October is Adopt-A-School Month. MSCS and the Greater Memphis Chamber are issuing a CALL to ACTION to businesses to See the Future by becoming school adopters.  

Businesses have the opportunity to support schools, impact student learning and have meaningful volunteer opportunities. During this campaign, school leaders can engage in activities like inviting active and potential adopters to their schools and highlighting them on your school websites, social media pages, marquees, etc. Click here for more information.  

Adopt-A-School Recognition Luncheon Details: 

AAS Luncheon will be held Wednesday, October 25, 2023 at the Holiday Inn- University of Memphis. This program recognizes those adopters who have provided exceptional service to your school. 

Principals will: 

• Nominate one (1) adopter who is highly active and goes above and beyond. 
• Choose a category and briefly share why this adopter has been nominated. 
• The winner of Adopter-of-The Year will be revealed at the Adopt-A-School Recognition Luncheon. 
• The principal or administrator is required to attend. 

Please access the link to nominate one adopter by Wednesday, October 4, 2023. 

https://forms.office.com/r/MpFKiL6X3a 

We are looking for our SIGHT WORD CHAMPIONS throughout the District. Students and their families have the opportunity to compete in our Fall Break SOARING SIGHT WORD CHALLENGE. Win prizes from headphones to bicycles and MORE! See the flyer linked here for complete contest rules, expectations, and prizes! Submissions are due by Monday, October 16, 2023.

Attention: Elementary and Middle School Leaders

Elementary and Middle/K-8 Schools will receive their student copies of the Ready Read materials beginning next week. The Ready Read delivery window for schools is September 25th - October 6th. Principals, please complete the survey below once your Ready Read materials are delivered to your buildings. In this way, the Curriculum & Instruction ELA Team will be able to ensure each ES/MS/K-8 school receives the necessary materials for instruction.

Ready Read survey: https://forms.office.com/r/NgmMZMdKf1
Completed surveys are due by Friday, October 13th.

Questions? Email ci_ela_team@scsk12.org.

If you would like to sign up for the mobile mammogram, please see flyer with all the necessary information about the mobile service that will be at Gray's Creek on October 19th, provided we have at least 10 ladies who need the service. If you're interested, please register as soon as possible per the instructions on the flyer.

This is a great opportunity to take advantage of this mobile service and care for your health. Please don't hesitate to reach out with any questions or concerns. If you're interested, please register as soon as possible per the instructions on the flyer.

This is a great opportunity to take advantage of this mobile service and care for your health. Please don't hesitate to reach out with any questions or concerns to Caroline Earnest at earnestc@scsk12.org

• Schools may submit General Choice Transfer (GCT) rescind requests for students who are non-compliant with grades, attendance, and behaviors. Rescissions will not be processed until the end of the current semester.
• Please notify parents before submitting a rescind request and wait for confirmation of approval before submitting a centralized withdrawal or notifying parents of a rescind to home school.

Note: All special education (SPED) and displaced students must be vetted according to IEPs standards and McKinney Vento Law.

• Please submit all rescind requests through the following link: S.E.E.D. Request to Rescind GCT

**All rescind dates are aligned with MSCS grading periods.

• The centralized withdrawal form will close on Friday, October 6, 2023, at 4:00 pm
• School support staff will no longer have access to withdraw students from PowerSchool. These withdrawals will be handled by the SEED Office and Division of Alternative Education (for expelled students only).
• All no-shows must continue to submit a centralized withdrawal application to be withdrawn.
• Parents can access the withdrawal form through their PowerSchool Parent Portal; school staff can visit:

https://registration.powerschool.com/family/gosnap.aspx?action=37204&culture=en

Greetings Principals,

As your students and schools continue to participate in athletic contests and events, please review the information in the AOSS Manual regarding school Athletics and share it with your teams.

The first quarter ends Friday, October 6. Q1 report cards will be distributed to students, as well as, parents will be able to view the report cards in the portal after 3:00 p.m. on Wednesday, October 25. The Q1 Report Card Checklist for School Administrators and Teachers is available on SharePoint. This document outlines the teacher, principal/principal designee and district office (SIM) responsibilities for finalizing Q1 grades and report cards. 

NOTE: PowerSchool has a process for adding the extra points electronically to the quarter grades for Advanced Courses (i.e. honors, dual credit, dual enrollment, capstone industry certification aligned, Advanced Placement, and International Baccalaureate) such that teachers do not have to do this manually. The Q1 Report Card Checklist explains this process.

