Secondary News and Updates (09/29/23)

Please take a moment to check the STEM All-Events Calendar on our website.

There are lots of events already scheduled so please take a moment to take a look at the calendar to familiarize yourself with some of the events at the start of school. This calendar will continue to be updated throughout the summer as we get closer to the start of school.

Tuesday, Oct. 3, from 5:30-7 p.m – Mechatronics Lab in P-TECH/KOSON Building & Zoom

The KOSON/STEM Board of Directors will be holding its Monthly Meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 3, from 5:30-7 p.m. in person and via Zoom.  The BOD is comprised of parents and community members who volunteer their time. The Board’s role and purpose is to provide oversight of the KOSON Schools Chief Innovation Officer, who implements the policies set forth by the Board. The Board also provides support and direction for STEM’s long-term vision and mission. Additionally, the Board is active in making sure that KOSON Schools remains in compliance with all DCSD, state and federal compliance requirements, as well as STEM School Highlands Ranch’s Charter Contract.

Meetings are open to anyone to attend. Anyone who would like to address the Board Members must sign-up in advance by completing the Public Comment Form no later than 12 p.m. the day of each Board meeting. If written testimony or a handout is submitted, presenters are asked to supply one (1) copy via email to communications@stemk12.org.

Wednesday, Oct. 4 – Tuesday, Oct. 10

Encourage students to earn their Junior Ranger badge. Due to Katmai’s remote location, students living anywhere have the opportunity to earn their Junior Ranger badge virtually by downloading, completing, and mailing in the official Junior Ranger workbook. The book includes information not just about bears; it also explores the history and culture of the park and southern Alaska.

Junior Ranger experiences don’t have to be relegated to the elementary grades alone. Katmai also has a way for older students and adults to earn a Not-So-Junior Ranger badge. The short booklet delves into additional disciplines, such as geology, history, and Earth science, expanding the possibilities for interdisciplinary connections or folding in other standards within the NGSS. A great activity for middle school students that can run concurrently with Fat Bear Week is for them to investigate how volcanic activity helped sculpt the Katmai area through videos and readings provided by the USGS and the National Park Service (Disciplinary Core Idea MS-ESS2-2).

Friday, Oct. 6, from 10 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. – Elementary Gym

School Photo Retake Day will be this Friday in the Elementary School Gym. Click the button below to order photos. Please use the student ID number for the passcode when placing your order.

Tuesday, Oct. 17 to Thursday, Oct. 19

Mark your calendars—students will be able to apply to any public college or university and many private institutions for FREE from Tuesday, Oct. 17-Thursday, Oct. 19, 2023. For more information, check out the link below.

Are you looking for something to do during Fall Break? ACC’s STURM Collaboration Campus will host a free Cybersecurity workshop from October 16-19, from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. Registration deadline is October 11 or until full. See flyer for more information.

Are you looking for a Summer internship? Merrick & Co is currently accepting applications for their summer internship program. Both positions are excellent opportunities for students who have completed or are currently enrolled in CAD coursework.

Mark your calendars! Lockheed Martin’s summer intern program application window is from October 5th thru Jan 4th for the Summer 2024 program. Register for one of the upcoming virtual information sessions via their website.

The Coding School will be offering two award-winning courses at the forefront of the technological revolution: Introduction to Artificial Intelligence & Introduction to Quantum Computing. Registration deadline is September 15th! Click the button below to register and view the flier.

Applications are open for the CU Pre-Health Scholars program. The program is available for middle or high school students. It will expose students to high-impact events, research, STEAM and Healthcare careers.

Calling all Juniors and Seniors

The NSA currently has programs available to HS seniors and juniors. Applications are being accepted now for next summer and the 2024-25 school year. Reach out to Nicole Ryan (nicole.ryan@stemk12.org) with questions.

STEM’s Student Support Team will be available for Secondary Conferences, coming up on October 12 and 13. To sign up for a conference with your middle or high school counselor, please click on their name below to be taken to their sign-ups.

