At our final Home & School Club meeting of 2020/21, Mrs. Butler announced the Leigh Volunteer of the Year. We were also honored to have the Leigh Teacher of the Year join us. Congratulations from the Home & School Club!
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Amy Hogg has been our HSC treasurer for 3 years. During COVID she pivoted and got everything set up online so that we could function during our virtual learning and eventual in-person transitions. Her deep knowledge of finance has been invaluable to HSC. The whole board functions well because of Amy’s work. Amy is also a critical part of our HSC Executive team and advises and collaborates on all of our projects. She is such a thoughtful person and brings great insight to everything we do. She is also kind, empathetic and an absolute pleasure to work with. We truly are indebted to Amy for giving so much of her time, energy, and expertise to our Leigh community. For these reasons and more, Amy Hogg is the Leigh Volunteer of the Year!
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Lynette Jackson, is a teacher, Science Department Chair, union rep and a Leigh parent. According to Ms. Jackson's students and colleagues, she is a strong, supportive, and diplomatic leader in the department. In a year of huge adjustments, Ms. Jackson took on a leadership role and supported all Leigh staff with her advanced technical skills. When people ask what makes working at Leigh so special, we point to Lynette Jackson. She does an excellent job of interacting with and supporting all students in her classes with thoughtful feedback and creative ways to support each of them. Ms. Jackson is always willing to spend extra time and effort to help a struggling student and to support them in any way she can. For these reasons and more, Lynette Jackson is the Leigh Teacher of the Year!
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THANK YOU TO OUR INCREDIBLE HOME & SCHOOL CLUB VOLUNTEERS!
This year, over 160 volunteers worked together through our various Home & School Club programs. THANK YOU for being part of what makes Leigh High School amazing. This has been a challenging time for everyone and we are so grateful for our wonderful Leigh community!
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WHERE DID WE SPEND OUR MONEY THIS YEAR?
THANK YOU so much to all of our families for your very generous donations this year. These donations continue to make an enormous impact and ensure we can support important programs that benefit all of our students. We are incredibly grateful to you all. Thank you for making a difference at Leigh!
Through our Annual Giving Drive, we raised $32,500 in donations and $12,400 in Corporate Matching. We also received the following large donations:
- $24,100 … stock donation from an anonymous donor
- $17,350 … donation + corporate match from an anonymous donor
- $7,500 … donation from an anonymous donor
Your donations allowed us to fund the following (note: this is a high level overview — more details are available on our website).
- Anti-racism training for staff ($18K)
- English novels ($15K)
- Professional development for staff ($14K)
- Classroom/teacher resources ($8K ~ $100/teacher)
- Haert online mental wellness program ($8K)
- Student assembly speaker ($5K)
- Wellness Center ($3K)
- Staff grants ($4K)
- Staff Appreciation ($3K)
- Campus Beautification ($1K)
- Misc: College & Career Center, communications, tax prep etc
Mrs. Butler has also requested funding for a shade sail in the quad. She has been sourcing quotes for this project and is hoping to have a more precise cost in the near future. We hope to be able to also provide funding for this project.
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A WARM WELCOME TO NEXT YEAR'S HSC BOARD & COMMITTEES
Executive Board
- President - Susan Smith
- Vice President - Ashleigh Coffeng
- Co-Past Presidents - Aine O’Donovan & Tamara Strachman
- Treasurer - Amy Hogg
- Auditor - Doug Evans
- Recording Secretary - Jenny Green
- Co-Parliamentarians - Gretchen Gabriel & Kerry Haywood
- Technology/Google Drive Support - Rama Nemani
Committee Positions
- Communications - Amy Gardner, Angie Lu, Susan Smith, Aine O’Donovan
- Community Building/Stampede - Susan Dahl, Andrew Hogg, Mike Norcia, Anne Haro, Chris Weitz
- Staff Appreciation - Amanda Bierly, Alexis Hoekstra, Amy Sells, Monica Fang
- Campus Beautification - Kelly Massini, Tamiko House, Ashleigh Coffeng, Lara Blom
- Grad Night - Kristina Williams, Kris Suzuki, Chris Weitz
- Academic Tutoring Coordinator - Rama Nemani
- Mental Health & Wellbeing - Kristin Welter
- Volunteer Coordinator - Angie Lu
- Club Support - Anne Haro
- TBD - Erin Nokes
District Representatives
- Facilities - Tamara Strachman
- Finance - Doug Evans
Booster Club Liaisons
- Sports - Jennifer Lipscomb
- Spirit - Christy Dennington
- PAPA - Amy Gardner
We continue to add people to our team and invite you to join us next year!
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HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE MAY 2021 HSC MEETING
Minutes from past meetings and dates of upcoming meetings can be found here.
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Highlights from Principal Kara Butler |
Looking Forward to the 2021/2022 Year
- Parent Bootcamp opportunities for incoming 9th and 10th grade families.
