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Nickajack  2012-2013  Beat

This Newletter is jointly sponsored by the PTA and the NES Foundation 

 

Issue: 2012- 059         

May 21, 2013 



In This Issue
Early Release Days
5th Grade Walk of Honor
Library Books Due
Lost & Found
2013-2014 Teacher of the Year
Mayor's Award
AR Reader Awards
AR Teacher Awards
Chess Scrimmage
PTA Outstanding Volunteers
PTA Outstanding Volunteers of the Year
Heathier US School - NES!

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2012-2013
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PTA Pals


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Gold PTA Pals
 
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Moore

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Warner
Vickery Benesh VSA4beat
k-9 Coach
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  CA&A

Silver PTA Pals

vinings lake church 
Music Studio  
Playin' on Purpose  
 becky jones Macaroni Kid  
beachbody Spanish  
  Genesis lola rose  ssf   MK Stacy Lange  
Pedo at Vinings
Smyrna eye   Gateway fan sam then again  McCray's
Litttle Studio New


chess 2 children 2012

 
Bronze PTA Pals
 
    
Overtime Athletics
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Smyrna Bicycles

Early Release Days Ahead
Wed., May 22 and Thurs. May 23

bus Please note, school will dismiss early on Wed., May 22nd and Thurs., May 23rd.

Students must take all items home on Wed.  Nothing (backpacks/book bags) can be taken home on the bus on Thursday, May 23rd. 

Dismissal time will be at 12:30 pm.  The ASP program will begin at dismissal.  

 

5th Grade Walk of Honor
Thursday, 12:10 pm

graduation Come watch our 5th graders take their last walk through the hallowed halls of their beloved Nickajack!  Be sure to bring tissue!  Tears of sorrow and JOY will be shed as these students make their journey to middle school!

Congratulations boys and girls!

 

Library Books
Must Be Returned or Paid for if Lost

Books Parents please note:  Report cards will be held until all library books are returned to the media center or if the books are lost, then cash payment is made to the school for any fines.

Books found after the last day of school, (5/23) should be brought into the school and given to the front office staff.  Please DO NOT leave books outside the school doors.

Refunds will only be given for materials found and previously paid for during the 2012-2013 school year if returned to the front office before May 29th. 
Lost and Found - Please Come Claim
 
The school lost and found is brimming with students' jackets, lunch boxes, hats, etc....
 
Please take a moment to stop by the school to take a look. Our wonderful custodians have laid out all the items on tables in the front hallways for your to easily view.
 
Items such as eyeglasses, cell phones, and the like are kept in the front office. 
 
All items not claimed by the last day of school will be donated to a worthy organization. 
 
2013-2014 Teacher of the Year!
Ms. Amanda Newman

Amanda Newman We are pleased to announce that first grade teacher, Ms. Amanda Newman has been nominated, and voted on by the faculty and staff at Nickajack to serve as our 2013-2014 Teacher of the Year!!

Please join us in congratulating this wonderful teacher!
Mayor's Awards
2nd Half of the Year Recipients Recognized

Please join us in congratulating our most recent Mayor's Award recipients.  Mayor Max Bacon presents these awards twice a school year to deserving students, staff and volunteers within the Smyrna area schools.  Recipients are nominated and voted upon by faculty and staff. 

Student:  Marcos Ramirez
Marcos Ramierez

3rd Grade- Mrs. Paller/Ms. Kreitlow

Marcos has attended Nickajack since the First Grade.  Since then, Marcos has made significant progress in all academic areas.  He is also an English Language Learner and has made great strides in mastering English and in his oral communication skills.  This year, he is a member of the DREAM Team  and is a role model, in which other students emulate.  Marcos is well deserving of the Mayor's Student Award.

 

Staff: Mrs. Jessica Powers
Jessica Powers

Jessica came to Nickajack in the middle of the year and hit the ground running.  She is scheduled  to work two hours a day but always puts in more time.  She is excellent on spreadsheets on the computer and enjoys extra projects using this media.  Her smile and friendliness is contagious.  She also substitutes in classes when her work is finished in the office.  She is definitely an asset to our office staff.

 

Volunteer:  Mrs. Beth Figaretti and Mrs. Allyson Balzuweit Beth & Allyson

Beth and Allyson do many of their volunteer tasks together.  They are both very active PTA members.  Both of these ladies regularly come in and support AR for the multiage class and Allyson supports Ms. McDonald's class  for AR as well.  Allyson is also a room parent for multiage and for Ms. McDonald's class.  Both ladies for the last two years have been in charge of the Nickajack Dash and the Silent Auction.  This is an amazing event for PTA that not only raises funds for Nickajack, but also brings the community together as a whole for a fun filled, family event.  Allyson and Beth also volunteer regularly to help with KC Club, the PTA Book Fair and often they sign up to assist whenever any other volunteer sign ups are posted.  Nickajack is very lucky to have these two very dedicated, caring volunteers. 

