Florence Elementary
GOOD NEWS. Our Fall Festival was held on October 10. In spite of the cool, damp weather everyone had a great time. We collected 870 pounds of canned food items to donate to Urban Ministries.

GOOD NEWS. Students have enjoyed exploring the concept of voting in age-appropriate elections, complete with voter registration, posters, and polling booths in the hallway. Kindergarteners voted on flavors of ice cream, while 1st-graders chose ice cream sundaes over popsicles. Second-graders practiced "real-time" voting using reading times and recess activities. Our 3-5 graders voted in a primary election for student council officers and will complete the elections after campaign speeches.


Johnson Street Global Studies
UPCOMING EVENT. Students at Johnson Street Global Studies are spending their Thursday afternoons getting FIT!  Each Thursday after school approximately 50 students and 10 staff members are participating in a conditioning program to get prepared to run the GO FAR 5K marathon on November 14th.  The marathon begins at the Advanced Home Health Care facility on Piedmont Parkway in High Point. The GO FAR program was started in 2003 by former Physician’s Assistant, Ms. Robin Lindsay, and is designed to highlight the problem of childhood obesity in the United States and to get kids moving! JSGS Physical Education teacher Michelle Bode, keeps everyone going with words of encouragement and a driving determination to get everyone ready to be successful runners (and walkers) in this exciting event and beyond.    

Johnson Street students get into the “SPIRIT” of competition for the United Way: The students of Johnson Street Global Studies are enjoying the spirit of giving through a fun and competitive donation program for the United Way.  Every morning throughout the month of October, students are invited to fill up donation jars in their classrooms with pennies.  The school is looking forward to presenting the total amount given to the United Way.  And the students can’t wait to learn which teacher’s net figure is the highest!  

Northwest High
GOOD NEWS. Neil Shah, a senior at Northwest High, received the highest honors at the Region Six Finals of the 2009 Siemens Competition in Math, Science & Technology, the nation’s premier high school science competition. Shah, along with teammate Katie Shpanskaya of Raleigh, will share a $6,000 scholarship. Their project, titled Supercomputing Analytical Discovery of Plasma Instabilities in Fusion Energy Reactors, facilitates the understanding of fusion by analyzing computer-simulated fusion reactor data and paves the way for an efficient analysis of massive amounts of data on powerful computer architectures, consisting of hundreds, or thousands of processors operating in parallel. Shah and Shpanskaya will be invited to compete at the National Finals in New York City from December 3-7, where the winners of the six regional competitions across the United States will vie for scholarships ranging from $10,000 to the grand prize of $100,000. The Siemens Competition, a signature program of the Siemens Foundation, is administered by the College Board.

GOOD NEWS. Cassady Tetsworth, a junior at Northwest High, served on the National Students Against Violence Everywhere (SAVE) Youth Advisory Board. Recognized as a leader in her school and community, Cassady joined nine other youth leaders to discuss school violence issues and is developing action plans not only for her SAVE chapter, but also for chapters across the nation. She was featured in the local magazine Skirt! in November. Click here to read the article.


Northwest Middle
GOOD NEWS. Nathan Cole, an eighth-grade student, will be awarded $100 and a new title on Friday, Oct. 30. The money and title, 2010 North Carolina Big Sweep Artist of the Year, will be awarded to Nathan for creating the winning 2010 T-shirt and poster design during the statewide Big Sweep contest. The contest was open to all North Carolina students in grades kindergarten through 12, and entries poured in from all across the state. Almost 500 entries were judged on the message, originality, educational value and attractiveness.

“We received a lot of really creative entries from all across the state,” said Judy Bolin, N.C. Big Sweep president. “After much careful consideration, the judges narrowed it down and Nathan’s creative design won first place.”

Nathan’s winning design features picture within a picture. An artist is in the process of drawing a person holding the world in one hand and a broom sweeping the world in the other with an accompanying slogan, “Do your part.” 

Big Sweep, an award-winning 501(c)(3) nonprofit whose mission is a litter-free environment, was founded in 1987 as Beach Sweep, a coastal cleanup with 1,000 volunteers. That cleanup expanded inland in 1989, and Beach Sweep was renamed N.C. Big Sweep, the nation’s first statewide waterways cleanup. More than 270,000 Big Sweep volunteers have retrieved over nine million pounds of debris from North Carolina’s environment since it was founded in 1987. To learn more, go to www.ncbigsweep.org.

Parkview Elementary
UPCOMING EVENT. Salvation Army Canned Food Drive Oct. 23-Nov. 19th  

GOOD NEWS. United Way Campaign-Parkview Students and Staff raised $871.45 for the United Way Campaign.

