Superintendent Brower's Newsletter

Dear Students, Families, Staff and Community Members,

In Gratitude-I am grateful to be a member of the Eatonville School District and Community. The unwavering support from this community for our students and staff members has been overwhelming. The dedication of our staff members to students and families has, likewise, been so impressive! Our students are receiving a quality education and we are improving all the time. Thank you.

Graduation Alliance-I am very proud of our most recent Graduation Alliance graduates who worked hard to finish their education and have now received their Eatonville School District Diploma. Their drive and dedication paid off and will continue to do so as they work toward their future goals. Congratulations!

Student Athletes and Coaches-As I have previously stated, our student athletes make us proud whether they are on the field or off the field, on the court or off the court or in the pool or out of the pool. This is illustrated by the recent awards that Eatonville students have received. Our EHS Swimmers are the 2023 WIAA 1A/2A Academic State Champions! They had an average GPA of 3.634 and were honored at the Washington State Swim Meet. Our EHS boys tennis took home the Nisqually League Team Sportsmanship Award! Our student athletes are great because of the support that they get at home as well as from their coaches. It is nice when our coaches are recognized for the countless hours that they spend teaching our students the fundamentals of the sport as well as lessons that will carry over well past the season. This year, Machaela Swartout, our head girls soccer coach, was nominated by the Evergreen 1A league as the Coach of the Year! MaryAnn Baker, who has been a tennis coach for 37 years, was recently honored with the U.S. Army Salute to a Coach Award for personifying the U.S. Army values of loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service, honor, integrity and personal courage. Congratulations to all of our student athletes and coaches for a successful season.

Transportation Update-There are 295 school districts in Washington State yet KOMO news chose to highlight the great work that the Eatonville community is doing to address the bus driver shortage! We were featured several times by KOMO in articles which culminated in a spot on TV on November 13th. It was an honor to highlight the great work that our transportation department is doing as well as point out that 41 members of our community stepped up and applied for bus driver positions. This has put us in a great position to get all of our students to school within a few weeks. Thank you Eatonville community! Here is a link to that story that highlights our Eatonville School District and community.

Levy Forum and Information-I want to thank the 75 community members who attended our public levy forum as well as the 200+ people who filled out our levy survey. We shared your ideas and priorities with members of our school board and together, designed our levy measures to reflect your priorities. Now that the school board has passed a resolution to run an Education Programs and Operations Levy and a Capital Levy, we can now officially share levy information with you to make sure that you have all of the information you need as voters for the upcoming February 2024 election. If you desire further information, please do not hesitate to contact me . If you need to register to vote or update your address so that you can vote in the next election, we have linked the website in this newsletter.

School counselors/social workers and other members of our Eatonville School District team provide support to students and families throughout the year but I would like to highlight them for their extra care and concern for our families and community members during the holiday season. Thank you! Likewise, I would like to thank our community partners for their generosity and kindness to our students and families. Eatonville Strong!

Mr. Jay Brower

Superintendent

Eatonville School District

Dear Families,

During the December 20 - January 2 Winter Break from school, we are grateful to everyone for helping to restore a routine for showing up to school while supporting students and families.

We appreciate everyone’s efforts to avoid taking extra time prior to the winter break. As long

as your child is healthy, please encourage showing up to class when school is in session.

Every day of school is an important opportunity for students to learn as well as to connect to

their peers and teachers.

We thank:

• Our students and their families who do their best to show up daily even when it isn’t easy.
• Our teachers who go above and beyond to make school a welcoming and safe place for all students to learn.
• Our administrators who help us work together to ensure we create a physically and emotionally safe and engaging learning environment.
• Our many, many healers and helpers - the support staff and community volunteers who provide the extra hands and attention our children need.

We appreciate each one of you. May these days off be restful and healing.

• If your family or your child needs support, please reach out to your child's school for help.
• We look forward to seeing you again when school resumes on Wednesday, January 3, 2024.

Thank you for partnering with us.

I would like to highlight OUR VERY OWN Mr. Pederson implementing instructional strategies that are proven to be effective in student learning!

Matt Pederson uses evidence-based strategies from “Building Thinking Classrooms” by Peter Liljedahl, which offers a different take on how classroom work is organized, how tasks are assigned, and how students learn and work together. This Instructional strategy has proven to be successful in improving student outcomes, in 3rd and 4th grade math at Weyerhaeuser Elementary. “Our team loves this book because it offers very specific strategies based on thousands of hours of research. It’s like a roadmap to effective UDL instruction,” says Mr. Pederson.

