ALL students may pick up FREE “grab-and-go” meals for ALL children 18 & under at Dana Middle School, located at 5504 W. 135th Street in Hawthorne, from 11:30AM to 1:00PM. However, free meals end on Dec. 31, 2020 and schools only receive additional funding for qualifying students if applications are turned in this month!

Please complete a meal application to ensure your child receives free or reduced price meals for the entire school year. Apply by Oct. 15 (deadline extended!) to be entered into a raffle to win one of 7 Portable Bluetooth Speakers and 7 24” Gaming Monitors, provided by our generous donors! If you have not yet applied, an already-addressed and stamped envelope and application will arrive at your home via mail next week to make the process as convenient as possible. We know that so many of our families have suffered loss of income and other extenuating circumstances--we want to be sure we can serve your children all year long, not just while free meals are available through December.

Apply online at www.mymealtime.com

Apply online at www.mymealtime.com, download an application from the Da Vinci website at www.davincischools.org/meals, or pick up a meal application from Dana Middle School or at the high school campus at 201 N. Douglas Street. 

NEXT WEEK!

We have lots to share about upcoming events and an opportunity to hear from each of your child's teachers. Please join us for a greeting and overview, rotation through your child's classes and a closing Q & A session.

A schedule and zoom links will be emailed to you and given to your students next week.

We are so excited for the opportunity for students to "show what they know" with their families! SLCs are a signature practice that take place at all Da Vinci Schools and are also mandatory for all students. Even though we are living in a different and trying time, SLCs are so valuable that we are making space for them to be done well. Please look out for a separate blog post explaining how SLCs will work at the K-8 and the high school.

Please remember that SLCs are student led, so this means the focus is on student learning and sharing. This is different from a "parent teacher conference" where adults talk about students. At SLCs, students are encouraged to talk about what they are learning, where they feel strong, where they have room to grow, and reflect on how they feel about their learning. Dates below and more info coming from individual teachers:

Your teachers are sending information and Sign Up Geniuses this week so be on the look out! In order for teachers to meet with individual families, we are not holding "live" (zoom/synchronous) classes October 12-15. Teachers will send out asynchronous videos and work for students to complete as an equivalent to their at-school learning time. We know that losing "live" time with classmates may feel disappointing, but please know that teachers will be spending extra time in the coming weeks prepping material in order to also make space for an entire week of back-to-back family meetings. They are working double duty because honoring students' voices in their education is that important! Thank you for supporting SLCs this year!

You will hear more about this at this coming Wednesday's Back to School Night!

Look for an e-mail in the coming weeks containing a link and unique password to your child's individual photo gallery if they took a student photo with our photographer, Stacee Lianna!

If your child did not take a school photo but you want them included in the yearbook, you will be able to submit a photo of them through our yearbook portal--more info coming soon!

We have an incredible team dreaming up this unique year's yearbook for our K-12 students! Please provide your feedback on yearbook format and ideas HERE

You may know about Da Vinci Schools' college pathway program, Da Vinci Extension. Please read below regarding a project led by counselor Kene Washington and a way for you to support their work engaging our newest voters!

This year, our goal at Da Vinci Extension is to have 90% of our eligible students registered and voting in the upcoming November 3, 2020 election. To do so, we are launching the Seeds of the Future project to educate our DVX college students on the voting process and what's on the ballot during this election. In addition to hitting this target, we need volunteers to assist with our Voting Lighthouse! The Lighthouse is our Google Meet site where volunteers will be available to assist students and Da Vinci community members on voting inquiries (voting locations, rules, etc.). during election day in real time. Volunteers are asked to commit to a 30-minute time slot. If you are interested in volunteering, Click here to schedule your time of interest. Volunteers will be required to attend a training session Friday, October 16th, at 1pm to review important information. If you have questions, contact Kené: kwashington@davincischools.org

Just a reminder that there are no classes for students on Friday, October 18th for Professional Development Day. On that day, our staff will continue the work we began on September 18th: understanding and building "agency" in students. We define this as "recognizing obstacles and leveraging resources to navigate challenges in one's life in order to create positive change." If you are a returning family, you may have noticed in our handbook that regarding our Habits of Heart and Mind, we replaced Perseverance with Agency. Years ago, Dr. Angela Duckworth's grit theory got the ball rolling with the importance of perseverance/grit, but the educational community often over-simplified her work and didn't account for the fact that we all come to the table with different experiences, networks, gifts and gaps. A focus on perseverance alone does not take into consideration the fact that hard work isn't the full picture. Educators such as Dr. Pedro Noguera have collaborated with and deepened Dr. Duckworth's work to include agency. You can hear more about that here. As we continue our work understanding the role that equity plays in our classrooms and throughout our school, we will examine how to build agency in all students.

Just a reminder to check Da Vinci Schools' calendar (scroll down to Connect!) for all major events.

Happily Family has a long-standing relationship with Da Vinci in supporting our community in all things parenting, social emotional development, and compassionate communication!

Supporting our community in these ways is SO important to us, because we believe in self-love, self-care, and self-growth...all of which we believe can transform into community care! Please love yourself by setting aside some time (even if it's just 20 minutes) to take a walk by yourself, find a cozy spot to cuddle up with a cup of tea and/or a furry friend, and watch or listen to one of the incredible speakers in this lineup!

You can find out more/register HERE!

In celebration of Wellness Wednesday’s we have two Dare to Share challenges for parents and kiddos!

Physical activities are an important part of having a healthy brain..

Show us how YOU stay healthy!

~Challenge~

Create a 90-second workout routine!

'Dare to Share' your favorite exercise Flipgrid video link: -Your Favorite Exercise!

~also~

Join us on our Dare to Share 'Padlet' and ‘Flipgrid’ video link to post something special about YOU! Take an opportunity today to break away from the madness and share a personal inspiration. This is the perfect time to be kind to yourself, by sharing something special about you!

Padlet:

Flipgrid:

password:

Dare2020

We've entered parent email addresses to our K-8 and High School blog so you should now receive blog emails periodically (we've sent out 2 to each group so far). They arrive in your inbox like an email from "Da Vinci Connect" and the subject line is "Da Vinci Connect Updates" (K-8) and "Da VInci Connect High School Updates" (HS).

If you aren't receiving them, check your spam/clutter/junkmail box and if there's nothing there, try subscribing directly on our blog site (you can check back here periodically as well). Connect HS Blog found HERE and Connect K-8 Blog found HERE.