Contents
New Items
New Board Submission Process – for All Administrators
Previous Items
Connector Certification – for Middle School & High School: Principals, Assistant Principals, Instructional Coaches, and building staff
Emergency Drills BOE Policy EBBE / Senate Bill 128 – for All Administrators
Website Training Sessions – for Principals
Communications Resources – for All Administrators
New Items
New Board Submission Process
from Jody Mitchell
To streamline the HR Board Agenda process, the District has revised the method of submitting information for Board Approval. Please see the information below for details of this change:
Due dates ??? All Board Agenda items are due at 5 p.m. the Tuesday preceding a scheduled Board Meeting. All submissions will be approved by Executive leadership prior to posting.
Submission method ??? Submission of Board Agenda items will be collected through Google forms by way of data entry. Details and instructions regarding how to enter the information for Board Approval is included in the Google form. We have also created a FAQ link with additional information.
The link to submit HR Board Agenda items can be found here.
Excel document for submission of more than 10 employees (*information must be uploaded to request form) Once the Excel document is completed, upload into the Google form.
Previous Items
Connector Certification
from Lindsey Schneider
The Connector is an online platform where teachers can attend live chat sessions with professionals and also schedule personalized discussions with their classes. It’s great for advisory, counseling, soft skills development, project-based learning, career exploration, content discoveries, and more! Last year teachers at Arrowhead, Eisenhower, and Coronado Middle Schools were able to bring the Connector to so many students in really unique and thoughtful ways!
All KCK middle and high school teachers have unlimited access to the Connector for the 2019-20 school year! For additional information about the Connector please go to: https://prepkc.nepris.com/home/v4
Connector Certified teachers will be:
– competitive in the education job market
– able to demonstrate successful technology adaptation in the classroom
– successfully showcasing college and career preparation in their lesson plans
– strengthening industry relationships to improve the classroom-to-workforce pipeline.
Prep KC has three upcoming options for Connector Level I Certification classes:
– Wednesday, July 31 from 12pm to 4pm
– Monday, August 19 from 4pm to 8pm
– Wednesday, October 9 from 4pm to 8pm
This training is highly recommended for:
– instructional coaches
– counselors
– career education teachers
– college and career staff and support teams
– administrators
– teachers with unlimited access to the Connector, which is all KCK middle and high school teachers!
This training and Level One Certification will cover:
– Full usage of the Connector site
– Lesson planning ideas and strategy time
– Session request writing
– Best practices for usage and facilitation
– Great examples and more
– Information and preparation needed for Level II Certification
To sign up, please email Brittany Verrette, bverrette@prepkc.org
If you have any questions, please feel free to contact Brittany Verrette at bverrette@prepkc.org. Please forward this information to any teachers, coaches, staff, etc. who you think may be interested.
Brittany Verrette
Connector Program Specialist I PREP-KC
bverrette@prepkc.org I 618.830.2041
Emergency Drills BOE Policy EBBE / Senate Bill 128
from Henry Horn
Governor Laura Kelly signed Senate Bill 128 into law on April 10, 2019 changing the number of safety drills K-12 schools in Kansas must perform each year from sixteen (16) to nine (9).
As schools across the state of Kansas know, Senate Bill 109 passed in 2018, schools were required to change the number and type of drills conducted during the school year.
The change required schools to conduct nine (9) crisis drills, four (4) fire drills and three (3) tornado drills during the school year, for a total of sixteen (16) drills per school year. The change was positive in bringing about crisis drills to schools, however the total number of drills proved to be overwhelming for many school districts.
With that in mind, Senate Bill 128 was introduced to change the number of drills requested for schools. The bill changes the total number of drills from sixteen (16) to nine (9). Schools must conduct at least two (2) tornado drills (one in September and on in March), three (3) crisis drills and four (4) fire drills per school year.
Crisis drills should reflect events that have a potential to occur in your school and can included but are not limited to, things such as a water main break, earthquake, missing student, hazardous spills, intruders, active shooters or medical emergencies.
The new law went into effect on July 1, 2019 and will be applicable for the 2019-2020 school year. Attached to this notice is the new drill form which reflects the change in number of drills. If you have any questions please contact one of the following persons or refer to BOE policy EBBE:
Lisa Garcia-Stewart, Director of Student Services
Henry R. Horn, Chief of Police
Joel Beckner, OSFM Prevention Education Consultant
joel.c.beckner@ks.gov or 785-296-0659
K-12 School Drills – Explanation PDF
Website Training Sessions
from Mike Keener
Please sign up 2-3 people from your school (if you like, you can sign yourself up) for training on the new school websites. Contact Mike Keener with the names of those coming, their email addresses, and which session they will be attending. You are not required to have all the trainees from your school attend the same session.
Here are the current available training session times:
Tuesday, August 13 – 8:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.
Tuesday, August 13 – 12:30 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.
Thursday, August 15 – 8:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.
Thursday, August 15 – 12:30 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.
Friday, August 16 – 8:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.
Friday, August 16 – 12:30 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.
Communications Resources
from Mike Keener
On the new website, under the Communications and Marketing tab, you will find two links: One is listed as “Marketing and Communications Assistance,” and another is listed as “School Communication and Promotional Information.” Both of these pages are password protected solely for anti-spam purposes; the general password to acces these pages is admin500.
Marketing and Communications Assistance will lead you to a short email-based form, which you can use to inform the Communications Department about upcoming events, programs or other items of import that you would like parents and the community at large to know about. The form goes to the entire communications team.
School Communication and Promotional Information gives you a list of the various means by which the Communications team can post items for you. Additionally, there is a PDF copy of our informational brochure, with more information.