Week 7: Forty-Five Minutes Out

Happy Friday!

Thank you for another strong week. Last week our report card showed what focused instruction can do, and it showed that an A is only 11.69 points away. This week I want to talk about something underneath every one of those numbers: how we communicate with families. None of our three performance targets- academic growth, attendance at or above 93.5 percent, and improved behavior and school climate- move very far without families who trust us and hear from us before they have reason to worry.

Forty-Five Minutes Out

Early in my teaching career, I often took students many miles from home for agricultural/FFA education contests and activities. Parents were placing a great deal of trust in a young teacher, and there were no cell phones. The planning had to happen before we left the parking lot. When did the contest start, and how long would it run? How much money would I and the students need and what had to be paid ahead of time? How long to load students and equipment? Where would we eat, and would we need fuel? What about weather or a contest that ran long? How many hours was the drive home? Once I had worked it all out, I gave parents a written plan and an approximate return time.

That estimate mattered. Families used it to decide whether their child could go, to arrange rides, and to know when to be waiting in the parking lot. Most of all, it told them someone had thought through the details before asking for their trust.

When cell phones came along, I added one more practice. When we were about 45 minutes from home, I had the students call their parents. It was convenient for me, but the larger reason was that it released the responsibility to the students. When someone is waiting on you, you let them know where you are and when you will be there.

Good communication is part of the planning. Before any event, deadline, or change, ask what families will need to know, what they will need to arrange, and when they need to hear from us to have time to respond.

So whatever the task, whether it is a field trip, a schedule change, or a student who is starting to slip, I am asking all of us to think "45 minutes out." Look ahead, anticipate what the people depending on us will need, and let them know before they ever have to wonder.

No Surprises

That foresight matters most when a student is struggling. Parent/Teacher Conferences should never be the first time a family hears that we are concerned. No parent should leave a conference thinking, “I wish I had known.”

Please send progress home frequently. A short update should tell families how their child is doing, what needs attention, what support we are already providing, and what they can do next. Include the good news too. A family that hears about growth every week is ready to hear a concern when one comes. Whenever possible, let students help explain their own progress, the same way my students made the call home. This also connects to our report card: the last 11.69 points live in the growth of our lowest-quartile students, and those are the families who most need to hear from us early and often.

What ParentSquare Is Telling Us

We now have a tool built for this work, and the early numbers from ParentSquare show that many of you are already using it. Since August:

* 99.7 percent of our families are reachable. Only five family records need attention.

* Staff and families have exchanged 596 direct messages across 304 conversations, and 81 parents have started messages of their own.

* Staff have published 64 posts, and 172 parents have responded with 109 appreciations and 19 comments.

* 45 teachers have posted or messaged families, and several have each sent dozens of direct messages.

Thank you to every teacher who has been using ParentSquare to keep families informed. Our elementary campuses are leading the way. Now for the room to grow: about four out of five staff users have not yet published a post, and far fewer posts have come from our middle school and high school. Secondary teachers see more families, which is exactly why this tool saves time. If you have not used it much yet, start this week with one class post and one direct message to a family you have not heard from lately. Also encourage parents to download the app. Only 23 percent have it, and those who do get our messages as notifications instead of waiting in an inbox.

If you would like to see the full ParentSquare data dashboard with the most recent numbers, you may view it here.

When to Pick Up the Phone

Written messages carry our words without our voice, and tone is the first thing lost. In studies by Justin Kruger and Nicholas Epley, email senders expected readers to catch their intended tone about 89 percent of the time, but readers got it right only about 63 percent of the time. By voice, accuracy rose to about 73 percent. Kristin Byron’s research found that readers often take work emails as more negative than intended, so a note meant as concerned can land as critical. And although most of us expect phone calls to feel awkward, Amit Kumar and Nicholas Epley found that calls built a stronger connection than email and were no more awkward.

Use written messages for reminders, updates, and routine progress. Pick up the phone when you are sharing a concern for the first time, when the topic is sensitive, when a parent is upset, when a thread keeps going back and forth, or when you want a family to hear good news in your voice. Follow an important call with a short written summary. After all, the call home at 45 minutes out was a phone call. Families appreciated hearing their child’s voice. They will appreciate hearing yours too.