• Lily Williams (Middle School Counselor A-L)
• Lisa Clay (Middle School Counselor M-Z)
• Colene Birchfield (High School Counselor A-L)
• Madison Grebe (High School Counselor M-Z)

Tuesday, Oct. 10, from 7:50 a.m. to 12 p.m.

On October 10, 2022, STEM juniors will take the PSAT/NMSQT and STEM seniors will be virtual. The NMSQT is used as a qualifier for the National Merit Scholarship Program. For more information about these assessments, please visit www.collegeboard.org.

K-8 Typical School Day

• 6th, 9th, 10th, 12th will have a Virtual day – students will log into Canvas and/or Zoom to complete attendance and coursework per their teacher’s instructions.
• 11th and 12th-grade students must opt-out
• Those testing will be responsible for knowing missed content, missed tests or quizzes and project work but will be excused from afternoon assignments/homework.

Wednesday, Oct. 11

Those signed up for SAT’s will be taking the SATs on Wednesday, Oct. 11. Those students will be pulled from class.

Tuesday, Oct. 10, from 7:40-11 a.m. 

On Tuesday, Oct. 10, 2023, STEM 7th and 8th-grade students that did not opt-out will take the PSAT 8/9. This assessment is not part of state-mandated accountability testing but an opportunity for parents, students, and teachers to see what skills students need to prepare for High School and college. More information about the PSAT 8/9 can be found here. Following testing, students will resume their daily schedule. Students in grades K-5 will follow their normal schedule.  Students in 6th, 9th, 10th and those 12th graders not testing will follow their typical schedules virtually.

ACCESS continues to build as we get deeper into the school year. These past couple of weeks students have begun to utilize ACCESS to visit teachers and seek extra support on learning concepts, make-up work, and other needs. In addition to this, we have started having college visits during this time and have spent some time discussing executive functioning and reflecting in order to identify our individual strengths and weaknesses. Looking ahead to October, all of the secondary students will continue the conversations around executive functioning strategies and ACCESS teachers will support students with how to utilize Canvas for monitoring work completion and organization of their workloads. Students will also get an introduction and overview of Naviance as they begin their required iCap lessons. ICAP stands for Individual Career and Academic Plan, and is described by the Colorado Department of Education as a process that guides students in the exploration of career, academic and postsecondary opportunities and helps students develop the awareness, knowledge, attitudes, and skills to create their own meaningful and powerful pathways to Postsecondary and Workforce Readiness. Middle School iCap lessons for October will focus on career discovery and for high school they will focus on career and personality discovery, academic goals, and college applications. Finally, students will participate in an assembly with Deputy Uribe where the focus will be on cyber safety.

The following colleges will also be visiting in October and November (schedule is subject to change). All visits will be in Ms. Myricks office from 11:00-11:40 am unless otherwise noted.

October:

• Wednesday, Oct. 4: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
• Thursday, Oct. 5: University of California – Irvine
• Wednesday, Oct. 11: Hofstra University
• Thursday, Oct. 26: Regis University

November:

• Wednesday, Nov. 1: University of Colorado Colorado Springs
• Thursday, Nov. 2: University of Denver
• Wednesday, Nov. 8: Trinity University Dublin
• Thursday, Nov. 9: Colorado School of Mines – Presentation will be given in Mrs. Graham’s room, not Mrs. Myrick’s office.
• Wednesday, Nov. 15: Cal Poly: San Luis Obispo

Now is the time! Don’t delay purchasing your Secondary Yearbook for the 2023-24 School Year. Click the button below to place your order by October 31 and only pay $50. After October 31, yearbooks will be $60.

Special ads are also due on October 31 and can be purchased via the link below. Portraits and quotes should be sent to yearbook@s.stemk12.org.

One way to do this is to first be logged into your child’s account. Go to “Account” and then “Settings” on the left side. Then on the right side you should see a gray box that says “Pair with Observer.” This will give you a code that you can then enter in your parent Canvas account. You will need to do this from a computer, not a mobile device.

