Dear Holmes Families: 

Good evening!  We are officially halfway through the year! 

 

2nd Semester Schedules

All students grades 6-8 will receive second semester schedules in their first period class on Tuesday, January 30th. Students who have a new 1st period class for the 2nd semester can find their new class room number on an alphabetized list (by last name) on the wall in various places throughout the building (main hallway, in front of cafeteria, and next to E Hall).  

 

Spring Semester Testing (WIDA & SOLs)

In February, we will begin our first major testing period of the Spring semester: WIDA Testing for English Learners.  For more information on WIDA Testing in English and Spanish, please visit this page on the school website.  

All 8th graders will take the Writing SOL the week of March 5th, which will then be followed by the Divisionwide assessments for English & Math.  

Within the next few weeks, we will have the May/June SOL schedule out to you for your planning purposes.

 

PTA Updates

As a follow-up to my previous note about changes to our PTA Board, the PTA has officially announced in a message sent out to the community yesterday that Julie Strandlie will be stepping down as president and Tammy Murphy will be stepping down as Vice President for Fundraising.  (NOTE: If you did not receive it, please scroll to the bottom for the full message.)  We are incredibly grateful for the work they have done to revitalize and strengthen the Holmes Middle School PTA!  

We are excited that Mr. Rob Hardin will be stepping up as the new President for the remainder of the year and will continue to lead the PTA along with Dan Aminoff as Treasurer and Vanessa Ventura as Secretary.  Thank you all so much for your service to Holmes!  We hope that you will be able to join us at tomorrow's PTA meeting at 6:30 PM in the Lecture Hall for PTA business and a presentation from the school on Mental Health & Resiliency.

In our newsletter this week:

• This Week's Schedule of Classes
• This Week's After School Program Schedule 
• Capital One Coders: Applications now being accepted
• New Navy FLEET STEM Club After School!
• FCPS Technology & Digital Citizenship Message to Families
• National Junior Honor Society (NJHS)
• Important Dates
• PTA News: Next PTA Meeting, Leadership Updates (Message from Saturday, 1/27/18)
• How To Stay In Touch

Thank you, and have a wonderful week!  

Sincerely,

Margaret Barnes, Principal

[email protected]                      

This Week's Schedule of Classes*: 1/29-2/2

This week: Mon., 1/29 = NO SCHOOL/Staff Development Day  Tues., 1/30 = Blue Day Wed., 1/31 = White Day w/ ER 1 & 2 Thurs., 2/1 = Blue Day  Fri., 2/2 = White Day w/ ER 3 & 4  *NOTE: Students can always find the blue-white calendar in their agendas or on the website HERE.

After School Program (ASP) - Week of 1/29

This week's After School Program schedule is below.  If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Mr. German Cabezas at [email protected].

Capital One Coders Applications Now Being Accepted!

Capital One Coders Program is a special 10-week coding curriculum for middle school students. The Capital One Coders Middle School Initiative supports students as they learn how to develop apps for mobile devices using App Inventor blocks-based programming language. Led by Capital One volunteers, hundreds of young students gain exposure to software engineering principles and practices.  This is the 3rd semester this program has been offered at Holmes!  We are thankful to Capital One for extending the program for us.  

20 Holmes students will have the opportunity to get hands-on experience learning software development, problem-solving, and even develop their own app.  If students are interested and committed to meeting every Wednesday from 2:30-4:00 PM for the entire 10-week program (from February 28th through May 16th), they should sign into their fcpsschools.net email accounts and fill out the application linked HERE.  The deadline for submissions is 3 PM on Thursday, February 1st.

New Navy Fleet STEM Club Afterschool!

IS YOUR STUDENT INTERESTED IN USING GAMING TO LEARN MORE ABOUT STEM?

The Future Leaders in Experience-based Engineering and Technology (FLEET) program is an innovative, competitive ship design video game for students interested in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM).  As part of the FLEET STEM Club, students will go through a 10-week curriculum that utilizes the youth-friendly model of gamification to engage students in naval ship design and enables them to apply the real-life applications of STEM using an even mix of four elements: hands-on science, dynamic instructional videos, engineering discussion topics, and pilot testing using FLEET as a virtual simulator.  

15-20 Holmes students will have the opportunity to learn underlying engineering and scientific processes in order to help them make realistic ship design decisions through the FLEET gaming platform. In the end, students will create virtual Navy vessels and compete via a web-based platform to complete several scenarios faced by naval engineers on a daily basis in the field. If your student is interested and committed to meet every Thursday from 2:30-4:00 PM for the 10-week curriculum from February 15th-April 26th, they should sign into their fcpsschools.net email accounts and fill out the interest application linked HERE.  The deadline for submissions is 3 PM on Friday, February  2nd.

FCPS Technology & Digital Citizenship Message to Families

If you purchased a device for your child this past holiday season, FCPS wants to help you support your child in the online world.  If the device is internet-enabled, please consider the following tips and resources:

 

Educate yourself and your children.

Digital citizenship is learning process and your child will need sustained support from parents and teachers. Visit bit.ly/fairfaxdigcit for a fun and interactive parent-child course that can help your family start conversations about navigating the online world.

 

Establish rules and expectations.

Have you thought about the rules you want to establish with your child for setting up accounts and the privacy settings you expect your child to use?  What are your expectations and how will you monitor your child’s online activities?  Not sure where to start? Try these tip sheets, media agreements, and device contracts.

