NorthStar Lights

For the past 70+ years, high school students from across Central New York have been recognized in the Central New York Scholastic Art Awards. Congratulations to the students from the North Syracuse Central School District, who were among the hundreds of Central New York junior and senior high school artists recognized in this year’s CNY Scholastic Art Awards.

The annual awards’ program draws thousands of entries from talented students throughout 13 Central New York counties. Entries are judged by professional artists, educators and photographers. The 2023 Awards Ceremony took place on Tuesday, Jan. 17 at the SRC Arena at Onondaga Community College.

After the ceremony, more than 1,600 of the actual selected pieces will be on view at the college's Whitney Applied Technology Center through March 4. The top-rated works go on to the national competition and others will be shown at Everson Museum of Art from March 7 through April 5.

In addition to winning a Gold Key Award, Madeline Howell's print "Street side" (which is used as this newsletter's background) received the American Visions Awards (sponsored by The Print Hub Syracuse) recognizing the “Best of Show” from all Gold Key artwork and the Sage Scholars Educational Foundation Award for Best work in Printmaking. Some of the Gold and Silver Key Winning artwork is also being used on the NSCSD website at www.nscsd.org.

Click here to see the list of winning entries from the NSCSD and some of the artwork.

The Optimist Club of Cicero-North Syracuse is sponsoring an Essay Contest with a top award of a $2,500 college scholarship. Students under the age of 19 who live within the boundaries of the North Syracuse Central School District are eligible to participate. Entries for this year’s contest, “Who is an Everyday Hero that Brings out the Optimism in You?,” are due by January 27, 2023.

Click here to see the contest rules and to download the application form.

The North Syracuse Central is hiring bus drivers. If you're interested in learning more, mark your calendars for a job fair on January 21. Click here to view the flyer on Peachjar or click here to download an application.

On Friday, January 13, OCM BOCES held its first-ever Drone Day today at their main campus in Liverpool. As the educational organization gets ready to start a Drone service for students in its 23 component districts, it brought together about 30 staff and students from those districts to get a first-hand look at drones. Marty Miner, a North Syracuse Central School District Technology Teacher at Cicero-North Syracuse High School, brought three of his students to the event to share their experiences with drone technology. We appreciate our students, juniors Nolan Hartough, Nathan Luangaphay and Brian Pham, taking their time to speak to others about the skills they have gained and potential job opportunities. Our Technology Director Jason Clark and Instructional Technology Coaches, Shannon Knapp, Danielle Barrett and Chris Manke, also attended and even had a chance to fly their own drones. Thank you OCM BOCES for organizing the event!

The Star Shop at Cicero-North Syracuse High School is holding a Nike sale. Use this form to select the items you want and call 315 218-4150 to pay for your order. Items can be picked up at C-NS High School. We can also make arrangements to send them through the school mail or for them to be picked up at C-NS Security.

Did you know that the North Syracuse Central School District uses a program called MySchoolBucks for student meal accounts? With the program, families can create a free account to check their child’s meal balance, see their meal activity at school and set alerts for low balances. Payments can also be made through the system for a small fee.

Enrollment in the program is easy!

1. Go to www.MySchoolBucks.com and register for a free account.
2. You will receive a confirmation email with a link to activate your account.
3. Add your students using their school name and student ID.
4. Make a payment to your student's accounts with your credit/debit card or electronic check.

After the holiday recess, the District will begin sending notifications to families of students with negative meal balances as in previous years. Families with questions about the meal program, can contact the food services department at (315) 218-2176.

Winter weather is sure to arrive in Central New York soon and the NSCSD wants to remind our families and community members of some important snow day, delay and early closing information.

ParentSquare - ParentSquare is a unified app for school communication so parents and guardians can receive all announcements from the District, their children’s schools and teachers in one place, with options to specify how and when parents/guardians are notified. NSCSD students, parents and employees are automatically connected to ParentSquare through our school and employee information systems.

Community members and NSCSD partners can also sign up for the system in order to receive District Alerts. If you would like to receive messages from the District, simply go to https://www.parentsquare.com/community_signups/c20fecde-1b97-4e1b-9d37-ac66a49208ac/new and enter your name and email address. You can opt to receive messages in a variety of categories including “Emergency Alerts” for school closures and weather-related delays and dismissals.

We love to share photos and videos from our students, families and teachers. If you're willing to share, please do! We'll be using your photos in this newsletter and other publications throughout the school year. Additionally, high resolution, horizontal photos will be considered for the District website. If you'd like to share pictures, please email them to our Communications Officer, Laurie Cook at lcook@nscsd.org.

Did you know that the North Syracuse Central School District's Athletics Department has a weekly email newsletter? If you'd like to subscribe to the newsletter, click here to learn more.

The NSCSD produces a weekly digital newsletter, "NorthStar Lights," to share important information and good news with NSCSD families and staff. Parents and staff members automatically receive the newsletter through ParentSquare. Grandparents, community members and all friends of the NSCSD are also welcome to subscribe. Newsletters are emailed each Friday when school is in session. Help us share the good news and the great things happening in the NSCSD! Click here to learn more.

JANUARY 21: Transportation Department Job Fair

JANUARY 23: Board of Education meeting at 6 PM at the Jerome F. Melvin Administrative Office Building (5355 West Taft Rd.) in North Syracuse. If you'd like to attend the meeting in-person, you must pre-register by Friday, January 20. Please email jherrera@nscsd.org to attend.

JANUARY 31: Half-Day for students in grades Pre-K-12 for Staff Workshops

Email: webmaster@nscsd.org
Website: www.nscsd.org
Location: 5355 West Taft Road, Syracuse, NY, USA
Phone: (315) 218-2100
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NSyracuseCSD/
Twitter: @NSyracuseCSD