"We often take for granted the very things
that most deserve our gratitude." ~ Cynthia Ozick
Success Stories
Forr the
he December 10, 2012 Bo
Board
d off Educ
ucatio
ion
n Mee
eeti
ting
Recognition
g
of Student/School Success
School District No. 67 (Okanagan
(Okanag
gan Skaha) extends congratulations
to the following students/groups
students/group
ps for these outstanding examples of
successs for:
Columbia Elemen
Elementary
ntary
Family Fun Night
On November 7th Columbia hosted Family Games Night from 5:30-7:00pm. This was the
first of three similar planned events Columbia Elementary hopes to involve the community
with this year. The idea for the event came about during a staff meeting when staff were
discussing students who may be at-risk for success at school. There seemed to be a
pattern and further discussion led to how the staff noticed a strong connection between
too much screen-time and increasing difficulties at school. During the discussions it was
raised that the need for families to spend more time face to face playing together is
needed. Building stronger connections within the school community is an added benefit of
Family Game Night.
Columbia staff was thrilled with the turnout - approximately 100 families were
represented; with a dinner by donation and babysitting provided for pre-schoolers, this
evening was embraced by all! After dinner the children stayed in the gym to play fun
active games with Mrs. Zaugg while the parents came to the open area with Mrs. Ramsay
and Mr. Percevault for a 15 minute presentation on the importance of finding balance with
screen time and its' impact on families. All families attending entered their names into an
incentive prize draw to be held at the end of the night. Then it was off to the various
classrooms to learn the game that their child's teacher had taught their class. There was a
great variety of games all encouraging fun and learning together as a family. Game kits
(cards, dice, instructions, etc.) were provided to families to take home and use to keep
playing the games they learned. The energy and fun being had throughout the school was
absolutely wonderful during this play time! Columbia’s first Family Games Night was a big
success and the feedback received has been very positive. We look forward to more
community building and positive habit encouraging Family Nights for the community this
year!
Success Stories
Columbia Elementaryy Continued...
tinued
Family Fu
Fun Night
Giant’s Head Elementary
Kids Days
Giant’s Head is becoming a Tribes school. They are teaching and modeling the Four (4)
Agreements – attentive listening, mutual respect, the right to participate and appreciations.
Since September Ms. Fedorak has been spending a morning with every Grade running a “Kids
Day”. The purpose of these days is through hands on interactive activities, students learn
(and model) the four agreements. By teaching and reinforcing the agreements, Giant’s Head
Elementary hopes to build more connected communities within each of their grades.
Success Stories
Parkway Elementary

Parkway Elementary’s Breakfast Program was a great success, thank you to Lindsay and
Shelene.

Hot lunches have been fantastic! What a super group of volunteers Parkway has! Thank
you!

Parkway’s assembly in November was wonderful! A group of students from Princess
Margaret Secondary visited the school and gave a great assembly on Africa. Maggie
students will be travelling to Africa in the spring and summer months. Everyone is looking
forward to hearing about their trip as well as keeping in touch with them all the rest of the
year.

Parkway’s recycling team did another great job! Huge thanks for their hard work and
effort.

Mrs. Tucker's class and their big buddies went on an exciting field trip to the park.

Four members of the Penticton Vees visited Parkway to read with the grade 5 students
and play some floor hockey. It was a really good time!

Senior readers from the Concorde visited Parkway and thoroughly enjoyed a nice
afternoon reading with all the students.

The multicultural club met recently for some fun activities.