If that does not work for you, email support@stemk12.org, title the email “IT Canvas Observer Support” and include your child’s name and student ID number in the email so that IT can generate a code for you.

For any device at STEM to connect to our network, a certificate needs to be installed. A certificate or digital certificate is a unique, digitally signed document that authoritatively identifies the identity of an individual or organization. In our case, it associates the certificate with the STEM email. To download the certificate, go to https://securly.com/ssl and download the file associated with the operating system. The file is a program to run on the machine, but it only installs the certificate.

Once the certificate is installed and the computer is on STEM’s network, Securly Filter will ask once for the person’s identity. Once logged in with the STEM email account, Securly matches the email and the certificate and it then knows who it is and how the computer should be filtered. This system of identification using a certificate is the same that we have had in the past. We are just using a different vendor for that certificate. If students have issues installing the certificate, please send them to the IT office in RM 164.

We are asking all families, K-12, to please download the PikMyKid Parent App and set up an account. We will continue to use the PikMyKid App for dismissal for Elementary Driveline, and will be adding PikMyKid to our Emergency Messaging platforms for all of K-12. We will not implement the dismissal component for Secondary at this time, and will release more information in the coming months.

If you have set up your account and do not see your student, please click the button below to complete the PikMyKid Help Form so that we can help you.

On Tuesday, the DCSD Board of Education voted unanimously to place a $66M Mill Levy Override and $484M Bond on the November 2023 ballot (see the press release). All seven Board directors expressed their strong support and personal dedication to our students and our staff. During public comment the Board heard from students, teachers, neighborhood school principals, charter school principals, business leaders, elected officials and more – and all expressed strong support for additional funding. I hope you will take a few minutes to listen to the public comment – the support for YOU, our teachers and staff, from every part of our community was overwhelming.

• Click here to watch the public comment portion of the meeting.
• Click here to watch our presentation to the Board where we outlined staff recommendations for a Mill Levy Override and Bond.

The Board also unanimously adopted a compensation resolution that will automatically trigger if the MLO passes. For school district staff, this means pay increases would happen automatically should the MLO pass (with increases being paid retroactively back to July 1). For charter school staff, exact details about pay increases will come from your school’s board and leadership.

To learn more about how additional funding would benefit our schools and our staff, visit www.dcsdk12.org/funding. I also encourage you to read through our MLO/Bond plan.

We are looking for 2 Program Leaders to work in a busy and fun after-school program. If you or someone you know likes working with kids, has some experience working with children ages 5-12, and is eager to develop and learn new skills in a growing program with a fun, experienced, and dedicated staff, this is the right move for you. Program Leader hours are M-F, 1:30-5:30/6 p.m. Part-time and full-time hours are available during school breaks. This position is a “Select Charter Position” and offers an additional 10% (to hourly base rate) monthly stipend. If you are interested but need more flexibility, we are hiring Program Leader substitutes. Substitutes can work 2-3 days each week. We are also happy to coordinate with STEM who are looking for more hours. Feel free to call or email me for more details or questions at amy.dupays@dcsdk12.org, or (720) 688-2928.

Save the number, save a life.

Add the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (988) to your phone now—it could save a life later. Trained crisis counselors are available to talk 24/7/365.

Writing SOS: What are some everyday things I can do to help my child’s writing skills?

Literacy specialist Kyley Pulphus encourages parents to make writing fun and purposeful. With her own daughter, she sees more enthusiasm for writing when asking her to write lists, letters, emails, greeting cards, and text messages.

Recorded Webinar: Concussion Process and School Sports

This Parent University Webinar discusses components of DCSD’s student concussion protocol and how our school district’s support and practice aligns with the Colorado High School Activity Association (CHSAA). We are excited to have Chris Mathewson, DCSD’s Lead Athletic Trainer as our panelist for this September webinar. Coach Mathewson will share insights, best practices and the latest research in this field. Additional information is also provided by DCSD’s BrainSTEPS Committee.