Burke Bulldog Weekly Update

Dear Burke High Families,

We are into the month of December and in the final weeks of our first semester. We are encouraging our students to focus on any missing assignments and finish the semester strong as credits are earned toward graduation at the semester end. We want all of our students to be "on-track" towards graduation. We need good attendance and a great effort these remaining weeks.

Winter sports are competing and we look forward to supporting our Bulldogs in activities and events. Our Performing Arts Department has performed wonderful concerts and plays.

As always, we have an open door here at Burke High School and value your feedback. It will be important for all of us to stay connected as we continue through the school year.

If you have questions about school, feel free to contact us at 531-299-2580.

Go Bulldogs!

We are providing updated information to this link weekly to help keep our students and families informed of information related to Burke High School and student learning for the 2024-2025 school year. We hope you find this to be a valuable resource.

We wish everyone a safe and relaxing winter recess. Students will have no school from December 20 through January 3. Our second semester begins on Monday, January 6th.

Our Winter Activities are in full swing and there are a lot of opportunities to support our students. Our sports teams are competing in the Metro Conference and off to a good start. Our students are supporting each other as a community.

We are sharing our restroom use procedures for students during the instructional day.

Attendance Matters Did you know it takes an average of three days for students to catch up for every one day they’re absent? Omaha Public Schools is committed to working with our families to support student attendance every day, because we know every minute counts.

Our district has updated our action plan to follow state guidelines on assisting students who miss a significant amount of class time. Our student attendance team will meet with families of students who have 20 total absences, whether or not those absences are excused. The team will work with the family to create a collaborative plan to improve attendance.

You can make an impact on your student’s attendance now, and we’re here to help. If anything is getting in the way of getting your student to school, please contact your school’s principal, school support liaison, school counselor or bilingual liaison for help. These resources and contact information can be found in our staff directory of our school website.

We are sharing our Tardy Procedures here so our students and families know what to expect for students who are having difficulties being to classes on time. We generate reports each Thursday and begin the steps for addressing chronic tardiness using the procedures outlined here.

Our third 2-Hour Late Start Day will be Tuesday, January 28th. Our bell schedule will be as follows with school buses running accordingly. It will be an Even Day schedule.

December 20: No School for Students

December 23 - January 3: Winter Break, No School for Students

The Omaha Public Schools and Zum, our new transporation vendor, are preparing for the school year with a continued focus on safe and reliable transportation. Our district communicates directly with famiies about bus routes and customer service resources. Anyone with questions about services can contact the Student Transportation hotline at (531) 299-0140.

Stay up to date with what our Newspaper students are doing by clicking on the following link to access The Burke Beat!

https://bhspress.com/

We are attaching the Bell Schedule for 2024-2025.

We are attaching our district school calendar for 2024-2025 for your advanced planning. There is also a PDF that can be downloaded.

Dear Burke High Families

The students of the Omaha Public Schools all have been provided an iPad with wifi access to support learning in our classrooms. Our students have become familiar with the use of the iPad and the applications that are available to support learning and are doing a wonderful job. Our teachers and students are utilizing our district provided devices to engage students in learning. These provided devices include safeguards to reduce use for non-school purposes.

The use of cell phones in our classrooms and other personal electronic devices are not needed for instructional purposes and often times create frequent distractions to our students. We are not alone with addressing the challenges that personal cell phones and other electronic devices create in our instructional spaces. We began rolling out cell phone expectations in March of 2023 so most of our students and families understand the expectations for cell phone use.

Continuing this school year, Burke High will implement cell phone expectations and practices in all of our instructional classrooms. We are sending this communication to our families in advance so we can begin to work together to help our students and families have conversations about this practice.

Classrooms will have a designated area within the room that is safe and visible if a student does not have a backpack or space that will keep their device off their person. Teachers will have professional judgment to determine if access to cell phones will be allowed and beneficial at any point during the instructional time and will communicate those expectations to our students.

The expectation of students entering the classroom is that personal cell phones and non-district electronic devices are put away in their backpack on silent or powered off. These devices should not be visible to the student or teacher. This includes ear buds or headphones.

If a student is accessing a personal electronic device during the instructional period without permission from the teacher, the following sequence of interventions will be applied. Compliance with any step along the way will prevent movement to the next step.

1. Teachers will ask students to place their electronic devices in the designated visible and safe location within the classroom. These will be numbered and align with student seating in the classroom.

2. Teacher will contact the assigned Dean of Students and the device will be collected and held in the Assistant Principal’s office for the remainder of the day. If the student refuses to turn over the device, the student will be removed from the classroom and our school will contact parents/guardians if this intervention is necessary.

3. If habitual non-compliance with these expectations leads to frequent disruptions to learning, teachers will refer the student to his/her administrator to work with the student and family to determine a personalized plan to meet the expectations.

Let us reiterate that our goal is not to confiscate cell phones and create additional power struggles with students and families. Our goal is to preserve the best instructional learning environment that we can and we believe that students will perform better, achieve at higher levels, and have better learning experiences in our classrooms.

