From the Administration
What a fun Spirit Week! Thank you, Leadership teachers and students. It's always fun to have these reminders that we can have fun and learn at the same time. Speaking of fun, the Haunted Auditorium was a huge hit. Thanks to Cullen Wade and his MHS Horror Club for providing some spooky Halloween entertainment.
The MHS Crisis Team met on Friday to discuss our biggest current issue: Student Substance Use. While we work with the county attorney on the concept of "lunch release," we are brainstorming ways to get students (especially 9th and 10th) to stay in the building for lunch. Thursday's Haunted House was packed with kids, so how do we offer fun and relaxing activities that keep more of our students here? We talked about using the Atrium as a quieter alternative to the cafeteria, providing games and quieter activities for kids to engage. We are also considering opening outdoor spaces for activities like soccer and corn hole.
Families, we want to reiterate that we do not encourage 9th and 10th grade students be released for lunch. Lunch release was meant to be a senior privilege, but it was always a gray area matter that parents/guardians could check their child out for lunch. If they do get released for lunch, they must leave campus because we are not expecting them to be on campus and they may not be supervised. That goes for students who have a release during an instructional block throughout the day (e.g. seniors and juniors can have a release if they have a study hall).
Also discussed at the meeting was the establishment of a student led, anti drug committee. Sponsored by Bre Lundgren, our Mental Health Practitioner and Chris Cochran, our Region 10 Student Assistance Counselor, the goal is to combat drug use with student initiated ideas and strategies. We have a lot of great ideas that came from students themselves as they met with both Bre and Chris in the last few weeks. More to come on that shortly.
Our increased restroom sweeps has proven to be very effective. We rotate security more regularly so that we can go in all restrooms and not have a disadvantage about not being able to monitor both the men's and women's room. Consequently, we were able to catch several students and one in particular who was "tagging" our boys villa bathroom w graffiti. Our next step is to interview for a School Security Officer who will be 100% mobile throughout the building and parking lots.
By now I am sure you are aware that the governor has created Executive Order 33 to eliminate cell phone use from "bell to bell," which is defined as start of the day to the end of the day. The school board will receive the proposal from the ACPS Cell Phone Task Force, who was charged with creating a division plan for implementation. The board won't vote on the plan until December, but I did want to raise your awareness that cell phone use will look different when we return from Winter Break. ACPS will likely send out more communication in the coming weeks.
Course registration for next year will begin in December. Can you believe we are doing this again already? Be on the lookout for new Dual Enrollment and CTE courses. We are finalizing those now.
This week's recognition goes to our two Coaches of the Week-Sarah Miller and William Trent. We are grateful for all you do to support our student athletes!
