Although we can’t physically gather as usual to run/walk on the Mt. Hebron HS track, we can still run this Thanksgiving!

Physically distanced, but virtually united!

EVENT DATE: Your run must be completed between November 23rd-30th.  

TIME: Anytime that suits you best between Nov. 23rd and Nov. 30th.

Always make sure you are clearly visible to cars and other pedestrians and especially in the twilight hours.

LOCATION: Run/walk ANYWHERE that is SAFE! (sidewalks, paths, treadmill)*

Please ensure a parent or guardian is present.

DISTANCE: 1 mile (approximately 10-15 min) or more

Once you have finished your run complete the form linked below.  Please completed one form per child.  All SJLES students who submit a form will be entered into a drawing for SJLES spirit wear.

https://sjlespta.org/virtual-turkey-trot/

Attach a picture of you and/or your family participating when you complete the form.  We will create a picture collage that we would like to share with our school community! 

Mr. Notari shared a video message with us yesterday to officially kick off the Turkey Trot.

Thanks, in advance to everyone who participates!

Well, after much deliberation, our judges (Mrs. Harkness, Mrs. Peddicord & Mrs. Essa) were able to come to a consensus on the winners of the Pumpkin Decorating Competition.  It was SO hard to choose because they were all so awesome in their own way!  

1st place: #18 (Easter family)

2nd place: #26 (Xia family)

3rd place: #31 (Guy family)

Honorable mentions go to:

Spookiest – #14 (Chaturvedi family)

Movie Madness – #28 (Nichols family)

Most Festive – #29 (Ganti family)

Creepiest – #9 (Patel family)

The judges wanted everyone to know that it was SO hard to pick only a select few.  They would have picked them all if they could!

We will be in touch by email with the winner families to arrange for prizes to be delivered.

Thank you SO much to all the families who participated! We hope you had a good time coming up with your designs.

SJLES PTA

Check out the entries for the inaugural SJLES Pumpkin decorating competition! Winners will be announced Friday Nov 6th…

PTA News

Hello to all the SJLES Staff & families!

There’s a lot going on right now, and the PTA are super excited to share some of the upcoming events and opportunities to connect & strengthen our school community. 
Read on for more info…

Looking to connect with other parents? The PTA would like to offer a chance for parents to connect with each other via Zoom for each grade level. Calls will be managed by a volunteer facilitator and kept to an agenda that will include things like helpful tips for online tools, effective & healthy home learning environments and ideas for managing multiple grade levels at home.  We would also be happy to receive questions in advance to ensure that these discussions are targeting what everyone is thinking about. We’ve created a very short (2 min) survey to gauge interest  – please take a moment to let us know what you think: SURVEY

Volunteers needed! We are looking for several volunteers to help facilitate the Zoom parent chats (see above). Email sjlesptavolunteer@gmail.comfor more info. 

Pumpkin decorating contest is on NOW! This year we’ve had to get (even more) creative in how we celebrate and enjoy Halloween as a school community. So, what better way than a spooky, festive, mucky, funny pumpkin decorating competition! Decorate a pumpkin and submit your photo by October 31^st. Winners will be decided by our SJLES teachers and prizes will be awarded. Click HERE for details

Virtual Book Fair: Our school is hosting a Virtual Scholastic Book Fair from October 26th – November 8^th, 2020. The Virtual Fair is a fantastic way to get books in the hands of your students now to keep them reading at home, AND orders placed over this period will be sent to you just in time for the Holidays! More details HERE

PTACHC Submissions: The PTA Council of Howard County continues to collect and compile questions from PTA/PTSA members for the Board of Education candidates. You can submit questions to Debate@ptachc.org until Thursday, October 15th. On October 16, the questions will be sent to the candidates and any answers received will be posted to the PTACHC website no later than October 23rd. It is the intent to list as many of these questions as practical online; however, PTACHC reserves the right to hold questions that it deems inappropriate for the organization.

