Obion County Schools October 2019 Newsletter

I shared with the Board of Education, that conversations were positive, and I am more convinced that we have teachers that want Obion County Schools to be the best system in the state..

October 2019 Official Newsletter of Obion County Schools

[ S i d e b a r

T i t l e ] [ S i d e b a r s

a r e

g r e a t

f o r

c a

A MESSAGE FROM

MR WATKINS

NEWS FROM CENTRAL OFFICE

NEWS FROM THE SCHOOLS

Upcoming events

 National Bullying Prevention Month

 Fall Break October 14-18

 National School Lunch Week October 21-25

 Red Ribbon Week October 23-31

Tim Watkins, Director of Schools

A MESSAGE FROM MR WATKINS

Congratulations to the Middle School Cross County teams

from Obion County Obion County completed the sweep of

the TMSAA West Tennessee Sectional Black Oak Boys and

Hillcrest Boys were 1st and 2nd respectively as well as Lake

Road Girls and Ridgemont Girls were also 1st and 2nd

respec-tively We also had individual qualifiers Livee Seals, Landon

Temple, Ethan Caldwell, and Anna Beth Correa I want to

wish all these student-athletes the best of luck as they

repre-sent Obion County at the state meet

I want to thank everyone at each of the schools for the

hospi-tality shown to me as I visited the schools over the last few

weeks The opportunity to sit down and talk with staff

members was informative and enjoyable I shared with the

Board of Education, that conversations were positive, and I

am more convinced that we have teachers that want Obion

County Schools to be the best system in the state I plan on

making these types of visits a regular part of my schedule I

will make sure the next visit is at a different time of the day

than the previous one so I can see teachers that possibly

weren’t free during last visit

Thank you for all you do to make Obion County the special

place that it is and thank you for all you do for the students

of Obion County Schools

S

i

d

e

b

a

r

T

i

t

l

e

]

[

S

i

d

e

b

a

r

s

a

r

e

g

r

e

a

t

f

o

r

c

a

Mr Adam Stephens

RTI

As many of you know, last spring our district began transitioning to Aimsweb PLUS as the new and upgraded screening tool for RTI We learned several things through the pilot program, but the RTI teacher leaders and school ad-ministrators have worked hard since the beginning of school to complete the transition We have now finished the fall benchmark process, established new groups, and progress monitoring is scheduled within the new program

There are many advantages to using this version of Aimsweb Scoring is all digital and reporting is instant

When a student finishes a test, the results are calculated and changes to instructional practices during intervention can happen much faster This version also has skills-based and standards-based measures; therefore, it can be used much

more effectively as a predictor of future success on state tests It will help us pinpoint students that are having issues

Although we have worked through many issues associated with starting any new program, there are still ques-tions we are working through daily As a group, we are using the program with much more proficiency The overall goal

is to help students be successful, and I feel that this transition will help us identify and help students at all levels.

Data

We received our achievement and growth data much earlier this year, and I have either sent data by request or met

with most every teacher of a tested subject in grades 3-11 If there is anything you would like to discuss or revisit, I am available to meet with anyone during planning times, after school, or answer questions through email correspondence –

astephens@ocboe.com

Obion County Schools has three teachers who are “new-ish” to Special

Educa-tion for the 2019-2020 school year Clockwise

from the top of the picture are Casey Wade at

Lake Road, Casey Webb at Obion County

Central, and Ali Daniel at Hillcrest

Casey Wade is the new CDC teacher

at Lake Road Elementary She is from Water

Valley, Kentucky, and she attended college at

Bethel University where she received her

teaching degree in Special Education in May

of 2019 While there she played softball for

Bethel in the positions of pitcher and first

baseman, and she also received the Student

Teacher of the Year award for Special

Educa-tion Casey enjoys teaching and working with

children, spending time with family and being

outdoors hunting and fishing She said, “I’m

looking forward to a great year at Lake Road!

LRS is the best!”

Casey Webb started at Obion County Central High

School in 2007 teaching various

levels of mathematics Her

favor-ite math class to teach is

Geome-try Casey earned her Master’s

degree in Special Education in

February 2019 She is married to

Jason Webb, and they have two

children, Elly and Eli, who both

attend Hillcrest

Ali Daniel joined Obion County during the Spring semester of the 2018-2019 school year and believes that Obion County has the best students and faculty around but also claims to be a little par-tial, since she is an OCCHS alumnus She

graduat-ed from the University of Tennessee at Martin in

2017 with a Bachelor of Science degree in Psychol-ogy with an emphasis in child brain development and behavior Currently, she is in her last semester

of her Master’s program with its focus in Special Education When she finishes her Master’s, she has

a goal to work towards a Doctoral degree in Ap-plied Behavior Analysis Ali is also a full-time wife and mother Her husband, Travis, is a carpenter for his own carpentry business, and they have two chil-dren, McCoy (3) and Margo (2 months), as well as two dogs, Teal and Charlie, and seventeen chick-ens Let her know if you ever need any eggs! In her spare time, she enjoys spending time with her

chil-dren and running When asked to pro-vide some information about herself, Ali stated, “I would like to start by saying how grateful and happy I am to be a part

of the Obion County School System I absolutely adore my students and my job.”

