Liebe TCGIS Gemeinschaft / Dear TCGIS Community, 

Our educators are in the middle of winter data meetings. This is part of a Multi-Tiered Support approach that TCGIS uses to reach kids at a variety of levels.  The grade-level teams meet to look at the comprehensive results of the Winter Screening cycle, which screens Math, German Reading and Social Emotional Health.  The team sets benchmarks and looks at those students not reaching those benchmarks. These students are identified as needing intervention either in the classroom with a classroom teacher or interventionist or in an individual or small-group setting outside of the classroom with an interventionist. I am very proud of the work that goes into this program. Our amazing Dean of Data and Compliance, Esther Neu, heads up this screening process and the subsequent data meetings. Our team of interventionists are a key component in the academic success of our students.  

This is just another reason that TCGIS is a great choice for your children!

Elizabeth Zehnpfennig

Reminder: Early Release Day - Jan 16th

This is a reminder that there is an Early Release Day on Friday, January 16th. Students will be dismissed at 12:45pm.

The front office will be closed at 1:30pm for a staff retreat. You can reach us via email anytime at info@tcgis.org.

Kinderclub February Booking and Seeking Donations

• Registration for February Kinderclub bookings (via Regpack) will be open January 10th–17th.

• Are your kids done with a fun game or Legos that still has lots to give? Bring them to the Kinderclub team! We are always looking for fun games to explore and giving a new home to those left over art supplies that still has potential to be used.

TCGIS Summer 2026 - Last Call for Camp Leads!!!

This is your last call to be part of the Summer Camp team as a Summer Camp Lead. If you have a fun idea to share with our campers this Summer 2026, then fill out this form.

4th Grade Sport Sampler: Jan 15-31

We are offering a sports sampler for our 4th grade students in winter and spring 2026. The students will get to know several middle school coaches as well as the various sports that we offer to our middle schoolers through TCGIS Athletics.

Sign up for our sports sampler on January 15-31 on Infinite Campus (school store).There are two sessions with a limit of 20 students per session (calendar). Each session will cost $100 for the five-week sports sampler. Please register for only one session right now, and allow others an opportunity to sign up. We will announce any extra spots available on February 1, and if you are interested in a second session at that time, you will be welcome to sign up for two sessions.

Calendar 2026-27 Survey

Please take a moment to provide feedback in order to help inform calendar priorities for the 2026-27 TCGIS calendar.

Please Be Mindful of Handicapped Parking Spot

Please be mindful of not parking in the handicapped spot in the TCGIS parking lot if you do not need it (or blocking the spot accidentally). We have members of our school community who do need to use the accessible parking. If you are legitimately using the handicapped parking, please be sure to have a placard visible in your vehicle.

Special Education Advisory Meeting - Jan 26

Just a reminder that the next SEAC meeting will be January 26th. For more information about what SEAC is, please see this article. This meeting will be virtual. Please be on the lookout for a flyer with the link and all other pertinent information.

READ Act and Winter Screening Update 

In December we conducted our universal screeners, as required three times a year by MDE and best practice. New this year from the READ Act: 

• K-3: You will receive an email that includes your child’s screening results as usual. If your child is exhibiting characteristics of dyslexia as defined by MDE’s criteria, you will receive an additional email report with further details. Please note, MDE’s criteria does not include adjustments for dual language programs. 
• 4-8: Similar to K-3, you will receive an email that includes your child’s screening results as usual. If your child performed under benchmark in English reading, they will undergo additional screening with an MDE-required tool called “Capti ReadBasix”. The benchmarks do not take German reading into account. If your child takes the additional screener, you will receive an additional email report with further details.

A gentle reminder to families that literacy trajectories for multilingual students in immersion settings often looks different compared to monolingual peers depending on when English literacy instruction is introduced. You can learn more literacy development and the READ Act by viewing the presentation slides from November 24th here, particularly slides 11 and 20-on.

Do You Know Someone Looking For a Great School?

TCGIS is hosting a Prospective Family Openhaus on January 28th and is now accepting RSVPs! If you know someone looking for a great school, please pass along this invite.

A Message From the Library!

• New German Tonies for classroom use! The library received 32 Tonie figures, a display case, and a Tony Box from a generous donor! If you'd volunteer to record yourself reading aloud or singing in German, contact us at library@tcgis.org.
• Bücherei Profis! Kids in grades 3 to 8 can get in on the action and become a TCGIS Library Pro by following the steps on this sheet.

A Thank You Message from TCGIS Interns

Dear TCGIS Community,

We, the interns, would like to express our sincere gratitude to all of you and especially to Monica Komomua for initiating and organizing this generous gift. It truly means a lot to us that you thought of us, and we are more than grateful for your kindness and support. Thank you so much!

Wishing you all a wonderful holiday season,

Interns: Elena, Felix, Franzi, Julia, Laurine, Lennart, Lisa, Luca, and Yarah

Movie Night with the PTO - Jan 23rd

Join our PTO for our Movie and Pizza party: First Meeting of the school year!

• Friday January 23rd at 6pm
• TCGIS Cafeteria
• We will serve a FREE Pizza dinner and have a quick PTO meeting, then we will watch a movie together!
• Bring your whole family, and bring cushions or pillows or sleeping bags to spread out on the floor for our indoor camp-out pizza party.

Sign up so we know how much pizza to order. See you there for the fun! Donations are appreciated and help us to continue to support our crew at TCGIS and help us to pay for pizza and supplies.

Cozy up for a Good Cause!

Support our PTO and snag an amazing last minute gift for your TCGIS student. Order an amazing TCGIS Loons fleece blanket and you'll give the gift of warm snuggles! 

Our PTO earns 50% of the amount raised, and that supports our teaching team at TCGIS by helping us to pay for pizza at conferences, coffee in the teachers' lounge all year long, and to bring treats during teacher appreciation week. Order yours today!

Note: If you don't see the calendar at the end of your Rundbrief, the message has been clipped and you must click "View entire message" to read the entire Rundbrief. Danke!

Represent TCGIS at MPLS School Finder Fair

Help represent TGIS at the MPLS School Finder Fair. This is especially great for folks who speak more than one language, especially Spanish. This is an event for families to learn about all the schools in the Twin Cities and the 2 most common languages spoken at this event are Spanish and English! Reach out to Paige Yurczyk with questions.

Festival of Cultures Table Hosts Needed 

Would you have something special to share about your culture? Help us make Festival of Cultures a success! The event is only able to run with table host volunteers - We are looking for more table hosts, fill out the form here. 

Upcoming School Board & Committee Meetings

• Fundraising Committee Meeting: Tue, Jan 13th, 6:30-7:30 Meets
• Governance Committee Meeting: Mon, Jan 19th, 4:30-6:00pm Meets
• Board Meeting: Thur, Jan 22nd, 6:30-9:30pm in Room 100 or Zoom

German Robot Invasion!

Dunwoody College of Technology is hosting the 16th annual Autonomous Snowplow Competition, and we have our first team from Germany scheduled to compete, coming from the University of Stuttgart. You can come and cheer them on and see lots of cool robots in action! The event is free and open to the public. For more information, please check out our website

Dates:

• Fri 1/16 (Evening) - Poster Presentations and Welcome
• Sat 1/17 (All-day) - Main Competition Events, and Awards Ceremony

Location:

Dunwoody College of Technology

818 Dunwoody Boulevard

Minneapolis, MN 55403

Jan 16 - Early Release Day



TCGIS Google Calendar