High School Principal’s Notes 11/30/2009

It seems odd that the school year is now 1/3 done. It seems even odder that we are now in the Christmas push. This is always the hardest time for me out of the year. I see a lot of pain in the students and it is usually caused from things I can’t fix. These next three weeks bring an enormous amount of stress to our impoverished student’s lives. Those students see the excitement and joy in other students and have some difficulties with the season. That can also be said of the student’s who have lost loved ones. Those things are pretty tough to deal with at any age, let alone during adolescence.

We have had a very quiet start to the new trimester. There have been very few students who needed schedule adjustments.

Winter sports begin tonight with the girl’s basketball team travelling to Forest Hills.

Alec Beattie made All-State in football. That is very cool for our football program and school.

I got bored over the weekend (my wife always looks forward to Mondays!) and started messing around with a new project for home basketball games. I am giving it a test run tonight. You’ll have to attend a “big” game to see what I came up with.

High School Principal’s Notes 11/23/09

It is hard to believe that we are almost 1/3 through the school year! We wrapped up our fall sports over the weekend with Destiny Noordyke competing at the state swimming competition. This week we have exams with a half day on Wednesday.

I stop by the general shop classes quite often to see the kids working. Some of their projects are nearing completion and are looking great. Mr. Tank really has taught his students a tremendous amount of skills while creating a tangible result.

I received word today that the further $127 reduction was a “done deal.” Both houses are out of session now and there is no hope for an emergency session. I went to a Principal’s meeting last week for the Lakes 8 Conference. Every other school is experiencing the same issues with regard to economics. It will be an interesting Spring.

Facebook sure has been causing us a lot of issues. Today another issue was brought to school because of a Facebook exchange over the weekend. It is amazing what a double edged sword Facebook is. I use it quite a bit to connect with former students and it is very cool to keep in contact with people who live all over the world. The other side of the sword is when it is used as a way to target the kid down the street. We have had quite a few bullying, harassing, and fighting issues this year. It is very eye opening to read what students are putting on the internet. It is also surprising to look at the time of day when these messages are sent. It is not uncommon for messages to be sent after 1:00 am. I found out the other day that many students have double Facebook accounts. One for their parents to see (in case parents want look into their child’s account) and another one that their parent’s will never know about. I never would have thought about that reality.

Board of Education – 10/26/2009 Meeting Minutes

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Quiz Bowl – Holland Invitational

Headed to State!

After a one year hiatus the Fremont Varsity Quiz Bowl team returned to the Holland Fall Quiz Bowl Invitational on Saturday. Teams were grouped in tiers of 4, and Fremont had a quite a challenge ahead of them after being grouped with perennial powerhouses Manistee, White Cloud and Holland’s B team. After six matches our record stood at 1-5, our only victory coming from a tight battle with Holland. However, the team gained a lot of confidence after challenging White Cloud the second time around, earning an 80-85 1^st half score. I told the team they were the best 1-5 team at the tournament.

Teams were re-seeded in the afternoon in new tiers of 4. We still had some tough challenges ahead of us, as Holland A and Kent City, both teams that have beaten us pretty solidly in the past, were in our bracket. We started out a bit slow vs. Ionia in the first match. At half time the team asked me to “fire us up, coach”. I told them, “3 wins and you’re going to state”. The team responded! They quickly built a lead against Ionia and didn’t look back, winning 185-110. Next up was Holland A, which beat us soundly last month in White Cloud. With confidence brewing, the team took it to a stunned Holland team, winning 190-155. Our last match was against Kent City, which always has a strong team. With a state birth on the line, the Packers raced out to a huge lead and never looked back, scoring 270 points in a rout.

After a 2 year lapse the Fremont QB team will head to state in March. If you see any of the following players please congratulate them on a job well done (please wait until after 1^st hour. The team doesn’t know they qualified yet and I’d like to tell them first). A huge thanks goes out to all of you for teaching this great group of young people all the knowledge they have.

Varsity Team Members:
Sam Breza
John Carlson
Shae Shornagel
Tara Weaver
Felipe Agurto

Coach Chris Gleason

Senior Class Fundraiser

The senior class is collecting cell phones to recycle and raise money for their class trip.

Calling all Fremont community members, help support the seniors of Fremont High School AND help clean up the environment. 

The senior escape committee is having a Race to Recycle^TM it is a FUN, first-of-its-kind fundraising program, with Motorola’s help, schools can earn extra cash and do their part for the environment.

Motorola is accepting used cell phones, any brand, any model in working condition.  Batteries accepted but must be discharged. 

Please drop off your phone(s) to: 

• Fremont High School
• Fremont Middle School
• Times-Indicator att: Deb Reinhold
• Career Tech center att: Jill Vansickle. 

We hope you join in and put your old phones to good use.