Have you heard of AmazonSmile? It’s a simple way for you to support your favorite charitable organization every time you shop, at no cost to you. Essentially, you can nominate St John’s Lane PTA to receive 0.5% of every eligible purchase you make on smile.amazon.com. This is basically an effortless way to fundraise for our school – and particularly fruitful as the holiday season approaches! For more details, click HERE.

PTA Meetings – Are you curious about what goes on at the PTA meetings, but feel a little intimidated about attending? Please don’t be! Our PTA is made up of a group of volunteers who help out where they can in strengthening our community and improving our kid’s experience at school. Newcomers are ALWAYS welcome. Take a moment to find out a little more about PTA meetings HERE. 

Until next time!

SJLES PTA

Virtual Parent Chats + Survey
The PTA would like to offer a chance for parents to connect with each other.  This year has so many new aspects and challenges, perhaps we can be a resource to each other as we try to navigate it.  We are considering scheduling “Parent Chats” via Zoom for each grade level.  Don’t worry – these are not related to planning any PTA events!  The chats would be a way to meet other parents, support each other, and reach others going through similar situations.  

Some suggested discussion topics may include: 
– Questions and helpful tips relating to technology platforms (Canvas, Dreambox, Lexia, Flipgrid, etc)
– Learning spaces at home – what has worked and what hasn’t 
– Siblings – How to keep track of assignments for multiple grade levels / How to balance little ones not yet in school while helping with school time?

Calls will be managed by a volunteer facilitator and kept to an agenda. We would also be happy to receive questions in advance to ensure that these discussion are targeting what everyone is thinking about.

We’ve created a very short (2 min) survey to gauge interest  – please take a moment (seriously, 2 mins!) to let us know what you think.

Membership
There’s still time to join the PTA online. Membership is $12 or $20 for families. You also have the opportunity to donate to the SJLES PTA. Your donation helps us reduce fundraisers and increases the quality of our events throughout the year. As always, your donation directly benefits our teachers, staff and students. Any questions please email sjlesptamail@gmail.com

Spirit Wear
SJLES spirit wear can now be purchased online. The kids especially love the hoodies so make sure you check out our store!

PTA Website
Massive thanks to Meg & Paul Halvorsen for giving our website a much needed face lift. We now have an up to date calendar of events, regular notices, and helpful links. 

Box Tops
Box Tops is an easy way to earn money for our school. The program is moving towards an online app on which you scan receipts to earn the rewards, but you can still clip Box Tops and return them to the school (in a Ziploc bag) once school reopens. See the attachment for more details on using the online app. Any questions, email Sayli Moskowitz at sayliw@gmail.com

Hey SJLES Families!

We wanted to give a massive shout-out to the SJLES teachers and staff for their flawless coordination of school materials pick-up last week. As always, they threw themselves into the task 100% and got it DONE. Thank you so VERY much!

Shout-out #2 goes to all our SJLES parents putting the final touches on their at-home learning environments over the weekend. This will be a work in progress though – no doubt we’ll learn a lot about what works and what doesn’t over the coming weeks. Don’t stress Families! Your SJLES community is here for you. Not only do we have our incredible teachers and staff, but the SJLES PTA is here to support in whatever way we can. Want to stay in touch? The best thing to do is to follow our Facebook page (www.facebook.com/SJLESPTA) and you can also join the St John’s Lane PTA Families group where everyone has the opportunity to post and connect with our community.

The SJLES PTA website is also going through an refresh and this will soon be a terrific hub for info & updates so watch this space…

And finally, the first PTA meeting will be taking place in the SJLES parking lot on Thursday September 10^th @ 6.30pm. Our key business will be to elect the new PTA board and approve this year’s budget. We expect the meeting to go for about 30 mins. Please come along if you can make it. We need to ensure that we have enough attendees to form a quorum – plus it’ll be a good opportunity to meet some of our school community, especially if you are interested in volunteering. SJLES Spirit Wear will be on sale at the meeting. T-shirts, Hoodies and track pants are available in sizes S-XXL (although we have varying quantities of each). Hope to see you there!

In the meantime, all the VERY best for week one of 2020-21

SJLES PTA