested in learning more about open positions, please email us at desanadragonspto@gmail.com with your interests and contact information.

PTO MEMBERSHIPS

Please sign up to join our PTO! We have some great school wide initiatives being developed to give back to DeSana Middle School students, which is not possible without the support of parents, families and our community. PTO Memberships are only $35 per family and you can register here

Need to contact us? Email your PTO Board at desanadragonspto@gmail.com!