GOOD NEWS. Arts Explosion-Reward Day: Students achieving a high number of points in their arts classes this quarter will be able to participate in African dancing on October 29.

GOOD NEWS. PBS-RRCH (Respect Responsibility Caring and Honesty) Dance, and Students earn this reward for demonstrating RRCH and receive points. Students achieving a certain number of points will be a fall dance complete with a DJ.

Pearce Elementary
GOOD NEWS. Students raised $2,436.27 for the United Way campaign, while employees raised $3,207 for a grand total of $5643.27.

GOOD NEWS. Pearce Elementary held their 2nd Annual Talent Show on October 29. Students and staff performed a variety of talents including guitar, piano, violin, singing, dancing, gymnastics, Tae Kwon Do and drums.

GOOD NEWS. Superman, Spiderman, and Wolverine joined Spongebob, G-Man, Loud Boy and others at Pearce on Friday, October 23.  Was it a gathering of super powers?  No, the Bookworm Boys hosted five nationally known cartoonists who showed how they created characters that are entertaining for kids across America.  Many thanks to Acme Comics for making it possible for Chris Giarrusso, Art Baltazar, Jacob Chabot, Brian Smith, and Gregg Schigiel to visit the Bookworm Boys Club.  Every child received a G-man comic book, and many were given drawings made especially for them. It was a special evening for the more than 80 Pearce Patriots in attendance.

GOOD NEWS. Pearce Elementary has received a grant from Bright Ideas. The focus of this grant is Successful Science for Students. Nonfiction books covering the topics of, plants and animals, landforms, weather and climate and forces and motion will be purchased for students in grades K through 5. Students will be able to build their vocabulary and knowledge of universal scientific concepts. This grant will enable teachers and students to study about high interest science topics. In building the base of scientific knowledge each consecutive year students will be well prepared to be lifelong learners. This grant was designed and written by Angela Osborne and Michelle Borland.

Penn-Griffin School for the Arts
GOOD NEWS. On Friday, October 16th , the Penn-Griffin School for the Arts High School band played at the Polo-Ralph Lauren “Pink Pony Walk” to celebrate Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

GOOD NEWS. Poet Jaki Shelton Green will be visiting Penn-Griffin School for the Arts during the last week of October, when she will help students prepare for participation in Poetry Out Loud, the poetry recitation competition sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts and the North Carolina Arts Council. She will be visiting John York’s creative writing class and Shelly Walker’s drama class for two days, Oct. 28 and 29.

GOOD NEWS. In recognition of national Breast Cancer Awareness Month, Penn-Griffin's high school Key Club organized a Pink Out to show support for breast cancer survivors, the families of victims, and research to find a cure.  The overwhelming majority of high school students and staff came to school dressed in some form of pink. Click here for a web story.

GOOD NEWS. Ms. Walker and the High School Theatre students won “Best Set Award at the Play Festival.

GOOD NEWS. Ms. Craven, Life Skills teacher, and Liz Samuels, sixth-grade Language Arts teacher, were both awarded a Jr. League Mini Grant.

GOOD NEWS. PGSA 11th-grader Megan Raisner and 10th-grader Muffy Underwood have been selected to participate in Mars Hill Honor Choir at Mars Hill College on February 5-6. 

UPCOMING EVENT. Penn-Griffin 2010 Seniors will be having a yard sale on November 14, 2009 at the High Point Public Library from 7:00-11:00 am on Main Street beside the Krispy Kreme to raise money for their senior trip to New York. All items not sold will be donated to the Salvation Army.

GOOD NEWS. Congratulations to Charley Ward (Middle School Theatre Arts Teacher) The Charley Ward Band won the Piedmont Blues President Society Blues Challenge (band section) for 2009. They will travel to Memphis in January to represent the PBS in the International Blues Challenge.

GOOD NEWS. Congratulations to Catherine Butler, chorus teacher, who was one of only three directors to have students place in the Honors Chorus this year.

Shadybrook Elementary
GOOD NEWS High Point Mayor Smothers addressed second-grade students about government. Students are learning daily about the responsibility government leaders have as well as the citizens. 

Southwest High
UPCOMING EVENT. Parents, Teachers and Community Agencies are invited to help students succeed at the PARENT EMPOWERMENT SUMMIT on Saturday, November 14 from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Quality topics to ensure student success include: Reality Check (Graduation Requirements, Calculating GPA and more); Peer Pressure (Current trends in substance abuse amongst teens); Athletics (Fair Play); Dollars for Scholars (College Applications, Preparing for the Workforce); Parent Involvement (Why Now, Parent Surveys) and more!