Greetings Principals,

Each month, the Student Information Management (SIM) team will need to have dedicated time with your staff who are responsible for PowerSchool data. These sessions are mandatory given the need to ensure the district is receiving proper funding under TISA and that data related to accountability (e.g. assessment provisioning) are accurate. On most occasions, it will be the clerical person assigned to PowerSchool tasks at your school who will be involved. At times, we may need someone else to attend, like the person who handles student schedules.

Soon, SIM will begin sending invitations to your staff and will CC you. You do not need attend if you are listed in the CC/Optional line, but this will allow you to be notified such that you can prepare for the absence of the person who will be spending the day in these data clean up sessions. The sessions will be in person at the Coe building.

Thank you for your support of this important work!

The window for completing Growth and Achievement selections for the SY 2023-24 is open from October 2-27.  Please find the guidance for EDUCATORS and EVALUATORS, which can also be found in PLZ under the "Resources" tab for completing the selections for Growth and Achievement. 

Any Questions? Reach out to the EPS office by phone,  at 901.416.2475 or via email at eps@scsk12.org. 

• The Fall Student Perception Survey is vastly approaching. The survey window will run from October  30 - November 9.
• Site Coordinator Training Dates:   All Site Coordinators should register for one of the virtual sessions in PLZ.  Course #32320. The training dates are October 5, October 16, and October 18. 

Informal Observations

The 23-24 Instructional Practice Classroom Walkthrough Tools are available here.  You can use this link (bit.ly/2324Walkthrough) to submit your walkthrough tool which will feed data to the Power BI on the Instructional Practice Dashboard.  Please download a PDF copy of your entry for your records.

Formal Observations

One Informal Observation must be completed in PLZ prior to completing the Formal TEM Observation. The step sheet on how to upload to PLZ the PDF from what you submitted in the Microsoft Form is linked here. 

If you have questions regarding the 23-24 Classroom Walkthrough Tools, the submission link for the walkthrough tool, or the PLZ step sheet please email professionallearning@scsk12.org.  For TEM questions, please contact eps@scsk12.org.

New TEAM Observers:

(Managed by the TDOE) - Click HERE for guidance on becoming TEAM Certified. 

*Be sure to select TRAINING FOR ADMINISTRATORS' certification!

Please forward a copy of the completed TEAM Certificate to eps@scsk12.org.

The TEM TEACHer Training Series is now open for ALL teachers. The focus of the series is to identify teacher and student actions that guide effective instruction at performance levels 3-5 of the TEACH indicators. Register in PLZ, course #26177.

New Releases:

• Student Attendance Overview KPIs have been updated to include Chronic Absenteeism - High Risk! This metric allows schools to go ahead and identify students with attendance rates less than or equal to 90% regardless of how long they have been enrolled. You can also see this within the on-page Report Builder filters under Select a Metric.
  • See the user guide for more information about Attendance Overview and this guide for more context about the Chronic Absenteeism business rule changes!
     
• Student Enrollment: Enrollment Details Report now includes a new data table visuals with the ability to break down enrollment by student demographic, intervention, and priority groups!
  • See the user guide for more information!
     
• Student Enrollment: Projected Enrollment Report is now available! This report highlights comparisons between projected enrollments and current enrollment YTD.
  • See the user guide for more information!
     
• Digital Citizenship has been updated and is now available!
  • See the user guide for more information!

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Coming Soon:

• Ready Graduates - updated AP IB exam results from the 22-23 school year
• Characteristics of Dyslexia business rule updates – aligned with DIG and state compliance.
• Instructional Practices will be available October 9th.
• Student Reports in both Student Enrollment and Student Assessments
• Tutoring Dashboard

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Training and Support Resources:  

Virtual Office Hours sessions are canceled this week (10/10 and 10/12) for Fall Break.

Next week (10/17 and 10/19), we will be back with Open Forum Q&A sessions. So, please bring any questions you have and we will there to help. 

If you missed our session on the Mastery Connect Participation Report, you can watch the video here.

Sign up today! For more information on Virtual Office Hours, check out this flyer! 

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Check out our new page of all updated features and recent releases on our DAIM Support Page!
You can reach out to us at DAIMSUPPORT@scsk12.org if you need support.  

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Power BI Access:

Principals can give school staff members access through the PowerBI Access App. For more information about how to use the app, see this user guide! 
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Be a Power BI Power User!

Be on the lookout for our new campaign highlighting MSCS staff members who use Power BI the most.

 

Our Power Users will win the chance to be featured in a short video and on our Hall of Fame site.

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