00:00:05:02 - 00:00:27:52
Unknown
Welcome to Stirling High School. This is the castle connection. And I'm Jared Claiborne, your principal. It is July 16th. That's right. We were halfway through July, but we're here with you to give you some summer updates this summer. So first off, I want to give a shout out and welcome to our class of 2030. You're now rolled over into on course in our system more officially.
00:00:27:52 - 00:00:53:07
Unknown
So you're going to get all the blast that come via email and phone call that we send out. So welcome to the class of 2030 and your families to this summer and to this preparation for a great experience at Stirling High School. So a couple things. If you're new to Stirling High School, a lot of the news and information that we do send out comes out via an email, via sometimes a phone call.
00:00:53:12 - 00:01:15:33
Unknown
In this case, I send it out. The castle connection will be sent on a link in an email. So if you are a freshman parent, the emails that we currently have are the ones that we took from the school that you sent over to us. However, you can update all that information when annual registration and on course comes open, and I'll talk about that in a minute.
00:01:15:48 - 00:01:38:04
Unknown
You can also look on the website. You'll see different news. There's also banners that scroll towards the bottom that give different information. We do use Facebook Limited that Facebook is just kind of one way communication to try to push push information out. We just know that people frequent that space. So if that triggers you to check the website, then we use Facebook for that.
00:01:38:04 - 00:02:01:00
Unknown
And then once your students are in here, then most of the information sent to your students goes into teams. So you can always ask your students about teams. So that's Microsoft's product teams. That's what we use. It's similar to Google Classroom, but that's our our product that we use at the high school here. And teachers, coaches, advisors will send information through teams.
00:02:01:00 - 00:02:24:16
Unknown
You can always ask your student what's going on on teams. All right. Our big news in the summertime is we are doing the one book, one school. This is an initiative to unite us in a reading. Every one student that's reading a book for the summer that hasn't before, that's our number one win. But to engage in conversations over the same topic is going to be important.
00:02:24:16 - 00:02:50:19
Unknown
We chose a theme for the school year. That theme is Choices matter. And so with this idea of being united and reading and a theme based initiative, we chose the book The Other West. More so all students should have a copy of that. If you didn't get your copy, you want to make sure you come up to the main office between the hours of seven and three, Monday through Thursday here in the summertime to access and get your copy of the book.
00:02:50:26 - 00:03:13:16
Unknown
So our assignment, what are the assignments? Hey, listen, there's not like firm assignments on this. This is meant to be a positive reasoning experience. So we're engaging in simple activities. The first activity was like Flat Stanley. Show us a picture of where you're reading. Maybe you're on vacation and you're at the beach and something fun. Show us in the background of your picture.
00:03:13:16 - 00:03:39:09
Unknown
Where are you doing your reading this summer? The next thing is I'm going to give you a question prompt. So here it is. Your question is to talk to your family about your family background. What is your family background? What is the history of your parents or grandparents guardians? How did they get to where they are? Have those conversations whether around dinner, breakfast, the car ride?
00:03:39:16 - 00:04:09:38
Unknown
But be intentional. What is the family background in your home? And the reason we're having that is because clearly we saw two very different backgrounds. Similar, but a choice changes, a very different background for our two West Moors. So that's your challenge. Have a conversation at home. Be prepared to talk about that. When you do come into school, we are going to have an event called Books and Baskets on Tuesday, July 28th at noon, right here at the high school in the front.
00:04:09:43 - 00:04:29:04
Unknown
We're going to be on the front lawn. It's a reading experience. We're going to get together, collaborate over some reading. We're going to have discussions on that first topic, talking about your family background as we get started with this book reading. So that's on Tuesday the 28th at noon. I'll send that out to you. The summer mailing goes out every year.
00:04:29:07 - 00:04:51:36
Unknown
A summer mailing is going to go out on July 30th. This gives you some of the welcome information and some of the tasks that you can be expecting as you approach the school year. One of those things is the annual registration. So look for that snail mail summer mailing to come out July 30th. It's going to get sent out, so hopefully it's at your mailbox by Monday, August 3rd.