The Obion County Special Edu-cation Department is excited to have these three ladies in our school system!

Mr Greg Barclay

Special Education

[ S i d e b a r

T i t l e ] [ S i d e b a r s

a r e

g r e a t

f o r

c a

Mrs Judy Denman

Food Service

Last year the decision was made to discontinue the break after

first period at Obion Central, beginning in January This meant

that there would be no “second chance” for the students to go to

the cafeteria for breakfast About half of our students who had

previously eaten breakfast no longer took advantage of being

able to eat breakfast at school Knowing that breakfast is very

important to learning, Mr Barclay and Mr Kendall began working

on a plan to take breakfast to the students A Mini Breakfast

Grant was available, and the cafeteria was awarded $5,000 near

the end of school last year Two mobile food carts were

pur-chased as well as two laptops to record the sales Our students

can enjoy breakfast again without having to rush to get to the

cafeteria before first period

After testing a few locations, the carts have both been placed in

the front lobby since many students pass that way before first

period Students and staff love the convenience of not having to

go all the way to the cafeteria to get breakfast The quick and

easy access saves time for those who may not enter the building

near the cafeteria Everything that is available in the cafeteria for

breakfast is also available from the breakfast carts except cereal

and coffee Items include a hot biscuit or roll with sausage,

chicken, or ham and cheese They can also select from Pop Tarts,

fruit, milk, and juice Other available items may include

pan-cakes, flavored crescent rolls, breakfast rounds, or muffins Our

supportive faculty is allowing the students to bring breakfast with

them to their first period class This gives them time to eat if they

only have time to grab breakfast off the cart and go to class

Breakfast is also still available in the cafeteria, and the ladies have

just added coffee that can be purchased a la carte The cafeteria

manager, Sharon Brewer, says she is very thankful for the support

given by Mr Kendall, as well as some of the Culinary Arts

stu-dents who have used their artistic ability to make signs

advertis-ing the new breakfast carts

Everyone is hopeful that the availability of breakfast will

en-courage the students to take advantage of breakfast once they

get to school The cost is very reasonable… if they select a

“meal”, it is FREE!!!

Mr Dale Hollowell

School Safety

September 18, 2019 was a red-letter day for Obion County Schools It marked the first day that every school

in the system had a full-time SRO The staffing of SROs in our five elementary schools was made possible by a

$175,000 grant from the state of Ten-nessee as well as a financial commit-ment of about the same amount from the Obion County Commission

Obion County Schools is indebted to Sheriff Karl Jackson who worked tire-lessly to make this initiative a reality In addition to persuading the county com-mission to help fund the project, Sher-iff Jackson was responsible for hiring the additional personnel and providing each officer with the equipment and training needed to work in our schools

The new officers and their assign-ments are:

Black Oak School: David Callens Hillcrest School: Justin Hobbs Lake Road School: Ben Hudson Ridgemont School: Harold Banks South Fulton Elementary: Ben Burnett Obion County Schools is excited to partner with the Sheriff’s Department

in this endeavor to increase the safety and security of our schools as well as

to enhance the relationships between law enforcement and our students

S

i

d

e

b

a

r

T

i

t

l

e

]

[

S

i

d

e

b

a

r

s

a

r

e

g

r

e

a

t

f

o

r

c

a

Mr George Leake

High School Highlights

Did you know that OCCHS and SFHS graduates can

enter college with a full semester -or more- already

completed by taking advantage of Dual Credit, Dual

Enrollment, and Advanced Placement classes? DC,

DE, and AP courses are taught by Obion County

fac-ulty, and give students a high school credit as well as

postsecondary credit at most Tennessee colleges and

universities and many out of state institutions A

re-cent Obion County graduate earned 27 hours of

col-lege credit while in high school With many colcol-leges

charging $300 or more per credit-hour, the financial

impact of Early Post Secondary Opportunities (EPSOs)