 

Help your child monitor and manage their screen time.

It’s easy to spend hours on a device, especially when it's new.  Use these guidelines and strategies to help your children learn to monitor and manage their screen time.

 

Discuss privacy settings and accounts.

Teach your child to protect their personal information and model the use of privacy settings.  Discuss why these settings are important and teach them how to make privacy setting choices for every app and service they use.  This resource can help you get started.  

 

Give your child action steps.

Discuss potential situations that may arise before they happen and give your child action steps. Do they know what to they can do if cyber bullied, harassed, or if someone sends them something they don’t want to see? Every difficult situation is an opportunity to help prepare them for life beyond your home. These short parent advice videos, which can be filtered by topic and age, can help you identify action steps you can share with your child.  

 

Teach your child to assess risks and make good choices.

Online communication is public and permanent. Talk with your children regularly and remind them that what they do online can impact future opportunities. Their online reputation can also affect their relationships in the face to face world.

 

National Junior Honor Society Reminder

This is just a reminder that the deadline for eligible students to apply to NJHS (students were notified in December), th deadline for the application, which students can find on Google Classroom, is Wednesday, January 31st by 11:59 PM.  No applications will be accepted after that time. If you have any questions, please contact Mrs. Pickens at [email protected] or Ms. Oviatt at [email protected].

Important Dates

• Monday, 1/29 - NO SCHOOL / STUDENT HOLIDAY
• Monday, 1/29, 6:30 PM - PTA Meeting (Rescheduled from 1/8)
• Tuesday, 1/30 & Wednesday, 1/31 - Music Trips to Elementary Schools
• Wednesday, 1/31, 11:59 PM - Deadline for NJHS Applications to be Submitted
• Tuesday, 2/13 - Thursday, 2/15 - 8th Grade Court Trips (selected students only)
• Thursday, 2/15,  6:30 PM - Quarter 2 Honor Roll Ceremony
• Monday, 2/19 - NO SCHOOL / Presidents' Day Holiday 
• Wednesday, 2/21, 2:00 PM - Box Top for Education Submission Deadline

 

PTA News: Next PTA Meeting, Leadership Updates

(NOTE: Sent on behalf of the Holmes Middle School PTA, a separate organization from Holmes Middle School.  Some statements below may not necessarily reflect the school's perspective.)

Please mark your calendars for the next PTA meeting, scheduled for January 29 at 6:30 p.m. The January 8 meeting was snowed out.

It’s very important that you attend –

The PTA will discuss and plan upcoming events including teacher appreciation, family movie nights, international night, basketball game, the 8th grade celebration, and dissemination of program/teacher grants.

In addition, a Nominating Committee must be appointed to recruit officers for the 2018/2019 school year. According to the bylaws, the proposed slate will be presented at the March 12 meeting, followed by membership vote on May 14.

Each year around this time, with almost every PTA, it’s a struggle finding parents to serve in leadership positions. To help smooth the transition and onboard new leadership before the end-of-school-year-rush, we are making some officer changes. I am stepping down as PTA president, and Tammy Murphy is stepping down as VP for fundraising. The PTA has all the funds it needs to finish out the year, and we are very grateful that Tammy volunteered for this position even before she completed her two-year term as Columbia Elementary’s PTA president. She has earned and deserves a break!

Over the past year and a half, we created a turn-key PTA organizational structure, established and funded teacher professional development and after school program grants, successfully advocated for a National Junior Honor Society chapter, played a significant role in the Holmes 50th Anniversary Celebration, and more.

To continue and build on these efforts, Membership VP Rob Hardin (7th grade parent) is assuming the presidency. Dan Aminoff (6th and 8th grade parent) continues as treasurer and Vanessa Ventura will remain as secretary.  We are in the process of transitioning; I will help in the background as needed and continue to advocate in other ways for our students.

I strongly urge all parents to think about how they can make a difference. Most important – the PTA needs to fill the positions of volunteer coordinator(s) and communications coordinator as soon as possible. These roles are critical to supporting the officers, who cannot run the organization, plan and publicize all the events, and recruit all the volunteers. It’s simply too much.

Why is the PTA so important? The role of the PTA is to advocate for children, teachers, and our community. Not all things are equal in Fairfax County and the zip code you live in impacts the quality of education and services you receive. I have testified on behalf of Holmes PTA on this topic (along with teacher pay, funding for the IB program and late buses, benefits for parent liaisons, and more) before the School Board. The Board of Supervisors and the School Board have recognized the existing inequity and recently adopted the OneFairfax Resolution.

Unless and until OneFairfax is fully implemented, it will be critical for parents and the community to strongly support their community schools. This is why I’ve been so passionate about building the Holmes MS PTA.  I hope all Holmes parents will contribute what they can to this effort.   

Come out and support Rob and the team on Monday, January 29 at 6:30 p.m.  Looking forward to seeing you there!

 

Julie Strandlie

 

Immediate Past President

How To Stay In Touch

Please stay in touch with us throughout the year by:

• keeping your contact information up-to-date throughout the year
• visiting the Holmes MS website
• signing up for News You Choose
• following us on Twitter  
• monitoring your student's progress with SIS Parent Account
• join the Holmes MS PTA and attend meetings