Dear LACHSA Community,
I am excited to welcome all of our students back to school this Wednesday, September 1st! I would like to begin by thanking all of our incoming students and their families who participated in our first-ever New Student Orientation. I was inspired by your infectious enthusiasm and boundless joy. I also want to acknowledge the amazing work our LACHSA Parent Council for their tireless and amazing support. I look forward to an fantastic year!
One of the most important aspects of my responsibilities is to ensure
that the faculty I hire are the best faculty to teach your children. I wanted to update you on our recent recruitment process.
I am pleased to welcome Candace Chiang, a graduate of the University of Wisconsin at Madison--with a degree in linguistics--to teach our Mandarin classes. A native of Taiwan, she will infuse these classes with an authentic cultural aesthetic and arts-infused curriculum.
Two of our most seasoned faculty will also make their return to LACHSA this year. Jerry Freedman and Phyllis McQuery will return to their teaching posts; their complicated employment arrangements are now--and officially--a thing of the past.
The extensive RiF (reduction-in-force) faced by LACOE faculty and staff
this year caused a significant delay in our recruitment process. We were able to
commence this process in earnest in early August. While much later
that I would have preferred, we were still able to screen applications
and hold interviews for the numerous positions for which we had
vacancies. Despite the countless evening and weekend hours interviewing, there are
currently two teaching vacancies that still remain unfilled. There were simply no suitable candidates available in this first round of recruiting for our earth science and chemistry/biology positions. I was not prepared to hire a lacklustre teacher simply because they held the appropriate teaching credential. I have listed these two vacancies for an additional posting in the hopes of finding two teachers worthy of our school and our students.
While this will affect the students in these classes in the short term, it will not affect these students in the long term. I hope to bring this entire process to a close by week's end and have faculty in place by September 10th. Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions or concerns.
Please review the first week of school as outlined on our website. Our first day is as follows:
First Day with Students
September 1st, 2010
8:00 Meet in Arts (students will receive their schedules)
Visual Art: King Hall Lecture hall 2
Theatre: PE 134
Dance: King Hall Studio 1
Music: Music 149
9:15 Community Welcome at Golden Eagle Ballroom
ASB President Alex Cameron: Welcome Remarks
Administration Address
Staff Introductions by all department chairs
All-school Photograph
Class Round Walk Through (begins at 10:30)
Day ends at 12:35 p.m.
|
