Monday Morning Memo: Monday Morning Memo 2/27/23

Thank you for joining for Friday's gathering with Devin Hughes. I hope you left with your bucket refilled a little and a commitment to make moments matter!

Each week, I'll share a video or two of the team chants from Friday for us all to enjoy. I'm so proud to work with you and grateful for all the moments that YOU make matter!

CLICK HERE to see a fabulous team sharing their chart!

💖💖💖💖💖💖💖

Click here to see what Devin's weekly "feel good" email looks like.

If you'd like to subscribe, just click here to get to his website.

For all those who do Medicaid billing, this is your reminder to do it! We need you to please stay on top of this!!! THANK YOU!!!! 😁

If you have no idea what this means...you don't have to do it! YAY!!!!

I want to shout out to Michael Szotek for going above and beyond to make sure our students had QR code log in’s before the bad weather!

From Chris Brown (Paraprofessional at Lotus

Kudos to Cassie Curtis for engaging her students in a Quiz, Quiz, Trade strategy while dividing integers. I got to participate....the kids and Cassie were awesome!!!!!!!!!!

and

Coach Bressett and Coach Medrano for holding extra practices for the girls before school!! The girls have really improved!!!

-From Jeff Sefcik (Principal at Stanton)

Kudos to Kelly Capp for the delicious KING CAKE on Fat Tuesday!

-From Michele Burgess (Administrative Assistant at Stanton)

A HUGE shout out to Jillian Rejczyk, the Stanton ILP-A teacher. Jillian has experienced some behavior issues in her classroom lately, but manages them with patience and grace. Her firmness in class expectations is appreciated by everyone in her class and the way she handles each situation shows a great amount of maturity. Stanton is very lucky to have this "go getter" on our team! Thank you Jillian for showing me how to accept our student's strengths as well as their struggles.

-From Betty Cwiak (Library Paraprofessional at Stanton)

Huge thank yous to:

Everyone for your positive vibes for Shaun's surgery!

Everyone for all your flexibility and "can do" attitudes with the weather "what ifs" last week.

Jeff, Don, Mike, Mary, Norm, and David for handling the Wednesday power outage at Stanton.

Don for coming in SUPER early on Wednesday to make sure we were good to open!

-From Heather 😘

Please send me your kudos for colleagues each week! I'll happily post them in this section!

Here's a link to all the ideas gathered for the HOW and WHY of the Friz 5...I'll keep adding as great ideas come forward.

Board Meeting Follow Ups

I got some really good questions after the meeting, and wanted to make sure the information was shared with everyone:

*The additional Special Education Coordinator will be partially funded by a grant from ISBE targeting us improving our retention rate for special education staff. The core team working on this grant also very much supported the idea.

*Funding for Panorama (which will replace SAEBRS next year but costs appx $9000 more) will come from federal grants as well as the funds that have been spend on SAEBRS...and we'll get WAY more for the money.

*The staffing plan is NOT finished. There are additional changes coming, and the paraprofessional staffing plan has not been started at all.

*We will post the additional Permanent Sub positions immediately in hopes that we can fill them in the near future.

*While you may not agree with the class size numbers, please keep in mind that, even at the projected numbers, we are FAR below other local districts. Additionally, as we head into bargaining next year, it would not make sense to have classes under 15 students.

Please let me know if you have additional questions. I'm happy to answer them. Just send me an email or let's set a time to meet.

SNEAK PEEK--SUMMER SCHOOL 2023!

Summer School 2023 is right around the corner! Here's what we know so far:

6 weeks

Monday-Thursday, mornings only

Both sites

Weeks in session

6/12

6/19 (Monday off for Juneteenth)

6/26

Off the week of July 3

7/10

7/17

7/24

Pay rates comparable to last year, which were:

Certified staff--$52/hour (this pay rate uses the end of our ESSR funds, and the rate is higher than other elementary districts in our area)

Support staff--hourly rate + $75 weekly bonus for each week with perfect attendance

Please email me if you are interested in working summer school this year!

February Wellness Calendar

Wishing you all a happy February!

Wellness Calendar

Lake County Educator of the Year Event!!!

Please see information on this year's event! I'd love to see some great D114 representation to share our awesomeness!!!!

PLEASE CONSIDER COMPLETING A NOMINATION, AND LET ME KNOW HOW I CAN HELP!

The Lake County Regional Office of Education will be hosting the second annual Educator of the Year Ceremony. The Ceremony will be held at the Lake County Fairgrounds on May 10th, at 5:30 pm. There will be a social hour with dinner. The awards ceremony will take place after the dinner. Ticket information will be provided at a later date.

The Educator of the Year Ceremony will resemble a mini Oscars like celebration. I have included all of the information in this email. The information can also be found on the ROE shared drive under the Educator of the Year folder and on the ROE website under the tab Educator of the Year. We will be honoring paraprofessionals this year as our special guest. The ROE will pay for 1 paraprofessional's dinner from each school district. The district can bring other paraprofessionals if they would like to be honored.

There will be 9 categories for nominations. Districts can submit as many nominations for the categories, but all the paperwork must be included for each nomination to be considered. Paper or electronic nomination packets are due to the ROE by Friday, March 17, 2023.

Here is a link if you would like to submit the nomination packet electronically. 2023 Lake County Educator of the Year

This folder contains all the information needed for the 2023 Lake County Educator of the Year.

2022-2023 Information

If you have any questions please let me know. This will be a great event to recognize our amazing educators.

Have a great day,

Mike

Michael Karner, Ed.D.

Thanks to everyone for your feedback! Erica and Stephanie are sending out Lotus- and Stanton-specific supports, but I'll also post the link to a folder containing them all here so they are easy to find, everyone can see everything, and you're reminded to check them out!