Natural State Ornament Project

The Arkansas Department of Education has invited each school building to submit one student-designed ornament for the holiday tree at the Arkansas State Capitol through the Natural State Ornament Project. The theme is Symbols of Our State, such as the state bird, flower, tree, mammal, insect, or flag.

* Designs must be hand-drawn, painted, or colored by a student. No AI-generated or computer-created artwork will be accepted.

* Students must use the official ornament template, and the selected design must be scanned as a JPEG.

* Each building chooses its own design in October. The entry form in the link must be submitted by October 24th. Submissions are due to the Department on November 13th, the display opens November 16th, and ornaments return in January.

If your students take part, let their families know now. A parent whose child’s design might hang in the State Capitol will want to hear about it early.

Closing Celebrations

What a week it has been. Homecoming week filled our buildings with festivities, school colors, and the kind of energy you can only get when an entire community pulls in the same direction. If anyone doubted it, this morning’s pep rally settled the question. It was loud, it was proud, and it was a preview of what we expect tonight: a big and excited crowd at Bob Carver Bearcat Stadium as our Bearcats open conference play against Waldron. Homecoming is one of the few nights each year when current students, alumni, families, and neighbors all fill the same stands for the same reason. That shared joy is not a small thing. It is the kind of unity that carries into our classrooms next week and reminds all of us that these are our kids, and this is our school.

Please note that the Homecoming Ceremony has moved to 6:15 p.m., ahead of the 7:00 p.m. kickoff, so we can recognize our Homecoming Court and honor the 1976 State Championship Football Team. Fifty years later, that team is still part of what it means to be a Bearcat, and I hope you will be in your seat early to welcome them home.

The academic news this week was just as worth cheering. The Office for Education Policy at the University of Arkansas recognized all four of our schools in its annual Outstanding Educational Performance Awards for high student growth on ATLAS. Louise Durham Elementary and Holly Harshman Elementary each earned High ELA Growth in the Southwest region. Mena Middle School earned High Math Growth statewide, along with High Overall Growth, High Math Growth, and High ELA Growth in the Southwest region. Mena High School earned High Math Growth in the Southwest region, finishing in the top five in the region. Last week I wrote that reading growth is where our last points live. It is encouraging to see that our elementary campuses are already being recognized for exactly that.

Our athletes had a full week as well. Bearcat Golf hosted the 4A Conference Tournament at Glenwood Country Club and came away as 4A Conference Champions, taking the top two individual spots, while our Ladycats finished fourth. The Bearcats advance to the 4A State Tournament in Harrison on October 5 and 6, and one of our Ladycats qualified individually for the Girls State Tournament at Sage Meadows on September 28 and 29. Thank you to the golf families, volunteers, local supporters, and Glenwood Country Club for making that tournament possible. On the volleyball court, all three Ladycat teams beat Ozark on Tuesday, and our junior Ladycats followed with a 2–1 win over Hackett yesterday. In junior high football, our seventh graders beat Waldron 18–8, and our junior Bearcats won 32–0. In our tennis match at DeQueen, the Ladycats won both of their matches and the Bearcats split theirs.

A reminder that Monday, September 28, is a Teacher Professional Development Day, with no school for students.

This week in Mena Morphology Matters, our students studied phon, meaning sound. Next week’s root is lingua, meaning language or tongue. Our youngest students will meet it through speak and language, our third through fifth graders in language, our middle school students in linguistics, and our high school students in multilingual, with bilingual and linguist available across every grade band. The Bearcat Word Detective Challenge asks students how life would be different without language. After a week spent thinking about how we talk with families, it is a fitting root. Language is how trust gets built, one message and one phone call at a time.

It was a good week of homecoming at Mena Public Schools.

At Mena Public Schools, our students are prepared, our staff is supported, and our community is confident.

Keep Leveling-Up, and have a great homecoming weekend!

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