To stimulate independent thinking, Mr. Pederson (and his 4th grade team), reorganizes some of his classroom approaches: Start with hard puzzles and problems that push kids to their limits; decrease the fundamental passivity of classroom seating; and use highly structured group activities to promote discussion, peer review, and collaborative thinking to solve math problems.

In this lesson, fraction problems were sequenced so students get incrementally more challenging problems to solve in groups using white board to illustrate their work. The goal is to get most or all students thinking, and thinking for longer periods of time, within the context of the Eureka math curriculum using a problem of practice model for learning.

Mr. Pederson provided students with a full “cake” cut in different size pieces. Students were asked to work in groups to think about what fraction would represent each “cake,” the learning target, “to correctly identify fractions with unusual shapes”.

Students were grouped using a random group generator to ensure that different kids work together across multiple exercises. The large surfaces spread out around the room also allow students to see the work their peers are doing in other groups, and build off of each other’s understanding. It makes it easy for the whole class to see what everybody else is doing.

Students have to evaluate what’s tough about the problem, and Mr. Pederson encourages them to sort it out on their own before stepping in to help. Students are challenged to use social/emotional learning in the effort to negotiate working in a group and reflecting on what high engagement looks like.

A few students shared their excitement,,” Math is my best subject!” Leo Allen commented.

“It is fun for now and later in life, especially working in multiple ways. I will know all these things for my job and I can answer questions”, as noted by Gabriel Schuerman.

To find out more about Thinking Classrooms visit: Thinking Classrooms.

Eatonville’s strategic planning and Portrait of an ESD graduate, will provide a framework so that the most important priority of the school – students’ educational achievement – is taken care of. Having a sturdy educational strategic plan helps keep issues like accessibility, literacy, preparation for an ever changing workforce, and social and environmental enrichment, front of mind.

When the experience of the student is the priority for the school district, the strategic plan becomes a collaborative effort to figure out how best to set students up for success.

Our School board and Steering team, worked diligently on crafting mission and vision statements at two meetings in November. Being on the same page for these is extremely important for schools: sound planning and communication helps ensure that stakeholders, including parents, teachers, administrators, principals, board members, and the greater community, are all striving for the same overall vision.

This is important teamwork, done in the spirit of laughter, respect, humility, and hope for our future, all in for our kids. For schools, our strategic plan will provide a north star for deepening a sense of community and knowledge. We really appreciate our board members and their commitment to this process!

The members of the Instructional Leadership Team have been busy over the last several months.

We started the year with two primary tasks to identify our parameters and determine our instructional materials review process. This includes Identifying state laws, federal requirements, district policies, and procedures.This work has driven our agendas and framed important conversations regarding ELA material needs.

Thank you to all P-5 teachers for completing the ELA survey. We are using your feedback to design the Eatonville filter as one of the tools to be used to review and rate materials.

Our December work will be to review and rate materials.Targeting district priorities that include:

1. Review alignment to state learning standards

2. Look at district data to see current assessment/performance trends and to review areas of strength and areas of struggle for our students.

3. Review information on the Science of Reading

4. Use state recommended/required rubrics to evaluate materials.

Our Leaders bring teaching experience to represent all grade levels K-5, for our district committee. A shout out to our great team for your commitment to this work; Shay Painter, Jen Olsen, Rachel Hight, Mandalyn Ames, Christian Tonkinson, Robyn Johnson and Elementary Principals.

Congratulations to the Swim team, your 2023 WIAA 1A Academic State Champions! They had an average GPA of 3.634! Our EHS girls have the highest GPA out of all 2A & 1A girls swim teams in the state.

There will be no school from Wednesday, December 20 - Tuesday, January 2nd. All school offices and the district office will be closed during the break.

We hope you enjoy the time off.

School resumes on Wednesday, January 3, 2024 (Late Start).

With the weather getting colder, we want to ensure you are prepared for school delays and closures due to inclement weather.

The Boys Tennis Team received the League Sportsmanship Award, Maryann Baker received the WIAA and Army Salute to Coaches Award.

"Congratulations to Eatonville School District! We are the first district in Western Washington to have Kids Heart Challenge at every elementary school! That means that this year, every single family will have access to fun and important heart health information, learn Hands-Only CPR, and have the opportunity to give back to our community. This upcoming year the American Heart Association is celebrating their 100 year anniversary, so we are so proud to have 100% participation!"