The Remembrance Day Assembly on Friday, November 8th was excellent! It was led by
Parkway students and the presenters and emcees did a fantastic job. Thank you to Mrs.
Silvius.
Princess Margaret Secondary
Remembrance Day
This year, Leadership students at Princess Margaret hosted their annual
Remembrance Day Ceremony at Skaha Beach. Students from grades 9-12
worked together to create a meaningful, poignant ceremony honouring
Canadian soldiers. Highlights of the ceremony included Oliver D'Aoust
singing ‘A Soldier's Song’, Belle Grant and Grace Grant singing an original
composition ‘Hometown Hero’ and at the end of the ceremony having every
student place a maple leaf in the water in remembrance of all that the soldiers
fought for.
Success Stories
Ugly Sweater Day
Princess Margaret Continued...
The annual Ugly Sweater Day was once again a huge success with staff
and students pulling out their ugliest sweaters for a great cause. After
the day was over, many donated their sweaters to the textiles class which
will then turn this ugliness into great looking toques and mittens. These
items will then be donated to the Soup Kitchen for distribution to the
neediest people in this community.
DASH BC
Princess Margaret Leadership student Riley McKinley has been
selected to be the DASH BC Okanagan representative. She will
undergo extensive training to help prepare her for this role. In
this role she will be leading students throughout the province to
healthier lifestyles.
Maggie Fit
The second year of Maggie Fit is underway. This
program, which encourages students and staff to live
healthier, more active lives provides a free, healthy
breakfast every Thursday morning for participants as
well as prizes for meeting weekly fitness benchmarks.
Special Christmas Project | Santa’s Workshop
The Elves: Grade 9 Math Class + Santa’s Secret Helper
Students from Mrs. Berrisford’s grade 9 Math class are going to
be busy in the next few weeks preparing special Christmas hampers
to donate to families in need with young children.
The students will apply their skills learned in math (surface area,
Measurement conversions, scale factor and more) to the design
and to the painting of the wooden toys. In groups, the students
will create wooden toy plans and then Santa’s secret helper
will use their plans to make the toys out of wood. Then the
math 9 students will custom paint and assemble the toys
(wheels, etc.) The students will also prepare a food hamper
to give to the families.
Success Stories
Summerland Middle
Supplies Help Internationally
Last June, Ms. Steves and her class led a project to gather school supplies for students in
Mexico, the response from SMS students was outstanding. In Early November, SMS
donations were delivered to the Escula Secundaria in Lo de Marcos School in Mexico.
The response from the students was one of great excitement. The students were most
appreciative of the generosity of the Summerland Middle School students and sent their
thanks all the way from Mexico! That’s what you call a Success Story!
Trout Creek Elementary
TROUT CREEK ELEMENTARY SHOWS ITS WITS!
WITS
Trout Creek Elementary School has been using the WITS program beginning in 2007
as part of the school's plan to create a safe and caring school community. Teaching
students the WITS strategies has been a great way to increase the resiliency of the
students by empowering them with the skills to solve conflicts on their own. The
WITS program gives kids the language to deal with minor conflicts that occur in
their everyday lives.
At the beginning of each school year, the staff invest time to teach (and review) the
WITS strategies with students in a variety of ways. This year they decided to have
a group of grade 5 leadership students create and perform skits at a school-wide
assembly. A group of interested grade 5 students were selected and worked with
the school principal to create the skits for a couple of weeks in September. The idea
for the skits was to use a talk show format where the topic of the show was how do
you deal with teasing and bullying and the guests on the show were W, I, T, & S.
Each W.I.T.S. would talk about what strategy they used i.e. W would talk about
how she would walk away when being teased or picked on, I would talk about
ignoring the teasing, T (a natural born talker) would talk it out and finally, S would
seek help (after she tried the other strategies first). Then at the end of the talk show,
the WITS cheerleaders (another group of students) put on four little skits of things
that might happen on the playground and then use their WITS to solve them.
The school had to guess which of the WITS they were using. The students
presented the WITS skits at their next Assembly. It was a fun and very interactive
assembly with lots of energy and enthusiasm. As a follow-up the school principal
visited classes and read the story, "Bootsie Barker Bites" by Barbara Bottner to
reinforce the WITS in a more intimate, personal way.
Success Stories
Trout Creek Elementary Continued...
The school goal at Trout Creek Elementary is to increase the Social Emotional
competency of the students and the WITS program is a great fit as it really focuses
on building those interpersonal skills to deal with conflict in a "kids' world". As
mentioned earlier, the WITS program provides a common language for the kids
and it truly helps to build student's resiliency so they can become more capable
to solve problems on their own. The school decided to hold a parent information
night to talk to parents about the importance of Social Emotional Learning for the
kids and some of the programs are used at Trout Creek School including the
WITS program. The parent event was held on Wednesday, November 14th.
As part of the evening's activities and the most popular was the presentation of the
WITS skits to parents. Over 40 parents attended the evening (not bad for a school
of just over 200 students). The parents were delighted with the skits and it was a
great night of learning. Previously, a pamphlet was sent home "Using Your WITS
at Home", but seeing the WITS in action was a very effective way to show the impact
this program can have for the students.
WI
T
S
Success Stories
Trout Creek Elementary Continued...
WI TS
West Bench Elementary
COMMUNITY FOUNDA
ATION THANK YOU LUNCH
A huge Wildcat thank you goes out to the Community Foundation of
the South Okanagan for their generous donation last year. Their
donation allowed West Bench Elementary to renovate their kitchen
which benefits both the Breakfast Program and the Hot Lunch
program. As well, enormous thanks go to Mrs. Hakstian and the
Lunch Team, West Bench’s PAC parents and Chair,
wonderful Hot Lun
Carol Bayston for all their hard work to make the Fun Lunch program
a huge success!