As we have done in the past, the Normal Community High School "Future Business Leaders" will be offering school supply kits for purchase to Eagle Nation families for the 2022-2023 school year. Your kit(s) will include supplies conveniently put together and ready for pickup before school starts in August! Families have historically loved the convenience of this opportunity, and our teachers appreciate all of their students having the correct supplies.

Please note the following payment options:

• Cash/check turned into the Evans front office. Please place in an envelope with "Supply Kit" and your child's name. Checks should be made payable to NCHS.

• Credit/debit card through an online link

How do you order a 2022-2023 supply kit? Please use the following link: https://form.jotform.com/220986537898175

The deadline for all orders will be Friday, May 13th.

Believe it or not, it is already time for us to prepare "The Nest" for our newest eagles, our current 5th graders! Please note the following information has been sent to all elementary schools of future Evans Eagles!

• 6th Grade Orientation Night Flyer: Please note the flyer (page 1: English, page 2: Spanish) for our orientation night, April 27th.

• 6th Grade FAQ Document: Please note these helpful "Frequently Asked Question" documents. (English) (Spanish)

• 6th Grade Online Resource: I have created a website specifically for 5th grade students coming into Evans. Please visit it here: bit.ly/SoarIntoEvans

• 6th Grade Music/Tutorial Selection: This form is to be used by our incoming 6th grade students and families to let us know about their Music/Tutorial course selection.

• "The Nest" Evans Visits: Please take note of our upcoming 5th grade visits for students!

  • April 25th: Pepper, Cedar and some of our Northpoint and Oakdale friends!

  • April 26th: Benjamin, Towanda and some of our Glenn friends!

The Scholastic Book Fair is coming to Eagle Nation on April 25th! This event directly affects our students as purchases help us earn books for "The Nest's" IMC! Students will visit our IMC with their Literature and Composition classes, but interested families may also visit the book fair during school hours. New this year: Families can set students up with an "eWallet" so they do not have to carry cash to the Fair!

For more information, as well as an online shopping option, please visit: https://www.scholastic.com/bf/ejhsvirtualfair

Unauthorized area: shifted from our third highest offense pre-spring break to our highest post-spring break. It represented 19% (11 events) of all behavior events these past three weeks. This behavior continues to have a dramatic increase since winter break.

• • What does this behavior look like? These events contain instances of students being unaccounted for in areas of our building without staff permission. Examples of these behaviors include students leaving classrooms without permission, hanging out in our bathrooms, etc.

  • Where is this behavior happening? Currently, over half of this behavior is happening with students attempting to "hang out" in our bathrooms. Students typically participate in this behavior so they can be on their phones, create a mess in our bathrooms, and/or hang out with their friends.

  • When is this behavior occurring? During the school day, the majority of this behavior is happening during 1st and 3rd hours.

  • Who is participating in this behavior? 7th grade students account for 80% of this behavior with males accounting for 100% of all of these behaviors.

  • How are we working to prevent these behaviors in the future?

    1. Many classrooms have instituted a no "drop and go" policy. This prevents students from coming quickly into a classroom at the beginning of the hour, "dropping" their materials off and heading into the restroom. Now, students must get permission to leave the classroom.

    2. We continue to increase our adult presence in our hallways during passing periods.

    3. We tightened up the use of hall passes to ensure students have permission to be out of their classrooms during the school day. Every morning during announcements, students are reminded: "Not in class? You need a pass."

    4. We have increased the checking of our bathrooms before and after passing periods. Furthermore, we have increased randomly checking our bathrooms during the school day.

    5. We have locked bathrooms in specific areas of our building to decrease access to them.

    6. We continue to hold a "hard line" regarding consequences for these types of behaviors. Loss of privileges, alternate bathroom locations, 1:1 adult supervision during passing periods, suspensions (both In-School and Out of School) are utilized for these behaviors, depending on the severity and frequency of the offense.

    7. The administrative team at Evans speaks directly to groups of students and their families who continue to engage in this type of behavior.

    8. Universally, positive behaviors will be publicly and privately celebrated with students.

How can you "fly" with us?

Talk to your student about the importance of adults knowing where he or she is located in our building throughout the school day. A large piece of school safety is being able to account for all of our students. Also, talk about the impact on everyone when our bathrooms and specific locations of our school have to be "locked down" due to misuse and vandalism.

Most importantly, please continue to talk to your student about the overall expectations of our building. You can find a detailed list of our universal expectations, by each location of our building, here.

"Insubordination" or Refusal to Follow Directions: increased over the past three weeks to represent 17% (10 events) of all behavior events.

• • What does this behavior look like? These events contain instances of students intentionally refusing to obey a staff member's direction. Students may verbally or physically refuse to comply with a staff member's directions or directive.

  • Where is this behavior happening? Currently, the majority (91%) of this behavior is happening within our classrooms. This is similar to the location data for this behavior all school year.

  • When is this behavior occurring? During the school day, the majority of this behavior is happening between 12:00pm and 3:00pm.

  • Who is participating in this behavior? 8th grade students have accounted for 50% of this behavior these past three weeks. We have seen a drastic drop (40%) of 6th graders demonstrating this behavior. However, males continue to demonstrate the majority (81%) of these behaviors.

