Point Equity

The majority of points should come from teachers who are rewarding academic achievement. How can we

1. make it easier for teachers to award and report points, and
2. show them how easy it is without acting like nannies at some staff meeting.

Not Much Scuttlebutt

Heads and Interested Others--

I check in here every couple of days, but haven't seen much new here of late. Part of that is my fault for posting my "schedule" a couple weeks back. Part of that is the "let's relax" necessity of the profession. Bearing that in mind:

1. We do need to meet some time in the prep week before school starts. I don't see any major conflicts among us, but there are a couple of issues out there which we need to lash down before school begins. We come back Thursday 8/6, right? That's largely drenched with meetings. Friday we'll be staffing a table. I will be on campus starting either Tuesday or Wednesday--probably just for a few hours--can we set up a time?

2. These issues are, to me, the following

• Point equity. I have no problem with Conor coming last in 2009. I don't have any idea how we were so far behind though.
• With point equity comes two issues: raising staff involvement and improving sorting.
• Also, if we could have a calendar in place taking us through the first semester, complete with what inter-house activities/ competitions shall be held and when, we could remove that meandering feeling I had last year. I don't mind making things up as I go along, but it's a deuced difficult way to establish tradition.
• Revisit the notion of House Facebook pages. We could run it like the ECHS Alumni page. I can't see any problem with it.

Thanks,

Mel

Two more trinkets?

This idea just struck me today and I'm not sure whether I like it or not yet, but I thought I'd throw it up here and see what everyone thinks.

We now have two "trinkets" that sit with a Head of House--the Von Snyder Plate and the House Cup. I was just thinking, what if we generate two more such items, based on other criteria? As a reminder, the Plate is for the House with the most awards at the academic awards assembly; and the Cup is for the House with the most points at end of year. The other items could be for things like school spirit (how many people wear House or school colors at a given event, or how many people show up to support House or school teams, etc), or our "athletic" competitions, or whatever else we want.

I thought it would be fun to provide more opportunities to pass some of these items around; and it could also give the opportunity to have the goal of having a "royal flush" of all four items at once. That being said, I don't think it should go more than four, because then there's just too much. Having four unique items each winnable in different ways seems kind of neat.

As you can see, I've not really thought this through in much detail, so this is all I have to say at the moment. Comment away!

Gaining Enthusiasm

Shawn had mentioned that a good way to inform students about the opportunities, clubs, etc. at Charter was at the new student orientation, which I believe is set for Friday the 7th of August. I would be willing to arm a table with info. (flyer, pins, basic purpose, etc.) and man it for the orientation.

What is the likelihood of having get togethers off campus. For instance at the movies, or coldstone, alumni could even be invited for these inter or intra house gatherings.

Getting the "Competition" Rolling

Here are my ideas about getting things rolling--just "spitballing" as they say.

1. If we achieve "universal sorting," great. If not, start setting up the tables week 2. That same week, meet with house captains and prefects to start planning a first "in house" mixer.

2. Sort at the end of week 3.

3. In house welcome week 4.

4. House competition week 5--let's show them something different than dodgeball.

Start monthly competitions.

September (late September)--Academic League style--round robin or single elimination. This could also publicize Academic league. As we won't have started Academic League (probably), we can use more than just Friday on this.

October--screen the scariest movie of all time: Mary Poppins.

November--I LOVED our Thanksgiving celebration following Saxon Day. I think it would be cool if we could get short skits from each house into Saxon Day.

House Points

Is there any way to look and see how the house points were distributed last year? My guess is that the results were predetermined based on the class rosters of the teachers that participated the most. I rarely gave any points to Conor last year because I had very few students from Conor on my roster, especially compared to Halcyon and Sideris.

Crazy Ideas for Competitions

I thought I'd start a post for the topic in the title, just so any such proposals can all be in one place.

So post your crazy competition ideas here, everyone!

House Pins, Banners etc!

We need to get more house pins, and I propose a different style of pin. Jewel/metal pins are pretty cheap - prices vary. I'll find a price list and post them. Last school year the cost of the pins was reimbursed by the school. If Sahwn is reading, perhaps we could get an idea of how much the school is willing to invest (if any).

Also, I think the Houses should have a visual representation at assemblies that goes beyond Noah dressing as the golden monster of Sideris. I think we should have banners created, one per house, that the Heads take to each assembly and otherwise store in their classrooms. I'll try to find prices for those (these will likely be expensive).

Both items above suggest the need for a fundraiser of some sort. Car wash!

House Activities

One thing that got to me last year, and it was my fault more than anyone else's, was the lack of house activities the second half of the year.

I think we should plan out a monthly house competion/ mixer. This could be a lunchtime water carrying activity, a potluck, or a movie night.--but we need to keep interest in the competition August (or September)--May.

I also would like to make the point system more vital to campus life. I, personally, awarded points for every test, quiz, and paper (every "big" activity). It took approximately ten minutes a week to award these points. I didn't publicize it as I could, and will do so in the Fall. I would encourage all other teachers to do so. I know that other teachers may have had more complicate formulae, but I awarded ten points for an "A" and five for a "B."

I also want to have more in-house activities. I have been reflecting on the year the past two or three weeks and, despite my disappointments, I still believe that we have as fine a group of young people as one will find anywhere in the world. The young people of Conor House are just, flat out, good people. I'm sure that the same is true in Excelsior, Halcyon, and Sideris.

I have heard that the latest hen party has produced a schedule for house days at Charter. Let's try to occupy two or three days a month. We could use one in house activity and one intra-house activity/ competition. We could plan these out this summer--or, at the very least, brainstorm ideas.

Last year's activities bear revisiting:

1. Dodgeball.
2. Water Wars.
3. Princess Bride (a truly Charterian "Rocky Horror")

We entertained

4. Kickball.

I thought we might screen

5. Star Wars, Episode IV (the best of the lot)

Suggestions?

Let's get more teachers on here

One thing I'd definitely like to see is more involvement from other teachers. If you're one of our teacher House members reading this, PLEASE don't just read it, contribute! We don't want this to be just the four Heads running everything. If you read through the posts from last summer (interminable if they were mine), you can see that our vision is that everyone should be involved. Why not start here and now on the blog?

Hey Gang

How are we going to make this whole thing better for 2009-2010?