Every Voice Matters
In the early 1990s, there was a tv show called Quantum Leap about a scientist, Sam Beckett, stuck in an experiment gone wrong that sends him back and forth in time leaping into a new body each time. It was funny to watch him embody a new person each episode and try to figure out each new situation on the fly. This time of year, in the cycle of the school year, I feel a little bit like Sam Beckett.
While we are fully focused on the educational experiences of this school year, we are also currently fully looking toward next year. I find myself mentally traveling forward in time, imagining what life would be like at the school next year if this or that was different, taking on different perspectives and trying to predict what might work. At the same time, we are working within a budget that is still significantly lower than it was seven years ago (when we received approximately $500 more per pupil, totaling almost $120,000 more in the budget). I travel back in time, looking at previous budgets, and see how fieldwork was able to be funded by the school for students, teachers were supported with professional development, instructional budgets were robust. I wonder what opportunities we could be afforded if, at the very least, we were provided the same money per pupil than we received seven years ago. Moreso, our operating budget pays salaries, our rent of the building from the city, maintenance costs, snow removal, janitorial services, as well as textbooks, fieldwork, and instructional supplies. Every year, we are asked to do more with less which is why it is so important for us to participate in the advocacy efforts this Spring in Annapolis.
Let’s join together to write letters, attend legislative sessions, participate in rallies, and promote these efforts on social media. Our next big event is on March 11th in Annapolis at a statewide rally in support of fully funding all public education in Maryland. We have a number of buses leaving CNH at 4:00 and returning by about 8:30 pm. Bagged dinners (sandwiches, fruit, chips, etc) will be served. Sign up here if you’d like to join the City Neighbors team! Hopefully, through the various forms of advocacy, our voices will be heard, and our children’s educations will be fully funded in both traditional public and in public charter schools across the state. I will continue to dream about my Quantum Leap into next year with us being able to fully fund an even more robust set of educational experiences for all of our students at CNH!
Happy 25th week of school, everybody!
–Dr. Shyla.
All-School This Friday!
Families! Please join us for All School this Friday, March 1st at 2:30-3:15 for a Presentation of Learning from our Middle School Performing Arts Classes. 6th-grade students have written and choreographed original pieces in the Baltimore Club tradition, the indigenous sound and dance of our fair city. In the photo below, one music group is taking feedback from their peers after presenting the rough draft of their work. 7th and 8th-grade students are training in Lindy Hop. The 7th grade will be sharing the California Routine, an iconic choreography from the 1930’s, while the 8th grade is developing original compositions.
Family Arts Night — March 7, 2019
We are excited to announce the first CNH Family Arts Night on March 7 from 6:00-8:00 pm. Click here for a draft schedule of the evening.
This evening event is a celebration as well as a presentation of learning. Over the course of the evening, your family will rotate through visual and performing arts classes led by students as well as master classes led by guest artists. Each grade will lead an activity based on the arts class they have are participating in this trimester. These classes are bolded in the attached schedule. These classes are mandatory for the grade level leading. The other classes are “touchback” classes that relate to the arts learning they had in the first trimester. We will be sharing more details as we get closer to the date! Best, Ms. Breai and Ms. Cohen
Arts Fundraising in March
Create personalized gifts with your child’s artwork! Click here to visit the Square 1 Art website to see the types of items you can order. Order forms will be available March 6-20 with products arriving in April before Spring Break.
Help Us Celebrate Our Student Artists
This Friday, March 1st, 5-8pm
Please Complete the Family Survey
Now is the time of year when the Maryland Department of Education asks families to tell them how you think we are doing. We ask every family to participate! It’s quick and easy. Go to https://survey.k12insight.com/
In an effort to increase participation, the online survey is now mobile device compatible. The display of the online survey will automatically adjust based on the device being used.
Instructions
1. If you have more than one child enrolled at a school, please complete only one survey for that school.
2. If you have children who attend different schools, please complete one survey for each school.
3. Please read each statement and select a single response to each item.
4. As a security measure, if this survey is inactive for over 60 minutes all your previous answers will be lost.
5. Click the SUBMIT button on the last page of the survey ONLY when you have finished the survey; Clicking the SUBMIT button records your answers and prevents you from answering any further questions.
Please complete this survey by May 3, 2019.
Summer Camp
We are currently accepting applications from City Neighbors Hamilton students who will be rising first through fourth graders for summer 2019. Information and applications can be found on our website here. Hard copies are available in the school lobby. Please submit them to your child’s teacher so they know who is interested in participating. Deadline for submission of summer camp applications is March 8. Any questions about summer camp, please contact Summer Program Director, Sharon Jackson, at sjackson@cityneighbors.org.
An Easy Way to Support the School
Next time you log into Amazon, click on Your Account and go to “Your AmazonSmile.” You can select City Neighbors Hamilton as your charity. All you have to do after that is bookmark the site https://smile.amazon.com instead of simply amazon.com, and every time you shop, a percentage of the proceeds will be sent to City Neighbors Hamilton! It’s the same shopping, same deals, AmazonSmile simply donates to the school.
An Update on the Harford Rd Bridge
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The 2019-20 Enrollment Lottery is a Fait Accompli
On Friday, February 22–after two postponements due to inclement weather–we conducted our 2019-20 enrollment lottery drawing. At the time of the lottery, we received 375 applications for 17 open seats. Ten applicant families and a BCPS representative were on hand to witness our first time using a randomizer to select the order of acceptance and wait list applicants, rather than pulling and recording numbers and names by hand. The lottery took a grand total of 30 minutes, reducing the length of our lottery by at least a couple of hours. Thank you to our Director of Technology, Justin Eames, for assisting us in this time-saving transition.
Acceptance and wait-list letters will be going out in the mail today. If you know someone who is eager to hear their result, please plead for their patience, as we will not be providing results via phone or email before March 1, giving the letters a chance to arrive. Any applications received after 3 PM on February 8 have been and will continue to be placed at the back of the waiting list in the appropriate grade. Enrollment applications for 2020-21 will be available in October 2019.
If you submitted a sibling application, you will receive an acceptance packet. You must complete and return the white registration form (both sides) and the orange acceptance card by April 29 and provide the supporting docs indicated on the orange card during the week of June 3-7.
A reminder of our Diversity Spotlight for this month:
Diversity Spotlight — February
Welcome to the first installment of Diversity Spotlight from the City Neighbors Hamilton Diversity and Inclusion Committee. Once a month in the “What’s Good?” newsletter, we’ll share a conversation starter, and we’ll continue the conversation at the Families of City Neighbors Hamilton page on Facebook.
This month, we want to start a conversation about what diversity looks like at City Neighbors Hamilton. We can look at our own demographics. We can compare our demographics to the School District overall.
Race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status are some of the most consequential aspects of diversity. It can be helpful to think about more aspects of diversity, too. Next month, we’ll explore some of them. In the meantime, here is our Question of the Month.
QUESTION OF THE MONTH: Think about your family—can you think of something special you bring to our school’s diversity, or maybe a challenge that you and perhaps other families face that some in our community might not realize?
We’ll post this question at the Families of City Neighbors Hamilton page on Facebook; you can answer in the comments. Or, e-mail your answer to llanahan@gmail.com and Lawrence will post it. (There’s a way to account for diversity—we know some of you don’t use Facebook!)
Thank you for reading. We look forward to celebrating our differences, learning from them, and discovering what we have in common, as well as working to ensure that our differences do not turn into disadvantages.
We’ll be back in March!
Raina Wilson and Lawrence Lanahan