Accelerated Reader Awards
4th Nine Weeks and End of Year

The PTA and our PTA Pal, The Book Stop, are pleased to recognize the Accelerated Reader winners for the 4th nine weeks:

 

The following students were awarded a gift  

ceThe Bookstop logotificate from The Book Stop for a free book.


These students consistently read and took AR

tests!

 

Kindergarten: Miles Trumble with 5.4 points

1st Grade: Noah Butts with 18.0 points

2nd grade: Jonathan Fairgrieves with 49.6 points

3rd grade: Chandler Cornelius with 82.4 points

4th grade: Erin Yoo with 63.5 points

5th grade: Leah Fontenot with 172.8 points

 

We would also like to recognize three students from each grade that have the most AR points for the whole year.  These students received a coupon from our Partner in Education, Chick-Fil-A, for an IceDream cup.

  chick fil a

Kindergarten: 

#3 Jack Balzuweit with 24.5

#2 Hunter Fennel  with 50.8

#1 Anna Figaretti with 55.6

 

1st grade:

#3 Saraann Levine with 54.3

#2 Jackson Brooks with 60.2

#1 Rachel Levine with 103.5

 

2nd grade:

#3 Jonathan Fairgrieves with 100.6

#2 Sophie Balzuweit with 106.0

#1 Malia Yost with 173.4

 

3rd grade:

#3 Emma Miller with 320.3

#2 Katherine Childs with 362.8

#1 Ansley Bailey with 405.2

 

 4th grade:

#3 Taylor Spaulding with 164.3

#2 Sarah Delima with 327.0

#1 Alexander Melzer with 412.8

 

5th grade:

#3 Maria Harar with 416.3

#2 Devin Wade with 516.0 

#1 Damon Lin with 928.7

 

The student with the most AR points for each grade were also awarded a gift certificate for The Book Stop from Ms. Parks.

 

Congratulations boys and girls!  

 

Keep reading this summer and don't forget to sign up for the Scholastic Summer Reading Challenge and the Cobb County Library Summer Reading Program to win more prizes and to continue to improve your reading skills!


Accelerated Reader Teacher Awards
Highest Participation

Reading Our PTA Literacy Committee would like to recognize the classes that were tops in participation in the AR program for this school year.

We had a large number of our classes that had many students read many, many books this year, and take many, many AR tests!.

The Top Classes in Participation are:

 

 Kindergarten - Mrs. Butler's class

1st grade - Ms. Love-Mahone's class

2nd grade - Ms. Wood's class

3rd grade - Ms. Alleyne's class

4th grade - Ms. Nelson's class

5th grade- Ms. Bassett's class

 

Congratulations to these classes, and thank you to the teachers for encouraging Nickajack students to read and participate in the AR program!


NES and Whitefield Academy Chess Scrimmage
chess club 2013
The Nickajack Chess Club had another busy and successful year in
2012-2013!  In addition to having quite a few new children exposed to the game, we continued to strengthen our Intermediate and Advanced childrens' game this year.  
chess trophies   
A couple events that we did late in the year included the 2nd Annual Chess2Children Chess Tournament that we held on April 28th at The Galloway School.   We had over 60 children participate, with 17 from Nickajack Elementary!   All of the kids did very well, including a few that earned top finisher trophies!  Also, on May 17th, 30 students from Nickajack traveled over to Whitefield to scrimmage their team.  This was the first time we did something like this, and it was a huge success!   We had many of our younger children participate in their first tournament style event, and did very well.  Overall, our K-2 group and our 3rd-5th group ended up with more points than the Whitefield teams and displayed fantastic sportsmanship!  
 
We were very proud of all the children this year that participated in the chess club and we continue to be excited about the future of our club!   If you have any interest in summer programs or questions about the program, do not hesitate to contact Tarun Ganeriwal, (tarun.ganeriwal@gmail.com or 404-964-1355).   

PTA Outstanding Parent Volunteers Recognized

The following parents were recently recognized at the final character assembly of the year.  Please join us in congratulating these individuals for being outstanding PTA volunteers! 