- August 5th 5:00pm
- August 6th 8:30am
- August 7th 10:30am
- We will offer an orientation on August 6th to 9th and 10th grade students.
- Student schedules will be released through Aeries starting the afternoon of August 6. While schedules will be released online, students will still come to school in person before school starts to get their pictures taken for ASB cards and so forth.
- First day of the 2021/2022 school year is August 11th.
Construction Update
The main office is almost ready and the administration will be moving back into our new and improved space this summer. Additionally the new grass has been placed next to the pool so that spectators can sit either in the bleachers or on the grass. With sensitivity to water restrictions, our grass will be irrigated with non-potable, recycled water. Asphalt will be poured on the blacktop this month to make the blacktop smoother. The next project we will be working on is the Student Services Center to transform it into the teacher work room and lounge with a goal to complete the construction in August.
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The main office is looking great, and we will move in over the summer. Look at our new sink!
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The new grass is in place next to the new pool deck,
and the new pool gate will have our LHS logo emblazoned on it!
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Highlights from CUHSD Board President Kalen Gallagher |
The 2021/2022 Year
- CUHSD is committed to providing a fully in-person, five days a week, non-hybrid learning program as the default for all students next year. At this time we are still awaiting new guidance from public health officials on what, if any, preventative protocols will need to be in place next year, but we anticipate that the State of California will continue to lift restrictions in the coming weeks.
- CUHSD will also be offering a separate, fully virtual alternative for families who have determined remaining remote would best fit the needs of their individual student next school year.
Budget Planning
- On Thursday, May 27th, the Board of Trustees will hold the annual budget workshop, where district staff will present on the key factors affecting the 2021-2022 budget.
- While the district is receiving special one-time money from the state and federal governments in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, that money is not structural in nature and is meant for short-term expenses related to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
- CUHSD continues to have long-term budget challenges due to the rising costs of special education, health and welfare benefits, state-mandated CalPERS and CalSTRS contributions, the local cost of living, and our existing parcel tax (~$4.7M/year) being set to expire at the end of the 2022-2023 school year.
Addressing learning loss and mental health
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The district's Local Control and Accountability Plan (LCAP) for the 2021-2022 school year is in development. This plan is intended to provide transparency to our community about the District's goals, priorities, and expenditures, and to enable the community to provide input as the budget is developed. The LCAP is more important than ever this year, because there was a lot of learning loss over the past year. The school board is looking closely at how to get students caught up and how to address students’ mental health needs. You can learn more on the District's LCAP page.
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Highlights from Teacher Representative Celeste Smiley |
As always, Ms. Smiley's monthly report is loaded with information and updates. Some highlights include:
Teacher & Staff Appreciation Week
A huge thank you from all of the teachers and staff for our amazing coffee cart for Teacher & Staff Appreciation Week, as well as our other goodies!
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Student's Industrial Design Vision
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Staff Appreciation - Teacher & staff Appreciation Week was a great success, with lots of parents and students making sure our teachers and staff felt loved. The committee provided a coffee cart with hot drinks and lots of treats for the staff (see pictures above in the Teacher's Report area of this newsletter).
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Grad Night - Grad Night (graduation event for our Seniors) will take place at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. Please refer to Mr. Roe's Weekly Student Bulletin for ticket sales information and details.
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Mental Health Support - The HAERT program continues and plans are underway for the Wellness Center.
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Club Support - We had a very successful kick-off year this year, and we're working with Mr. Roe to continue to grow this program, getting more students connected and more parents engaged.
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Leigh Stampede - We're excited to see all the booster groups working together to make the Stampede happen in-person in May 2022 (exact date to be confirmed).
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How to Keep Up with Student Activities Every Week! |
Details about student events on and off campus can be found in the Student Weekly Bulletin from Dr. Anthoney Roe, Activities Director, including salient information about:
- Community opportunities (volunteering, summer programs, etc)
- Upcoming sports games
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Prom & Prom Court
- Graduation Ceremonies
- Grad Night
- Yearbook Distribution
As a parent, you can sign up to get the Student Weekly Bulletin, which is always chock-full of good stuff including updates on what's happening each week in student activities, sports, visual arts, performing arts, clubs and more.
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School Newspaper - Final Edition now Available! |
The Eleight, Leigh's student run newspaper, has just published its final edition of the school year! This is the Senior Edition and includes lots of info about our Seniors, including an interactive map highlighting where many of them are headed to college next year...
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Are you shopping on Amazon? Yes? Great! Use Amazon Smile and a % of your purchase automatically comes back to Leigh HSC. Shop at smile.amazon.com/ch/77-0199809 or with AmazonSmile ON in the app. This is free money for Leigh HSC - to date we have received $791 through this program. Thank you for your support!
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Leigh High School Home and School Club is an all volunteer 501(c)(3) non-profit organization.
Tax ID # is 77-0199809. All donations are tax-deductible.
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