  • How are we working to prevent these behaviors in the future?

1. As a school, we continue to reinforce the "Stop, Think, then Respond" practice. When introducing the "Stop, Think, then Respond" technique to the student body last month, appropriate "turn your thought into action" responses were explained to the students, i.e. being angry doesn't mean you need to act angerly towards someone. Furthermore, we talked with the student body about how the realization of doing what is right - for both themselves and others - is always more important than "doing what an individual wants." An example of this was shared with students regarding how not saying a response or acting immediately in the moment can be helpful in preventing situations from getting worse.

Students were taught that when they find themselves getting instructions, redirections or directives, or if they are in a stressful situation - they need to stop, think, and then respond appropriately. Again, students were informed how their first thoughts and impulses to a situation may be based on emotions, and these thoughts and impulses may not represent the correct way to respond, i.e. the "right thing" for themselves and others to respond or behave to a situation.

Students were provided these tips for when they are in a moment of redirection, stress, or receiving a directive:

1. Stop. Take a second before verbally or physically responding.

2. Think. Students should consider if their next response will:

   • Get them what they want or need, in the moment?

   • Solve the problem or make it worse?

   • Match the request or current situation, i.e. “little asks (please sit down)” need “little responses (sitting down as opposed to yelling, ignoring request, etc.).”

   • Waste all of the involved parties' time?

3. Respond either physically or verbally, depending on the request.

The clear expectation within Evans is when any staff member provides another individual redirection or a directive, the other person will respond respectfully either verbally or physically.

2. The administrative team at Evans continues to speak directly to groups of students and their families who continue to engage in this type of behavior. Family and community resources have also been contacted for support and preventative ideas for students who continue to display these types of behaviors.

3. This semester students participated in a "Stop, Think, then Respond" Advisory "refresher" lesson.

4. During February, we re-introduced opportunities for student and staff to positively connect with each other through "Shout-Outs of Appreciation and Respect (S.O.A.R.)" slips. Students were introduced to the idea of "gratitude" and taught what it looks like, sounds like, as well as how students can actively show gratitude to others within Eagle Nation. This initiative continues universally with the addition of student "Shout-Outs" during the morning announcements each Friday in December.

5. Universally, positive behaviors will be publicly and privately celebrated with students.

6. "Elite Eagle" awards will continue to be provided to students in preparation for raffles and our "Bird Bin" school store!

How can you "fly" with us?

Ask your student how he or she can utilize the "Stop, Think, then Respond" technique in a stressful situation or when given a directive or redirection by an adult. Role play a scenario with your student when the "Stop, Think, then Respond" technique might be useful both during the school day and outside of school, too. Most importantly, please continue to talk to your student about the overall expectations of our building. You can find a detailed list of our universal expectations, by each location of our building, here.

"Horseplay" or "Play Fighting" dropped 12% since the last "Principal's Post." It totaled only 5 events over the past three weeks.

• • What does this behavior look like? These events contain tripping, slapping, pulling, pushing, grabbing and other non-aggressive, physical contact with another student. These events overwhelmingly involve friends physically interacting with each other. Please note this behavior does not represent "fighting."

  • Where is this behavior happening? We once again see these behaviors occur mainly in our hallways.

  • When is this behavior occurring? We are seeing this behavior occur before the bell rings for 1st hour and during the middle of our school day, between 12:00 and 1:00pm.

  • Who is participating in this behavior? This behavior continues to be an issue for our 7th grade (81%), male students (100%).

  • How are we working to continue prevent these behaviors in the future?

    1. We have increased our adult presence in our hallways during passing periods.

    2. We utilize a staggered release both to our lunch lines and from the cafeteria during our 7th grade lunch.

    3. We have increased our adult presence in our 7th grade hallways.

    4. We continue to hold a "hard line" regarding consequences for these types of behaviors. Loss of privileges, alternate passing times, 1:1 adult supervision during passing periods, suspensions (both In-School and Out of School) are utilized for these behaviors, depending on the severity and frequency of the offense.

    5. We continue to highlight our "Safety is in Your Hands" campaign every day during our morning announcements for the entire student body.

    6. The administrative team at Evans speaks directly to groups of students and their families who continue to engage in this type of behavior.

    7. Universally, positive behaviors will be publicly and privately celebrated with students.

    8. "Elite Eagle" awards will continue to be provided to students in preparation for raffles and our "Bird Bin" school store!

How can you "fly" with us?

Revisit with your student what "Safety is in Your Hands" looks like to him or her, in regards to "goofing around" physical behaviors. Please talk with your student regarding the difference between the appropriateness of these physical behaviors outside of school, i.e. at home, in the neighborhood, at the park versus inside a public setting. A term we use continually in our building is: "learning the time and place" for specific behaviors. "Horseplay" might be perfectly fine at home, in the neighborhood, at the park, etc., but within our school grounds this type of behavior is not tolerated.

Most importantly, please continue to talk to your student about the overall expectations of our building. You can find a detailed list of our universal expectations, by each location of our building, here.