is tremendous Couple this with Tennessee Promise, a

program that allows students to attend a technical

school or community college tuition-free and the

re-cently announced UT Promise that allows students

meeting certain criteria to attend a University of

Ten-nessee campus tuition free, and its easy to see that

Obi-on County Schools is setting students up for

suc-cess School counselors Mrs Kendall and Mrs

Mitch-ell at OCCHS and Ms Pope at SFHS do a wonderful

job guiding students to post-secondary opportunities

that prepare them for life after high school

Mrs Lesa Scillion

In The Middle

Our partners at the CORE office, Stacey Ussery and Ashley Kelley, have led instructional coaches, building administrators and supervisors in the work

we began last year learning to utilize the Literacy Learning Walk tool and Math Learning Walk tool Both tools are designed to determine trends regard-ing the alignment to standards, depth of

instruction-al practices, and student engagement in reading and math across schools Thank you to all the teachers and students whose regular classes were interrupted

by our team visits, which is out of the normal rou-tine All students continued their tasks and

interact-ed with the team members as we askinteract-ed questions and viewed their work Great job!

Please continue to incorporate the OC Instructional Strategies, which include the 12 Powerful Words (and their synonyms) and UNRA(A)VEL strategies,

in your classroom instruction The UNRA(A)VEL strategies can be used in math, reading, social stud-ies, and science These strategies will help students

in every subject from now until they graduate from high school

Mrs Vikki Hayslett

Early Literacy

Buster the Bus Safety Program

Bryan Nash, of Crossgate Services, presented the Buster the Bus Safety Program at each of the elementary schools Students in pre-k through second grade attended the program Buster the Bus is a miniature, remote controlled three-foot-tall replica of a full-size yellow school bus, which is equipped with working stop sign, crossing gate, and flashing red lights Buster the Bus is a remote-controlled robot that uses an interactive ap-proach to teach the important lessons of school bus safety Buster moves, speaks, listens, and activates his lights all by remote control With his STOP-arm, he has all the warning devices of a real bus He can wink, blink, and move his eyes, and with his smiling mouth he presents a positive and friendly image to young and old alike In addition to Buster’s safety program, Mr Tim Maynard returned to each school each afternoon to al-low students to load a school bus and practice an emergency evacuation drill

The program includes messages about how to cross safely, staying out of the “Danger Zone,” riding the bus safely, how to safely wait for the bus, how to cross in front of the bus, how to climb the steps, how to ride a school bus to and from school or on a field trip, and how to evacuate the school bus Buster makes learning about bus safety a lot of fun! He grabs the students’ attention long enough to help them understand the im-portance of making good choices that lead to personal safety and good bus riding habits Shown below are a few pictures of Buster at three of the schools

S

i

d

e

b

a

r

T

i

t

l

e

]

[

S

i

d

e

b

a

r

s

a

r

e

g

r

e

a

t

f

o

r

c

a

We have had a great month at

Ridgemont

We had our annual book fair this month Our students love visiting the library and finding new books Coach Sarah had a book mark contest Students in each grade submitted book marks and different staff members voted

on the winners The top three book marks are going to be made into book marks for our students to use throughout the year

September 21st was a big birthday for our book keeper Mrs Sarah Hobbs The students, teachers, and staff showered her with love during her birthday week Ms Sarah has been an employee of Obion County Schools for fifty years and she is still going strong

We want to give a big Cou-gar welcome to Officer Jus-tin Hobbs, our new School Resource Officer! As S.R.O., he will work to provide a safer environment for our students and faculty

We are so thankful to have the opportunity to have added protection for our

Cougars!

Our Cross Country team have been doing great this season They qualified on September 20th to go

to state on Saturday Oct 5th We are very proud of these student athletes

[ S i d e b a r

T i t l e ] [ S i d e b a r s

a r e

g r e a t

f o r

c a

The Hornbeak United Methodist Church

has donated $500 to our school's backpack

program

From Mrs Angie in the Eagle Café

I'm sure you have all seen our growing system by

now, it is a grant I applied for back in May The

students check it out every day, I have a one

stu-dent who sings to our plants, they get lots of TLC

and if you haven't noticed lately we are proud

parents to baby Pac Choi! I just put this together

Monday and we already have babies! I take

pic-tures, keep a diary (this is required with any grant)

and I email the group I am in The Eagle Café has

gained fans on this adventure! The company is

enjoying our pictures very much and the

enthusiasm behind it

A winning season for cross country teams The boys team and Livee Seals will be competing at the State Championship Meet this weekend

South Fulton CTE students and sponsors created an amazing float that they used to participate in the Ba-nana Festival Parade We also had students that par-ticipated in the Banana 5k and helped serve some of the 1 ton Banana Pudding We love that our

stu-dents are so community minded

Mr Breneman took our band

to the elementary school to perform for the elementary students Everyone was super excited to have the band

per-form

Ms Mary Jane’s science class had an amazing week learn-ing about DNA! They made several types of models!

