Woodlawn Principal’s Blog 2/11/22

2/11/22    ←—- You all know that I love this.  Only 11 more days until 2/22/22.  

Happy Friday.  We made it through the week and as always, I am thankful to be the principal of this school.  I have been fortunate enough to work with this community and please know that regardless of the situation, you can always bend my ear. It is a short blog today so you will have more time for other things this weekend.  

 

8th Grade Parents - Graduation Information 

Please click on this link and fill out the information that we will need for graduation.  Make sure that the information is accurate before you hit submit!  Please fill this out by next Friday, February 11th.  

 

5Essentials Survey for Students Coming Up 

Parents and guardians:  Over the next few weeks, your child will be participating in the Illinois 5Essentials Survey, which asks students about their experiences, attitudes and activities in school ~ with the goal of helping schools to improve. This is the 10th year of the survey, which also solicits input from teachers and parents on how their schools may be improved.

 

The survey is for students in 4th grade and higher. District 96 middle school students take the 25-minute survey the week of February 14.  Elementary school students will take the survey the week of February 28.

 

This online survey is administered by UChicago Impact on behalf of the Illinois State Board of Education.  This survey is based on the Five Essentials for School Success, an evidence-based framework developed by the University of Chicago. This framework identifies how school performance on five factors or “essentials” can lead to important student outcomes, including improved attendance and larger test score gains. 

 

Twenty years of research at the University of Chicago in more than 400 schools has shown that schools that were strong on at least three of the 5Essentials were 10 times more likely to make substantial gains in improving student reading and math than schools that were weak on three or more of the Essentials.

 

Those 5Essentials are:

 

Effective Leaders

Collaborative Teachers

Involved Families

Supportive Environment

Ambitious Instruction

 

For more information or to view previous years’ Reports, visit https://www.5-essentials.org/illinois (choose “Select a Public Survey” dropdown menu). If you have questions about the survey, contact 5Essentials Customer Support at 1-866-440-1874 or [email protected].





 

NEW *Covid Metrics*

To stay up-to-date this school year on local metrics, please visit the COVID DASHBOARD for District 96. Our priority remains to keep our students safe and follow guidance from the CDC. If your student is identified as a "close contact", you will be notified individually through the contact tracing process. 




 

Click here for the Woodlawn Daily Announcements




 

Finally, it is time for my wife to have this column for her rebuttal….

Hello Woodlawn families!  This is Mrs. Julie Grana, often referred to as “the wife” in the weekly blog.  For the 16+ years that Principal Grana has been writing a weekly newsletter, I have often gently requested (he terms it nagging) the opportunity to give my point of view on several of his observations. This week he finally relented…and it made me wonder why….This weekend is the Super Bowl, typically a favorite time for him to ruminate on Super Bowl trivia, spout historical data on football teams, or share his favorite Super Bowl commercials.  It is so unlike him to give up the spotlight so easily!  I can only think of 2 things….First, his beloved Packers should be in this game and he is still getting over their early exit.  Second, it’s my birthday and he couldn’t come up with an original gift on short notice.  Sure, my birthday falls on the same day every year, but if you read this blog regularly, you will know that Mr. Grana is a true procrastinator (refer to Blog dated 12/10/21).  However, in that same blog he refers to me as “wildly intelligent and beautiful” so I can’t be too mad….although he does continue on to claim that my Irish heritage makes me less calm....a true but unnecessary observation. Other true observations: 

Blog 10/29/21: I am not a fan of Halloween but he more than makes up for it with his enthusiasm for the day.  It can be annoying…

Blog 12/3/21: The Bozo story is true but was not shared with me until AFTER I agreed to marry him.

Blog 1/21/22:  Costco….this one is highly accurate, except that MY way is better.

Blog 1/29/22:  He greatly embellished…I would only give him a ½ star rating on Yelp if given the chance. Be glad that, as the principal, he is not in charge of any maintenance around the building.  

To end this short story, I do want to add one other thing….my husband LOVES having people react to his blogs whether it is a “thumbs up” emoji or sharing a similar story.  It really bums him out if people don’t comment.  For a real birthday present for me (and just to annoy him a little bit) I would love to get more comments than he ever has