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VIRTUAL PLAY FESTIVAL 

Byers Drama Club presents a virtual play festival on December 11th & 12th at 7:00pm! You can reserve a spot for our virtual play festival HERE. Please fill out this form as best you can. The drama club will be following up via email with a Zoom and streaming link to our performance. You can expect an email confirmation after you submit the form and the link to be sent by Wednesday, December 9th. Please reach out to Cassidy Greif with questions.  

DSST FAMILY SURVEY 

Reminder: please take the Tri One Family Survey by 12/14!  We are committed to hearing your feedback on what is working well for you and your students, as well as areas that may need improvement.

• Click here to take the survey
• The survey window runs from today, November 30th, through the end of the day Monday, December 14th. 
• The survey covers a variety of topics and should take approximately 15 minutes to complete
• Families can choose to share their contact information or remain anonymous
• Four languages are available: English, Spanish, Arabic, Vietnamese. Click your preferred language on the top right hand side of the survey (see below).

Close out 2020 with a donation to DSST: Byers! Like everything in our crazy pandemic year, our yearly fundraising campaign is kicking off later than usual. We have faced so many new challenges together this year, and deeply appreciate your continued support as we work to maintain programming that ensures that students are making connections and finding success inside and outside of the classroom. Our GT@B campaign funds our yearly discretionary budget. With the economic downturn due to COVID19, we expect this budget to be increasingly tighter as we move into the 2021-22 school year, and every dollar truly counts.

This year, despite the pandemic, we were able to use funds from last year’s campaign to pay for coaches and digital platforms to continue many of our clubs and activities including Drama Club, Speech and Debate, Student Affinity Groups, Cross Country, Basketball, Cheer, E-Sports Club, Newspaper, Student Government, and more. In addition, these funds have provided us with flexibility to provide more materials to you in your homes - texts, science kits, etc. This year our Growing Together at Byers (GT@B) campaign is more important than ever! As we look towards the 2021-22 school year our carryover for this year will directly impact our discretionary budget and, therefore, the activities and resources we are able to provide for our Falcons.

As our most accessible ‘plus one’ opportunity in this pandemic world, we are hoping that every member of our community will give what they can- be it $1 or $1000! We are so deeply thankful for everything you have each managed this year, and we know it hasn’t been easy. Thank you for your continued support of DSST: Byers, we are glad to be in this together! To set up a recurring or one-time donation, follow the link here.

iREADY

iReady is a universal screener assessment for our students in English Language Arts 6-9 and Math 6-8. The these tests help us build an understanding of students foundational skills and support with more targeted instruction or interventions as needed. We will take our second screener on Monday, December 14th. This second assessment will help us understand student growth from the first assessment. Advisors will communicate the adjusted schedule to students before the testing date. Please see THIS letter with more specifics about the assessment and how you can support your student to do their best. Please reach out to Kareem Kalil or Amy Green, with questions or concerns.

GIFTED & TALENTED 

All 6th grade students will take an assessment in order to determine their eligibility to be identified as gifted and talented. This is a universal screener given to all 6th graders in DPS schools. This year, the assessment will be the CoGAT in order to be able to administer it in a remote setting. Please see the attached letter and one pagers to understand more about the assessment and how you can support your student to be ready to do their best. Please reach out to Amy Green or Lindsay Morgan for questions.

Is your 8th grader ready to start thinking about high school? Our DSST: Byers High School Recruitment Committee wants to have lunch 1 on 1 with them to answer their questions and get to know them. We will be hosting these on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 11:30am starting in December and you can sign your student up HERE. Your student will then receive a calendar invite from their RC member for lunch.

Additionally, we are hosting a virtual HS Open House for our current 8th grade families on Wednesday, December 16th at 5:00pm via Zoom. Please RSVP HERE to join us!  

Please reach out to Bailey Manning with any questions. 

YEARBOOK PHOTO SUBMISSIONS 

Because of COVID, we cannot have our regular picture day. Without picture day, we do not have student pictures. So, we need you to send us a picture of yourself!

• Subject line: FirstnameLastnameGradelevel
• Example: KatieHickey12

For MS, families will receive an email prompt to submit their student's picture via the Balfour app. You can find all the instructions HERE. 

FAMILY FORUMS

In an effort to make sure that we are hearing from our families on a consistent basis on the topic of instruction we will begin a series of weekly forums spanning from Mid-November through March. Each of these forums will include some framing, an update, some data to dive into, and a robust Q&A session. The forums will be led by Steven Menduke, our Associate School Director of Instruction, and he will be there to hear ideas, answer questions, and share updates from the instructional team. We will also work to include other members of our instructional team in these meetings as often as possible.  Below, please the calendar of meeting dates, and times, as well as the meeting link for Microsoft teams. You will simply access the call through your student's teams account. Meeting Link: Click here to join the meeting

Upcoming Meeting Dates:  

December 15-5:30pm 

• On 12/15, we will be joined by a variety of math and science teachers from both our middle and high school! They will share their own perspective from this year, and be there to answer questions!

January 19-5:30pm 

Thank you for your commitment to helping our community grow and thrive during this challenging time. If you have any questions, please reach out directly to Steven Menduke

REPORT CARD CONFERENCES 

Report Card Conferences will be held this Friday, December 11th. Classes will be asynchronous for all subjects and students. Students and parents must attend the virtual conference.

STP MEETINGS 

Did you know STP meets on the third Thursday of each month? Join them on December 19th at 7am via Zoom HERE with Passcode 808478. You can also check out their new website HERE!.