We hope your first month of the new school year was a success. As your student moves through the school year we want to ensure that you have all of the support your family needs to help it be a successful year.

Please see email addresses of our school counselors below:

EHS

• Maryann Barker: m.baker@eatonvilleschools.org

• Kirsten Saari: k.saari@eatonvilleschools.org

• Brenda Waugh-Reimer: b.waughreimer@eatonvilleschools.org

EMS

• Anisa Parks: a.parks@eatonvilleschools.org

CCA

• Deb Noble-Perry: d.noble-perry@eatonvilleschools.org

EES

• Jana McIlraith: j.mcilraith@eatonvilleschools.org

WES

• Kristin Bjorklund: k.bjorkulnd@eatonvilleschools.org

It is the Holiday Season!

While for many, this season can be one of hope, giving, abundance and togetherness, the holiday season can also be loaded with need, isolation, grief and feelings of not having enough.

Our counseling team sees an increase in office visits from students during the holiday times and we know that family needs during this time can increase as well.

If you are either looking for ways to give back during the holidays or if you need assistance with gifts or food for the holidays please contact the Eatonville Family Agency at 360-832-6805 or God’s Pantry. Please click here for the link to God's Pantry. Both of these agencies provide food and gifts for families during the holidays.

In addition to our local support, the following is an expansive list of agencies across Pierce County where you can access help or volunteer.

Ways to combat stress and grief during the holidays:

1. Start new traditions. If you’ve lost a loved one the holidays can feel heavy with memories of someone no longer able to be with us. Honoring their memory by starting new traditions can be a way to connect with the past and bring about a future that is

2. Volunteer. Volunteerism has been shown to improve connectivity, mental health and community outcomes. Giving back is a universal way to connect with others, regardless of your background or circumstance.

3. Explore other religious or cultural holidays. Learning about others helps us to see how similar we really are and can be an enriching experience for children and families.

Eatonville High School will be offering an optional teen Mental First Aid training. In the training, students can learn to recognize and help friends with mental health and substance use challenges and crises and how to get the help of an adult quickly. Teens often turn to each other when stressed or upset, and when friends try to help, they sometimes take on too much. This course teaches students not to try to take these problems on alone, and when to get an adult involved.

Please see the attached documents for more information.

Congratulations to Hannah Zaragoza! She was selected as Eatonville High School's 2024 Daffodil Princess. Mark your calendars for Saturday, April 2, 2024 to come watch one of the Daffodil parades, see Hannah, and the other 23 Pierce County High School Daffodil princesses.

These came out of the kiln yesterday and may be useful for some thanksgiving imagery.

Students' whose work is in the images with the leaves:

• Keith Smith
• Mac (Brooke) Ellingson
• Nicole Tomyn
• Emma Marsh
• Ashley Rasmussen
• Ava Dees
• Willa Rovang
• Adam Dean
• Maddie Wilcox
• Andrea McGraw

Superintendent: Mr. Jay Brower

Executive Assistant: Mrs. Ashley Farrens

District Office Hours: 7:30 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.

Email: communications@eatonvilleschools.org

Website: https://www.eatonville.wednet.edu
Location: 200 Lynch Street West, Eatonville, WA, USA
Phone: 360-879-1000
Facebook: facebook.com/eatonville.school.district
Twitter: @EatonvilleSD

Eatonville School District #404 will provide equal educational opportunity and treatment for all students in all aspects of the academic and activities program without discrimination based on race, religion, creed, color, national origin, age, honorably discharged, veteran or military status, sex, sexual orientation, gender expression or identity, marital status, the presence of any sensory, mental or physical disability, or the use of a trained dog guide or service animal by a person with a disability.

The district will provide equal access to school facilities to the Boy Scouts of America and all other designated youth groups listed in Title 36 of the United States Code as a patriotic society. District programs shall be free from sexual harassment. Auxiliary aids and services will be provided upon request to individuals with disabilities.

Address: 200 Lynch St. W., Eatonville, WA 98328; Telephone: 360-879-1000

Title IX Coordinator, Section 504/ADA Coordinator & Civil Rights Compliance Coordinator: Cristin Blaskowitz, Executive Student Services. Email: c.blaskowitz@eatonvilleschools.org