This is where we need our parents/guardians help and support. Ensure communication between the parents and students during the school day goes through the attendance office or main office, such as reminders for appointments or changes in plans for after school. Students will still be allowed to use cell phones during passing periods and during the lunch periods, but the timeliness of response from your student may decrease from what you may have experienced in the past. Our attendance office can be reached at 531-299-2588 or via email at Burke-attendance@ops.org

Feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns via email (Darren.Rasmussen@ops.org) or phone 531-299-6831. Thank you for supporting Burke High and being a partner in the success of all of our students.

Sincerely,

Darren Rasmussen

Principal

Frequently Asked Questions about our Cell Phone Expectations

1. What about smartwatches? Smartwatches should not become a distraction from directing attention to our classroom teachers or classroom learning environment. They should be on silent mode while in classroom instructional spaces. We will work with our families if these devices become a distraction for individual students.

2. Are we requiring students to put cell phones in the classroom pockets upon entering the classroom? No. We are encouraging students to put their phones in their personal bags FIRST. A phone only goes into the wall pocket if they choose OR if the student must be redirected.

3. What about hallways and restrooms? Cell phones must be put away while students are on restroom breaks or on “passes” during the instructional blocks. Cell phones may be used before and after school, during the passing periods throughout the school day and in the cafeteria during lunch times. If students are using their cell phones in the hallways or restrooms during instructional blocks, they will be escorted to their classroom and asked to place their phones in the classroom pocket until the end of that instructional block.

4. What about during Homeroom? Cell phones must be put away during our daily Homeroom advisory time and have the same expectations as our instructional classroom spaces.

5. Can I have my earbuds in while my phone is off? We are asking students to put their earbuds away in a safe space during instructional class times.

6. Can students have cell phones during evacuation drills? Yes, our goal is to reduce distractions and preserve instructional time. Evacuation drills are already a disruption to the instructional time, so using them as a technology break is okay.

7. What if I do not have a backpack to store my cell phone? This would be a great opportunity to use the cell phone pockets within each classroom. Cell phones need to be on silent and out of visible sight of the student and teacher during instructional times, or in the safe, visible space within our classrooms.

8. As a parent, what if I need to get in touch with my child during the school day? Ensure communication between the parents and students during the school day goes through the attendance office or main office, such as reminders for appointments or changes in plans for after school. Students will still be allowed to use cell phones during passing periods and during the lunch periods, but the timeliness of response from your student may decrease from what you may have experienced in the past. Our attendance office can be reached at 531-299-2588 or via email at Burke-attendance@ops.org

9. What if my Ipad is lost or the battery is dead? It will be important for students to charge their Ipads nightly. Charging student Ipads at night should become a routine for students as we have limited charging spaces throughout the day.

.On August 7 of 2023, our Board of Education approved waiving extracurricular

activity fees for the 2023-24 school year. This will continue in the 2024-2025 school year. Therefore, all students can receive an activity card at no charge. Our district will provide each secondary school with funding to account for this change.

We recommend that families submit an Educational Benefits Form to receive

additional services and benefits they may have previously obtained with the

free and reduced form

We are pleased to inform our families that free breakfast and lunch will be provided to all of our students for the 2024-2025 school year. If students wish to purchase additional items, money can be deposited into school lunch accounts or students can pay with cash.

Breakfast begins in our school cafeteria as early as 6:55 a.m. and students are assigned a lunch period within their schedule.

We are sharing our Standard Response Protocols for emergency situations. School safety is everyone's responsibility. We will be having discussions and practice drills for all of the situations outlined within our Standard Response Protocols.

• Safety is everyone's responsibility!

  If you or someone you know is in need of support, or you would like to report a safety concern, Safe2Help Nebraska Hotline is available 24/7 at 531-299-SAFE or Safe2Help Nebraska.

Infinite campus has been with us for many years and the opportunities to connect with our school will be increasing through the parent campus portal. OPS is adding opportunities for on-line payments and updating personal information such as addresses and phone numbers. Most of our students who attend Burke have access to the student portal. Having access to the parent campus portal requires and activation code that only our school can provide. We are attaching a couple of documents that can assist with downloading Infinite Campus Parent onto your devices. Please contact 531-299-2580 for assistance in getting the activation code once you feel comfortable with it and are at that point. We are here to help.

Online Payment is a reliable and secure electronic payment processing solution for fees and fines transactions. The Infinite Campus Online Payment has been launched and parents or guardians can set up a payment method and select fees to pay through their Campus Parent Portal account.

Parents or guardians must have a Campus Parent account to do this. If a parent or guardian needs to set up their account, they should contact their child's school. Please contact our school at 531-299-2580 for information on setting up the Campus Parent Portal Account if you haven't done so.

Website: https://burke.ops.org/
Location: 12200 Burke Blvd, Omaha, NE, USA
Phone: 531-299-2580
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/OPSBurkeHigh/
Twitter: @OPS_Burke