RCSA Fall Bulletin
August - November
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It's hard to believe how quickly the school year has been flying by! The past few months have been full of adventure, fun, and of course tons of learning. Check out our e-Bulletin below to see what the students and teachers of River City Science Academy have been up to.
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FSA Highlights and School Grades
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Our students studied hard for their FSA exams last Spring and it sure paid off! Many grades at all of our campuses scored above the district and state averages. RCSA Mandarin, Elementary, and Middle-High all kept their "A" grade from the Florida Department of Education. RCSA Innovation held on to their "B" and is very close to achieving an "A" as well.
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- RCSA Middle-High's Math Team rocked the house! The 7th grade math students received the highest score in the entire district. 6th grade math students received the 2nd highest scores in the district and 8th grade math students received the 3rd highest score!
- RCSA Middle-High excelled in ELA. Every grade tested scored in the Top 10 of the entire district. Our Grade 7 ELA scores were the 4th highest in the district and Grade 10 received the 5th highest scores in the district.
- RCSA Mandarin Grade 6 ELA scores were the 5th highest in the entire district! Grades 5, 7, and 8 all placed in the Top 10 of the district in ELA.
- RCSA Mandarin Science Students shown with 5th graders earning the 2nd highest score in the district and the 8th highest score in the state. Way to go!
- Grade 4 Math at RCSA Mandarin received the 3rd highest score in the district, with grades 5 and 6 both being in the Top 10.
- Grade 4 Math at RCSA Elementary scores were the 4th highest in the district and Grade 5 was in the Top 10.
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RCSA Elementary and Mandarin are now official Schools of Excellence with the FL Dep. of Education. To be a School of Excellence, a school must rank in the 80th percentile or higher for district schools with the same grade levels in two of the last three school years.
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Folio Weekly's Best of Jax 2019 is in and we took home first place in every category that we were nominated for! We are so thankful to our community for their support and passion for our school, we couldn't do it without you. We even received a congratulations letter from Governor DeSantis.
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RCSA Mandarin, Elementary, and Innovation all received the Five Star School Award from the Florida Department of Education in recognition of their exemplary community involvement during the 2018 - 2019 school year.
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At our Mandarin campus, Principal Mr. Akgul and Teacher Ms. Zuberbier, were recently recognized as Achieve3000's PRO Educators. This recognition is reserved for the most professional, resourceful, and outstanding educators whom are successfully helping their students accelerate their literacy growth.
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Leaders who keep on Learning
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RCSA School Leaders greatly value the importance of continuing to learn and better themselves. We are so excited for all of the programs that they have been accepted into this year.
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Dr. T, our Executive Director and Co-Founder, is participating in the Leadership Florida Education Program. This is a competitive, year long program that brings together educators throughout the entire state to discuss ways to better K - 12 education in Florida.
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Innovation campus Principal Erdogan and Mandarin campus Principal Akgul are participating in a yearlong workshop hosted by The Association of Superintendents and Elementary School Principals, located in Arlington, Virginia. The online course is blended with face to face meetings. Participants aim to learn best practices in education from experts nationwide.
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RCSA Middle-High's principal, Mr. Oz, was accepted and is participating in the Dr. Brian Dassler Leadership Academy. This is a year-long, professional learning opportunity designed to deepen skills for improving instruction among educators from the Florida Department of Education.
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Staff, Faculty, and Administration from all 4 RCSA campuses joined together to kick-off pre-planning at the very beginning of the year. Teachers had the change to mingle with others from other campuses and hear from Executive Director, Dr. T, about past results and future direction for the school. They concluded their day with some inspiration from Florida Blue Market President, Darnell Smith, and CIO with FSCJ, Cleve Warren.
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Students from RCSA Innovation, RCSA Mandarin, and RCSA Elementary that completed science projects, helped in the STEM Expo, and took on some extra work over the last school year got to attend the Jacksonville Jaguars first home game of the season in the Honor Rows section!
