Ozark Tiger E-News

Ozark School District offices and buildings will be closed through Jan. 2. Staff returns for a work day on Jan. 3 with students returning Jan. 4. We hope you have a wonderful break. See you next year!

We are excited to invite you to participate in our K-12 culture & climate parent/guardian survey. Your feedback is instrumental in our continuous efforts to enhance the educational experience for your children.

Parent/Guardian Survey

“Friday Night Lights" is the event series held on the first three Friday evenings in December leading up to Christmas! Christian County, Ozark’s Historic River District and the City of Ozark all work together to bring this event to the community — along with lots of help from Ozark Schools!

• OHS art students in Ashley Hawkins' class painted the downtown store windows.
• OHS band students, OJH Grace Notes, West Elementary and South Elementary all performed over the three Fridays.
• OHS National Honor Society students volunteered to help with the event and Ozarks Project Graduation had a booth that sold cocoa, popcorn and coffee.
• OHS students in Jodi Samsinak’s class helped Santa respond to all the letters dropped in his mailbox!

The Department of Elementary & Secondary Education released the state’s Annual Performance Reports for the 2022-23 school year, and Ozark School District scored 88.7 percent, a significant increase of 1.4 percent compared to last year.
We are so proud and thankful for our teachers & staff who strive for academic excellence day in and day out!

Read the full release here.

West students had a Penny War competition. Pennies and dollar bills counted as positive points for the grade level, but silver coins counted as negative points. So, students could deduct points from other grades if they brought in silver coins. West kids love a good competition! But the real winner was Ozark Cares Network! Students raised $1,029 for Ozark Cares Network, which is a school program that helps support families in need. We love how giving our students and community are!

South first graders got to do some last-minute Christmas shopping this week! Students opened up their very own store, selling anything from homemade wreaths to bookmarks to bracelets to Christmas ornaments to origami dragons. It was the culmination of their economics unit where they learned about goods, services, producers, consumers, needs and wants. Students made a product and priced it, designed a store, and then got to sell their product to other first graders! What a great lesson!

Ozark High School FCCLA enjoyed decorating Christmas cookies and collecting gifts for Santa's Toy Drive.

Last week, OHS culinary students helped spread some holiday cheer by baking 900 sugar cookies and making 900 bags of icing for Finley Farms' cookie decorating workshop! They made 300 cookie decorating kits and some can still be purchased at the Workshop at Finley Farms. Great job to all of our culinary students!

From Christmas celebrations, to reindeer games and visits from Santa … we are ready for Christmas break! Check out how much holiday fun our students had this week on the individual school Facebook and Instagram pages!

South third graders in Mrs. Chesick’s class wrote, illustrated and published their own realistic fiction books while FFA students in Mr. Phipps’ class also wrote their own nonfiction books about animals. This week, the two classes joined together to drink hot chocolate and read books to one another.

“I love it when we can use our high school students to share with the younger ones,” Chesick said. “This also shows that FFA students love the outdoors and literacy.”