Great job
Saralee and Daniel Parker

The Parkers not only serve as room parents for both of their children's classes but are also room parent coordinators and do whatever is necessary in other classes. Saralee is very active in several classrooms lending her expertise and MyOn program to the children and teachers. Both Daniel and Saralee are always ready and willing to step in whenever and wherever they are needed. They were here EVERY day during Teacher Appreciation Week working behind the scenes to make sure everything went smoothly for our teachers and staff. They step in cheerfully and have already been a big help with field day! The Parkers deserve to be recognized for all their contributions. :)

 

Meredith Yahne

Mrs. Yahne has donated her time and efforts to Nickajack elementary for years. She has worked to help establish and continue making the Nickajack Foundation as successful as possible. She has organized donation collections for the Foundation and supported students though Foundation Grants and supplying the school with a computer class and teacher. The grants have provided classroom needs and helped to build the school community. She is an active parent volunteer in the classroom. She even meets with the Kindness and Compassion Club! She is a very active parent volunteer for our school. Please thank Mrs. Yahne for recognition for her efforts.

 

Lou Bates

Lou goes above and beyond the average volunteer.  He supports the school in many ways including directing traffic and talking down road raged drivers at the open house, serving as the fundraising director for the Nickajack Foundation and actively participating in his daughter's classroom.  We appreciate all that you give to our school!

 

Faye Yost

In addition to Faye Yost's new job in the Media Center at Nickajack Elementary, Faye is still an active parent volunteer at the school.  She makes the time to volunteer for each event, works on The Beat e-newsletter and basically helps out in any way that she can.  Her efforts are recognized and appreciated. 

 

Rhonda Powell-Woodard

We would like to recognize and thank our PTA co-president Rhonda Powell-Woodard for all her volunteer hours.  In addition to her time she puts into PTA and Jessye Coleman council, she finds the time to help out in the Front Office as well.  She is always flexible and has a wealth of knowledge in all areas. We sincerely appreciate her willingness to assist and her commitment to our students, parents and school!!

 

Brenda Plaugher

We would like to recognize and thank or PTA Co-President Brenda Plaugher for stepping up to do this very important role.  Brenda is a relatively new parent here at Nickajack.  This is only her second year here, yet, she realized early on the importance of getting involved with her child's education.  In her first year she served as the PTA's Hospitality Committee Chair and then this year, she stepped up to be one of the Co-Presidents getting heavily involved with our PTA Pals and the weekly e-newsletter, The Beat.  She is also solely responsible for keeping us all aware of the happenings around Nickajack via Facebook and Twitter.  We would like to recognize Brenda for her commitment and dedication to Nickajack and all of our students!


PTA Outstanding Parent Volunteers of the Year
Chosen by YOU!

Based on the recent survey sent out to all of you, the following two volunteers were chosen by YOU as the 2012-2013 PTA Volunteers of the Year!  Both volunteers were also recently recognized at the last character assembly.thank you

Katy Weihe and Sam Spaulding!

Katy serves as one of our Co-Literacy Chairs and also the KC Club Chairperson.  She has two children, Ian, in Kindergarten and Kylie, in 5th grade.  Katy also actively assists in both of her kids classrooms and can be seen volunteering at almost every school, Foundation and PTA event.

Sam serves on the Foundation Board as Secretary.  He has a daughter, Taylor, in 4th grade.  He is also very active with his daughter's class, the F.B.I. (fathers being involved) and also can been seen volunteering at almost every school, Foundation and PTA event. 
 
Thank you Katy and Sam for your dedication and commitment to improving our school for all of our children!

NES Meets the HealthierUS School Challenge! 
Bronze Award of Distinction

 

Nickajack Elementary School is making national news by working to support and improve the health of our children and our community. As part of their effort, Nickajack Elementary School is featuring healthy items on its menus and emphasizing physical education and activity to students. The schools efforts are part of the HealthierUS School Challenge.

 

Nickajack Elementary School qualified for the Bronze Award of Distinction.

 

The HealthierUS School Challenge (HUSSC) is a voluntary certification available to schools participating in the National School Lunch Program.  It supports First Lady Michelle Obama's Let's Move! campaign by recognizing schools that create healthier school environments through  promotion of good nutrition and physical activity.  Sponsored by the USDA Food and Nutrition Service (FNS), the initiative encourages all schools to take a leadership role in helping students make healthier eating and activity choices that will last a lifetime.  

 

Schools, including Nickajack Elementary School, that champion the HUSSC work hard to make changes to their school nutrition environment in order to (1) improve the quality of the foods served, (2) provide students with nutrition education, and (3) provide students with physical education and opportunities for physical activity. 

 

To qualify for an award, a school must submit a formal application and meet basic criteria set forth by the FNS.  The HUSSC criteria reflect the recommendations of the 2005 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, and the Institute of Medicine (IOM), and also apply to those foods sold outside of the organized school lunch meal.  HealthierUS Schools must also have a local school wellness policy and those that receive the HUUSC award commit to meeting the criteria throughout their four year certification period.