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We love welcoming many of our community leaders to visit our schools and take a tour. This allows them to better understand what we are doing between our walls and cultivates conversation to ensure that we are providing the best education for our community.
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Supervisor of Elections Mike Hogan
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State Representative Cyndi Stevenson
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Councilman Michael Boylan
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Councilwoman Randy DeFoor
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Property Appraiser Jerry Holland
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We are very excited to be forming a group of Core Parents that will meet once a month and work to better River City Science Academy as a whole. Among the Core Parent Group, we have three committees.
- Events and Fundraising Committee
- Parent Involvement Committee
- Public Affairs Committee
If you are interested in joining this group and one of the committees, please
email Mr. Sel Buyuksarac.
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Students from all four campuses participated in a dress down fundraiser to raise money for disaster relief following Hurricane Dorian. Altogether, we raised $7,941.24 to donate to Team Rubicon.
As an added bonus, Team Rubicon donations were matched by PepsiCo, allowing the donation to be doubled to become $15,882.48.
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All schools worked together to support American Cancer Society's Real Men Wear Pink Campaign, where all donations go to support research and families affected by cancer. Together we were able to raise over $4,915.50. Co-Founder, Mr. Sel Buyuksarac, represented RCSA and was able to raise enough money to place him in the Top 5.
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Students at RCSA Innovation who are involved in the Ambassador program surprised a senior home with some cheer and goodies for Halloween.
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Students from RCSA Innovation and RCSA Middle-High have both participated in Jacksonville Beach Clean-Up's this year.
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RCSA Staff volunteered at The Longest Table event in Downtown Jacksonville, put on by the Jax Chamber. Over 800 people came to have dinner together and connect.
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Students are already working very hard to be competitive in their academic competitions!
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Our students love their robots! Robotics teams are working hard to prepare for the competition this year. Congratulations to RCSA Innovation girls for taking home first place in their practice tournament!
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RCSA Mandarin has a Model UN team that has been studying hard. Model United Nations is an authentic simulation of the UN General Assembly where middle school students come together to reenact the scenarios in which real-world leaders try to solve issues that plague societies across the world. They have a goal to make it to 3 conferences this year and are asking for support from our community. You can share or contribute to their
GoFundMe
here.
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Science Olympiad students have already competed in multiple invitational competitions.
The RCSA Middle-High middle school team recently returned from a tournament in Atlanta with one 1st, two 2nd, and three 4th place placements.
The High School team competed at the Invitational tournament in Orlando on November 23rd and received 1st place overall among 18 teams! The team received three 1st, four 2nd, and four 4rd place finishes.
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The High School Team at their Invitational in Athens, GA.
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Two students from RCSA Middle-High's Middle School Team at their Invitational in Atlanta, GA.
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RCSA Innovation Volleyball Team
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Volleyball season has come and gone at RCSA Middle-High and RCSA Innovation. The girls had a great season and had so much fun!
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RCSA Middle-High Volleyball Team
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All Pro Dads is a monthly school gathering where dads enjoy breakfast with their kids and engage in meaningful conversations and activities centered around a character-based curriculum. Their meetings at RCSA Elementary have been going strong!
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RCSA Mandarin, RCSA Innovation, and RCSA Elementary all participated in the Florida Department of Education's Dad Take Your Child to School Day.
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Our students always seem to be out and about. You may see them during the school day on a field trip, visiting a seminar, or spending their weekend at a conference.
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RCSA Mandarin students took a field trip to the Alligator Farm in St. Augustine.
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2nd Graders at RCSA Elementary took a field trip to MOSH, the Museum of Science and History.
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A group of girls from RCSA Innovation, Middle-High, and Mandarin all participated in GenerationWOW at UNF, a one day conference meant to inspire girls and connect them with a female mentor in the community.
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Select students from RCSA Middle-High, Innovation, and Mandarin spent a weekend at UNF kicking off the Chief Science Officer program in Florida with Northeast Florida STEM2Hub.