00:04:51:38 - 00:05:15:26
Unknown
In that you're going to get information on annual on course registration. So all students, regardless of the age, are required to complete annual registration. This is where you, as a parent, get to control all of your demographic information, update your cell phone, update your email, and update your emergency contacts so you are in control of who gets the blast.
00:05:15:26 - 00:05:36:14
Unknown
So as I said now our class of 2030 is into the system. You're going to get the blast that we have based on the contact information that we have. Once annual registration goes in, you'll be able to go in there, see what contact information or put in new contact information. So we're giving you the information best. So all students have to do that.
00:05:36:14 - 00:05:56:16
Unknown
It's going to open on Tuesday August 4th. If you do not complete this you will not have access to your schedule. So any student that doesn't have this done will not be able to see what their schedule is for the fall, so make sure that gets done. All right. Athletic schedules are also available for the fall. I'm going to send out a link.
00:05:56:19 - 00:06:17:21
Unknown
Mr. Siano did a little create video that shows how you can access that information. So if you are a fan or an athlete and you are trying to find out what those schedules are, they are available online. You can find it on the website. I'm going to show you a link on how to do that. I do want you to know that we do monitor what's happening at the castle during the summertime.
00:06:17:21 - 00:06:39:55
Unknown
The NJSIAa does not govern what happens at the high school. We do kind of contain that a little bit. It's important for you to know, though, that that we do not have a full time trainer on, on, on campus, the workouts that are done or pretty much volunteer by programs and are encouraged healthy activities for your students. But make sure we are monitoring heat.
00:06:40:04 - 00:07:06:07
Unknown
When there are heat advisories, we are reducing practice times and even air quality like we're seeing and experiencing right now. So we are monitoring those things. Reminder we do have summer construction projects on campus, so if you just see those, make sure you stay clear of them. That means that there are extra people on site doing work. All of those people are registered and cleared to be on campus, but make sure that we are staying away from construction zones.
00:07:06:09 - 00:07:30:07
Unknown
We're having great projects on HVAC in the media center, some classrooms, getting new flooring, those same classrooms are getting the new furniture that is that prosocial learning furniture that allows for small groups. So those are happening in a handful of classrooms and in a couple offices as well. A couple more. Two things ahead of the school year that I want you to pay attention to.
00:07:30:09 - 00:07:57:43
Unknown
Number one, parking at nucleus. Parking at nucleus is always been a point of frustration, but it is now a finite information piece. There is no longer parking for sterling students. At Nucleus Sterling. Students that choose to park there will get towed starting in September, so you cannot park there. So make sure you are communicating that our goal. We have enough parking for all students.
00:07:57:43 - 00:08:16:48
Unknown
We want you to park with us. You have to register to park with us, so make sure you're doing that. If your student plans to drive to school and park on campus, which is what we want, they still have to register so that we know exactly what car is on our campus and who it belongs to. Also, be in tune for an attendance procedure.
00:08:16:48 - 00:08:50:16
Unknown
Update. One of our policies we're looking to update is a total amount of attendance. Unfortunately, we have students that get jammed up with health items. If you have legitimate health things, then we need to pursue what's called homebound instruction if it is deemed necessary by a doctor. But if you are a person that has multiple absences and you are getting doctor's notes from multiple various various places, that could put you in a position where you exceed a total number of max absences, right?
00:08:50:16 - 00:09:11:31
Unknown
Because we have to verify with the state of new Jersey that you are meeting the seat time required to earn credit in each class. So look for information on that. But we are looking to tighten up to make sure that whether you have excuse or unexcused absences, a total might count against whether or not you earned credit in those classes.
00:09:11:31 - 00:09:32:24
Unknown
So we'll keep you posted on that again. We're here Monday through Thursday, 7 to 3 all summer long. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to reach out. Remember, counselors are not here in the summertime and teachers are not always here. So if you email them, you might not get a response. But if you emailed administration, we're happy to assist you.
00:09:32:28 - 00:09:46:12
Unknown
Have a wonderful summer. As you continue to enjoy the heat and and the outdoors. Hopefully you're getting vacations in. And don't forget that summer reading one book, one school we're reading together. Have a great day and as always, go nights.