Service Project
The Advanced Civics classes are hosting a service project that will run from December 3 - December 21. In support of the NGSSS Civics state standards, advanced civics students are leading a letter writing campaign for troops serving overseas this holiday sesaon. It is our hope that this activity will support not only our students' civic participation, but also our extended SPMS family!
Cardboard "mailboxes" will be located in various locations around the school where students can drop their letters, notes, drawings, etc. to be mailed overseas. Civics students will be responsible for collecting the letters, proofing them for appropriateness, and packaging /mailing them off.
If parents would like to "sponsor" the postage of a package of letters, or suggest a recipient (family or friend) who is currently serving overseas, please contact Ms. Megan Miller or Ms. Darlene Dowling via email for more information.
Semester Exam Schedule
Tuesday, Dec. 18th - White day - no study hall
During exams, students only attend classes testing.
Wednesday, Dec. 19th - Exams in Silver 2 & Silver 3
Thursday, Dec. 20th - Exams in Black 2 and Silver 4
Friday, Dec. 21st - Exams in Black 3 & Black 4
Semester Exams are cumulative and count as 20% of the students semester grade.
Exams will NOT be administered early. Make-ups for exams will be Monday, January 7th and Tuesday, January 8th when we return from the holiday break.
Proposed 2013-2014 School Calendar
The St. Johns County School District is seeking comments on the proposed 2013-2014 school calendar. A survey link is now available on the school district website for community members to provide input on the calendar. The proposed calendar can be downloaded and printed. The survey link can be accessed at www.stjohns.k12.fl.us/calendar or under "What's New" on the school district home page. Individuals are encouraged to submit any ideas, suggestions or concerns about the proposed calendar. Feedback will be collected through December 4. The final proposed calendar must be approved by the School Board.
Click here to read the Superintendent's Weekly Review
dated 11/27/2012
Science Fair
We are looking for judges with field or occupational experience in the following fields-
Engineering- Design and manufacturing, technical fields, possible computer engineers, mechanical engineers
Environmental Sciences- Geology, Environmental Engineering etc.
Physical Sciences- Chemistry/Physics, pharmacists, consumer sciences
Life Science- Biology, microbiology, vets, doctors, botanists, biotechnical fields
Judges should not be the parent or guardian of any student submitting a science fair project this year.
Judges will need to be present from 7:00-2pm on the day of the fair, Wednesday, December 19th
Judges need to go through the ID process prior to fair date.
Click here to register as a volunteer for St. Johns County
Judges can email Christy Milton with their area of expertise or area they feel most comfortable judging, so a welcome letter can be mailed. Her email address is christina.milton@stjohns.k12.fl.us.
In my efforts to keep you informed about educational changes, please read the two sections below.
Civics End-of-Course Exam (EOC)
The State will field test the new Civics EOC this year at selected schools. During the 2013-2014 school year (current 6th graders) students will take the Civics EOC and it will count 30% of their overall course grade. The following year in 2014-2015 (current 5th graders), the Civics EOC must be passed to leave middle school.
In St. Johns County 7th graders take Civics. Other districts have chosen to offer Civics to 8th graders.
Mr. Brown, the Social Studies Program Specialist from St. Johns, attended a state conference and sent the message below to middle school principals and teachers. I am sharing with you, so that you understand why we are increasing the cognitivity complexity of our tests here at Swiss Point to ensure that your students will be prepared.
Click here to see some moderate to high complexity level questions. As a reminder, a minimum of 75% of the questions on the FLDOE EOC will be moderate to highly complex. That means the vast majority of the questions on the EOC and DFAs will ask students to think beyond simple recall and identification. Also, I was told at the state conference that around 70% of the EOC questions will include maps, timelines, charts, graphs, tables, cartoons, images, or excerpt based questions. That means those are the types of questions our students need to be seeing in class as well. Civics is the only middle school class that currently has a state EOC.
Interview with Former Governor Jeb Bush on Education
State Impact Feature: Jeb Bush Talks Education
Forty-five states and the District of Columbia have signed on to implement new school curriculum and standardized tests.
It's called Common Core, and it'll replace Florida's FCAT.
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush is a big supporter of Common Core - and has been pushing this and other reform efforts around the country.
Education reporter Sarah Gonzalez with our StateImpact Florida team sat down with the conservative education advocate to talk about his national agenda.
Click the following link to listen to the interview:
Click here to listen to the interview
Sarah: Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, thanks for joining me.
Jeb: Yes, delighted to be here.
Sarah: You are known as the "Education Governor," you were a big proponent of standardized testing when you were the governor, the FCAT, but now its being replaced by Common Core in 2014. What do you think about that?
Jeb: Well first of all the FCAT, the dreaded FCAT that gives all children acne and makes then nauseous during the testing period, it will be replaced with a new test that will measure competency based on new standards. So the common core state standards are higher, they're fewer, they require more critical thinking skills and they will unfortunately at the beginning , they will probably show that close to two-thirds of our students are not college or career ready.
Sarah: We at StateImpact Florida are doing a series on remedial classes. We crunched the numbers and it turns out that of the students in Florida who graduated from high school recently, 54% of the students who took the college placement test had to take at least one remedial class. So they were not ready for college? Do you think that the goal of the FCAT was to determine whether or not students were college ready? Or just to determine whether or not students were ready to graduate from high school?
Jeb: Um, it's (FCAT) really a gateway to graduate from high school, not to be college ready, as evidenced by the fact that gosh 12% or 13% of students don't graduate because they can't pass a 10th grade level test, or worse yet as you said 50% of our students need remedial work to be able to take a college course, which is why the Common Core standards I think are a better indicator of that.
Sarah: I'm wondering where does faith in Common Core come from? Because it hasn't really been field tested anywhere and proven to work anywhere, so where does your support come from?
Jeb: Right. Because I've talked to a lot of people who are experts in the field of standards and what kids need to learn in the 21st Century to be successful. And what they say is that the greatest country in the face of the earth measures itself to lower standards than what the best is in the world. So I would argue that we should embark on this journey.
Sarah: Now you have advocated for education reform in Florida and outside of Florida and I'm wondering in light of the recent election, I know that some of the education reforms that you were pushing like in Indiana and Idaho didn't pass like pay for performance, requiring online classes, things like that. Do you consider it a setback to your education agenda?
Jeb: Eh. Well it's not my education agenda it's the education agenda of the Indiana governor, the Indiana state school office, the Indiana legislature, the Indiana business community that Tony Bennett didn't get elected. In Idaho, my gosh, Florida requires one online course in order to graduate from high school. No big deal in my mind. But in Idaho that became a controversial thing, give me a break.
The unions are very good at defending their turf and that's exactly what happened in South Dakota and Idaho. That doesn't mean the fight stops, you know, the fight will continue. In Washington state there was a passage of a charter school law. Washington state was, I think, one of eight states that didn't have a charter school law. In Georgia, they passed a constitutional amendment to allow for a statewide authorizer for charter schools. to kind of force more innovation at the local level.
So it was a mixed night, for sure.
And at the national level we have an interesting dynamic. Education is one of the few places where you have left/right coalitions that are for reform and left/right coalitions that are against reform. Its not as monolithic as some other areas of policy so I don't think much changes with the Presidents re-election. In fact think this is the one area where there is enough common ground to build on it.