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RCSA teachers take the time throughout the school year to schedule home visits with the families of their students. Home visits are done with students of all different learning styles. Whether they are exceeding standards or not quite there yet, home visits are a great way for teachers to connect with their students and learn more about how they can best help them succeed.
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The College Mentorship Program (CMP) is in full swing at RCSA Middle-High, Innovation, and Mandarin. Recently, CMP students at RCSA Mandarin got to take a visit to UNF to learn more about the programs that they offer.
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RCSA Elementary, Innovation, and Mandarin held their Annual Grandparents Day Breakfast to celebrate the many grandparents in our students lives.
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Veterans Day breakfasts were held at RCSA Innovation, Mandarin, and Elementary to honor the many Veterans that are family to our students. Thank you for your service!
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Character Education is very important to us at RCSA. Students study the character traits of the month in their media and foreign language classes. So far they have learned about Responsibility during the months of August and September, Courage during October, and Gratitude during November.
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RCSA Innovation held their first Start with Hello Week. Students spent one whole week taking small but powerful actions to promote connectedness by reaching out, valuing each individuals, and creating a culture of inclusion.
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Students were able to dress down in orange for Unity Day, a day to show that we are together against bullying and united for kindness, acceptance and inclusion. Check out this awesome video of students from RCSA Innovation celebrating with song!
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Jacksonville Meteorologists
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Jacksonville's local meteorologists were so excited when we invited them to visit and talk with our students about what they do. We welcomed Meteorologist Lauren Rautenkranz with First Coast News and Meteorologists Corey Simma and Mike Buresch with Action News Jax. The students loved it!
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RCSA Innovation did something special for their Kindergartner's who just finished learning the alphabet. They had an ABC fashion show! The whole school celebrated with them and it was a blast.
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All of our Elementary School students look forward to this event every year, Book Character Day! Students get to wear their favorite Book Character Costume and share about what they read.
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Festivals, Fairs, and Fun!
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RCSA Elementary held their Annual Back to School Bash where parents can learn more about the curriculum offered and students get to have fun! They even have the chance to win a brand new bike.
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RCSA Mandarin held an awesome Truck or Treat event where students got to visit some very intricately set up table designs! They also held their Arctic Festival to celebrate the Scholastic Book Fair and fun Fall time.
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Quarter 1 Assemblies took place at RCSA Elementary, RCSA Mandarin, and RCSA Middle-High. We love seeing all the students who are proud of all of their hard work!
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Breakfast with the Principal
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At RCSA Middle-High, Principal Oz invited parents to join him for a principal breakfast. This gave parents the opportunity to socialize with teachers and administrators, as well as bring up any questions that they had about the school year.
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Schools celebrated Hispanic Heritage Month from September 15th to October 15th. At RCSA Middle-High, students had fun posing with props from Spain and Mexico. Students also researched different famous Hispanic-Americans and their contributions and presented their research to their classmates.
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Taking in Important Information
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RCSA Middle-High welcomes a representative from FAFSA during a Financial Aid Info Night to help parents navigate the college financial aid process.
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RCSA Middle-High hosts a high school transition night to make sure parents understand the academic differences and expectations that students will encounter once in high school.
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RCSA Mandarin, RCSA Middle-High and RCSA Innovation hosted their Annual Family Picnics, a chance for RCSA students and parents to socialize with their teachers.
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RCSA Mandarin students play together at the annual family picnic.
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Teachers and Administration at RCSA Middle-High hard at work on the grill.
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RCSA Innovation students smile after getting their faces painted.
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- Schools host Curriculum Nights to allow parents the opportunity to learn more about what their students are learning.
- RCSA Middle-High partnered with Lifesouth Community Blood Centers to host the first blood drive of the school year.
- RCSA Elementary and RCSA Mandarin both held Bingo Nights to raise money for safety patrols and student council.
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River City Science Academy does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, gender, age, disability, marital status or genetic information in its educational programs, services or activities.
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