August 2023 Edition 11

Time is flying by here at Whitlow this school year! The fact that it is already December is exciting and shocking at the same time!

November brought us some great opportunities to connect with our vertical school team, “Heart of Forsyth.” All schools in the district are a part of a vertical team based on which elementary and middle schools feed in to a specific High School. While these feeder patterns are not always 100%, each vertical team consists of the schools which are the primary feeders from elementary to middle to high school. The Heart of Forsyth vertical team is made up of Whitlow Elementary, Cumming Elementary, Mashburn Elementary, Otwell Middle School, and Forsyth Central High School. At Whitlow, we currently have about 80% of our student body who transition to Otwell Middle, while about 20% of our student body transitions to Vickery Creek Middle. But both groups then come back together again for their high school years at FCHS.

Administrators from each school meet regularly to talk and find ways to build connections between all of our schools within this team; especially with FCHS since ALL of our Whitlow Wolves are currently projected to attend high school there. We saw many families in attendance at “Treat Street” in October which was held in the lot between Cumming Elementary and Otwell Middle. In November, we hosted members of the OMS and FCHS administrative teams so they could tour Whitlow and see some of the great initiatives we have in place here. On National STEM Day (November 8th) a group of FCHS teachers and students from their STEM Pathway joined Mr. Hawlk’s and Ms. Reynolds' Science and STEM Specials classes to lead lessons for our Whitlow students. The STEM connection between Whitlow, Otwell, and FCHS is a strong one that we are very proud of! If any parents out there were lucky enough to make it to our STEMsgiving Day parade on November 17th, you experienced the dynamic performance from the FCHS Drumline! Our Whitlow students (and our staff!) were in awe of the talent the FCHS students displayed (and we apologize if your child came home insisting they need a drum set!). 😉

And last night, FCHS hosted “Winterfest” which gave all schools the opportunity to show of the talented students in their Chorus programs. As you can imagine, our Whitlow Chorus (led by our fabulous Dedra Kirkland) brought joy to all audience members with an upbeat rendition of several holiday classics.

Each of these visits and events builds connection between our schools and provides our students with a vision of the future…a glimpse of some of the things that may lie ahead for them as they think about middle and high school. It also provides our parents with connections and hopefully builds a level of comfort when you think about future transitions for your child. We’re proud to be a part of “Heart of Forsyth” and hope to continue to see you at future events!

With only a few school days left before the break, I wish every family a peaceful, joyful holiday season and a very Happy New Year!

Go Wolves!

Dawn Bush

Mrs. Dawn Bush

Whitlow Elementary School

Principal

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Be on the look out for our "Wonderful World of Whitlow" flyer coming home in the next week to complete the survey if you have not already filled one out.

Whitlow's 5th grade BETA team competed at the state convention in Savannah last week. The engineering team won 1st place in their challenge and will compete in Nationals; and one of our students, Darsh, earned 5th place in the drawing competition. We are so proud of these students!

We are so proud of our 4th and 5th grade students who competed in the school spelling bee this week. Congratulations Kaushik, our 1st place winner, and Niralya, our runner up! Kaushik will go on to represent Whitlow at the Forsyth County Spelling Bee in January!

Interested in volunteering at our school? Please click on the link HERE to sign up. Thank you!