From imagination to comple-tion, these students from Mrs

Cantrell's Graphic Design class had a great time creating de-signs for their "be kind" rocks

They learned lettering, how to mix colors, and letter place-ment! (Centering really is a thing.) Proud of these students and their awesomely creative

selves!!

Mr Strode's classes have been working on building

"Lasagna Gar-dens" for com-post

S

i

d

e

b

a

r

T

i

t

l

e

]

[

S

i

d

e

b

a

r

s

a

r

e

g

r

e

a

t

f

o

r

c

a

Lake Road is proud to welcome Officer

Ben Hudson as our new security officer

Officer Hudson was born and raised in

Obion County, TN He has a bachelor’s

degree in criminal justice and 20 years of

experience in law enforcement HIs

wife, Lauren Hudson, teaches at Obion

County Central High School They have

a one-and-a-half-year-old son

Welcome aboard Officer Hudson!

Sarah Nailling is a fifth grade math, science, and social studies teacher at Lake Road Elementary She recently was able to attend WestTeach which is a five-day development program for teachers in the 21 counties

of West Tennessee In addition regular program sessions, the class will hold an Educational Summit for legislators, district and school admin-istration in February of 2020 Throughout the program, teachers will gain insight into the economic needs and opportunities in West Tennes-see, build links with industry and community leaders and get an out-of-the-classroom view of students' lives from community child resource agents The WestTeach mission is to engage and equip West Tennessee teachers with tools and leadership skills for success in and outside of the classroom Applicants must be k-12 teachers who aspire to stay in the classroom but want to be leaders in their schools Applicants must be nominated by their Principal and the Director of Schools Selection is also based on leadership achievements and potential to contribute to the region's educational system

Ms Nailing serves on the board for the Masquerade Theatre in Union City and is a member of the UT Martin Advisory Council for the De-partment of Education She is an Obion County Leadership graduate She is a recipient of the Obion County Teacher of the Year Award (2005) She hope that participating in WestTeach will help her meet and understand the needs of business and community leaders

Sonic have partnered with LRS in an effort to award each six weeks students, with Perfect Attendance

re-wards was celebrated Friday September 27 with "Make Your Own Ice-Cream Sundae”

sponsored a County Wide "Glow Dance" on Friday 13th Everyone had a great time!

and made cards to sup-port Jeffrey Sensing at South Fulton and sup-port St Jude, and also supporting the Target House

LRS girls team placed first in the sec-tional race and therefore earned the right to advance to compete in the state race in Clarksville on Oct 5th Ethan Caldwell placed 2nd in the race and therefore earned the right to advance to state as an individual rep-resenting LRS

These are some of the students who have

participat-ed in TN College App Week! Students enjoyparticipat-ed ap-plying for free to UT Martin and Bethel University

as well as other schools of their choice

[ S i d e b a r

T i t l e ] [ S i d e b a r s

a r e

g r e a t

f o r

c a

SFE is super excited about our SRO,

Deputy Ben Burnett He is doing a

wonderful job!

One of our students, Jeffrey Sensing, is in St Jude

fighting leukemia Our Beta Club students started a

donation drive for the Target House where Jeffrey

stays at St Jude We were able to send a trailer

with lots of items to St Jude thanks to local

busi-nesses and schools Ridgemont, Lake Road, and

South Fulton Middle/High School are some of the

schools who made awesome donations Simmons

Bank also set up for community members to stop

by and donate We are so thankful for everyone

who contributed

We had a students in each grade who

partici-pated in the Banana Festival Art Contest Each

winner will have their drawing exhibited in a

storefront downtown The winners were Jase

Long, Rayne Sills, Parker Wilson, Lilly

Haynes, Ciera Jennings, and Shelby Stevens

Way to go!

 Students who made their Accelerated Reader goals participated in the reward of “Redneck Waterslide” at the People’s Place Church The church partners with SFE to host this event each year which is always a favorite with our students

 On Friday, September 20th, we celebrated our Reward School status We started the day with a recognition ceremony in the gym where students received a certificate, a McDonalds coupon for an ice cream cone, and Wendy’s sent the Wendy’s Frosty to give out Frosty certificates to our win-ners Each student who met his/her goal on the state test received this recognition AirEvac sent a helicopter, South Fulton Fire Department sent their trucks, H & R sent a tractor as did Tennes-see Tractor and Hutson John Deere dealerships for our students to explore We had music, sidewalk chalk, and other games as well The South Fulton Middle and High School band performed as well It was a great day