Any questions please contact one of the senior escape committee members:

Deb Reinhold co-chair itadvertising@comcast.net
Michelle Pikaart co-chair mpikaart@fremont.net
Tammy Hawker secretary hawker29@concast.net
Lori Harmon co-treasure moneyman23@sbcglobal.net
Deanna Traxler co-treasure dtraxler@wildblue.net

Senior Newsletter – November 2009

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High School Principal’s Notes 11/3/2009

The flu has made its way to the high school. While the elementary schools are recovering and increasing their attendance rates, the high school is starting to decline. This progression is fairly typical. The little ones get hit first and then the high school kids get it a week or two later.

The girls volleyball team won last night and will face Shelby on Wednesday at 5:30 at Newaygo. I wish I could be there but I was asked to substitute at GVSU for the night and will follow through on my promise. I hate missing those big games. On Friday, I will be joining the cross country team at MIS. The team always goes down the night before and I serve as the district representative. That means I won’t be able to see the girls volleyball team on Friday if they win on Wednesday. Too many good things going on this week!

In the coming weeks, you’ll start hearing about a new community service day at FHS. The staff and I were presented with a community service idea from Tressa Wenk. The staff overwhelmingly supported the idea. The plan is to take one day out of our calendar and perform community and environmental projects. The goal is to teach students about community responsibility and being good stewards of our environment. We hope for it to become an annual project.

9/26/2009 – Homecoming Dance

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Times Indicator Advertorial – 10/28/2009 Research and Development Leads the Way

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Board of Education – 10/12/2009 Meeting Minutes

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Packer Pink Out – 10/23/2009

Packer Pink Out-will be held at the varsity football field of Fremont High School October 23 at 7:00 p.m.Fremont, MI. This is a cancer awareness event we’ve been selling pink t-shirts to raise money/awareness for cancer, a cause for a cure. The money raised will go to the oncology department at Gerber (Hospital) Memorial Heath Services. Fans will be wearing the pink shirts, football players will be wearing pink jersey’s with names on them of local community members affected by cancer.

High School Principal’s Notes 10/20/2009

I appreciate all of the emails on the dress code subject. The vast majority of responses that I have received advised letting parents set the standard. That gives me a good idea of where our FHS Packer parents stand.

Lots of talk about H1N1 in schools. Currently, the Health Department is encouraging schools to remain open during this outbreak of flu. We had a large group of students absent yesterday but not even close to the 25% of the schools that closed. We have asked our custodians to pay special attention to “community surfaces” and to be liberal with disinfectant. Understandably, there is a lot of fear over this pandemic.

The budget…I hate to even speak about this as it is such a political issue but it is permeating schools. Yesterday, Governor Granholm signed the school aid bill knowing that the school aid budget was short even with the $165 reduction. You can see the memo from the Treasury department here: http://www.masb.org/Portals/0/pdf/School%20Aid%20Fund%20Memo.pdf . In response to the legislature not passing new revenue legislation, she has said that the largest earning districts (some receive more than $4000 more per student than we do) will be significantly reduced. You can see the foundation allowance per student here: http://www.msbo.org/services/biz/2009/hfa_conf_distimpact0910.pdf . I warn you, you may be a little upset after seeing how much other districts receive per student. The foundation allowance was created during Proposal A to fund higher earning districts at what they were at when Prop A passed. The reason this is important is that the districts Governor Granholm is targeting for a larger reduction are primarily Republican strongholds. I believe her goal is to make the Republicans deal on tax increases in order to protect their schools’ funding. The Republicans are saying that those schools will simply loose their funding. Pretty tough talk from both sides of the aisle.

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High School Principal’s Notes 10/16/2009

I’m looking for some input on the subject of dances and dress codes. Currently, we don’t have a dress code at dances because formal wear often comes with a backless, strapless, etc. design. There are very short designs and there are designs that are longer but with a very high slit. (I am certainly not a fashion consultant and have difficulty dressing myself in the morning let alone commenting on the styles of today.) With that being said, I have heard a few parents comment on how short the styles have become and that the school should enforce a dress code at dances. I am more than happy to enforce a dress code at formal dances but it is a slippery slope. I have always looked at formal dances as more of a “family rules” night. What I mean by that is for the vast majority of parents, formal dances are special events. Pictures are often taken with moms and dads. The parents certainly know what their child is wearing and I would hate to have a family spend hundreds of dollars only to be refused at the door. On the other hand maybe parents don’t know what their children are wearing. Maybe we have reached the point where we need a dress code. We could send a letter home detailing the rules but I would still have a bunch of people showing up in outfits that are against the rules. What are your thoughts?

People have been asking about the following dates:

May 1 – Prom – Fruitport Golf Club
June 3rd – Mandatory graduation practice – All graduating seniors must be present from 11:30 – 5:30
June 6th – Graduation 2:00 pm at the varsity football field

Board of Education – 9/28/2009 Retreat Meeting Minutes

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9/25/2009 – Homecoming Presentation of Court

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