The BMS Beacon (Oct. 16, 2026)

Monday, October 19

• ALICE Drill (see info below)
• Blue Volleyball @ Saline (4:15pm; 5:30pm)
• Gold Volleyball vs. Bedford (4:15pm; 5:30pm)

Tuesday, October 20 (6th Grade Camp Day 1)

• SST Meeting (1:00pm)
• Football vs. Dexter (4:15pm; 5:30pm)
• BMS & CHS Fall Echoes Concert (7:15pm @ CHS)

• Cross Country SEC Jamboree @ Tecumseh (4:00pm)
• Blue Volleyball @ Lincoln (4:15pm; 5:30pm)
• Gold Volleyball vs. Dexter (4:15pm; 5:30pm)

Thursday, October 22 (6th Grade Camp Day 3)

• :-)

Friday, October 23 (6th Grade Camp Day 4)

• 7th Grade Community Meeting (Beach Block)

Saturday & Sunday, October 24-25

• MSBOA All-State Auditions @ Saline

What I noticed at BMS this week...

7th Grade art students are working with ceramics and designing their own 3-D projects.

7th Grade ELA students are learning adult discussion skills via socratic seminars. Students practiced preparing their points beforehand and engaged in discussions without any teacher input, building on each other's points and assessing each other's performance. This was extremely impressive to see from 7th graders!

8th Grade Science students engaged in meaningful self-reflection after their mid-unit test in order to understand their mistakes and where they can make adjustments to improve, a cornerstone of our Portrait of a Graduate and what we're about at Beach Middle School.

If you are able and willing to help provide food for our staff on November 2 (all-staff PD) and/or November 12 (Parent/Teacher Conferences), please sign up here!

Please see the message below from one of our parents, who has generously volunteered to help coordinate meals for BMS staff on two upcoming dates:

Our teachers and staff have some very long days coming up, so let's help make sure they have plenty of fuel! Please volunteer to bring a homemade dish, grab-and-go snacks, or a cash donation to provide meals during professional development and parent-teacher conference days in November.

Grab & Go Snacks for November 2nd Professional Development Day: Sign up to bring individually packaged snacks and drinks to keep staff going during a full day of training. Drop off to Beach by October 30th or contact Cheri for other arrangements.

Catered Lunch for November 2nd Professional Development Day: Sign up to make a monetary donation for a catered lunch during full day training. Venmo @cheriszcodronski (last four of phone number is 5618) or contact Cheri for other options.

Potluck Dinner for November 12th Parent-Teacher Conferences: Sign up to stock a chili bar for teacher and staff to get dinner during a long evening of conferences. Drop off food items to Beach by 2:30 on November 12th or contact Cheri for other arrangements. Pick up any crock pots or dishes during the school day on Friday, November 13th.

Contact Cheri Szcodronski at cheri.szcodronski@gmail.com or 615-604-5618 with questions or to make drop off arrangements. Thanks for your support!

Families,

Please note that you will need to order photos before this Sunday to avoid an $8 shipping charge. As a reminder, to order photos, use the information below!

You can order photos from SchoolPictures here.

The flyer attached below also has the information. All photo purchases are made online.

On Monday, October 19, Beach Middle School will conduct our annual ALICE safety drill.

For families who may be unfamiliar, ALICE stands for Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, and Evacuate. It is a school safety framework that teaches students and staff that, in an emergency involving an intruder, there may be different safe responses depending on where the threat is located.

During our drill, we do not use weapons, simulated gunfire, or an actual intruder. Instead, students and staff are given a hypothetical scenario involving an intruder in a specific part of the building. Classes then respond based on that scenario, with our lockdown protocol serving as the default response while staff consider whether another action, such as evacuating away from the threat, would be safer.

Students also completed a short lesson this week with their classroom teachers to review safety expectations and talk through what these protocols may look like in different situations.

As always, our goal is to help students feel prepared and confident in a way that is age-appropriate and not scary.

Beach continues to have one of the lowest chronic absenteeism rates in the county, and that is a reflection of how diligent our families are about getting students to school and communicating with us when challenges arise. Thank you for continuing to make regular attendance a priority.

As a reminder, our handbook notes that regular attendance is a vital part of the learning process and outlines a progressive attendance protocol. Families may begin receiving attendance letters as students reach certain absence thresholds. A first letter is sent after 5 days absent within a 45-day period, with additional outreach and intervention as absences accumulate.

These letters are intended as communication and an opportunity to partner with families, not as a punishment. We know that illness and other circumstances happen. Families are encouraged to submit medical documentation when appropriate so our records accurately reflect medically excused absences. We DO NOT count medically excused absences excused by a doctor's note toward these totals when sending letters home.

If attendance ever becomes a challenge for your family, please reach out. Our goal is always to work together to help students be at school as consistently as possible and get the most out of their time at Beach.

You can use this form throughout the year to give shout-outs and messages of gratitude to our staff. No need to wait for an "appreciation week"! We will ensure that the staff member you select receives your words of kindness--they go a long way.

Thank you for submitting so many of these already! They have made a huge positive impact on our staff.

Here is our staff directory.

A note from Mr. Schumann:

8th grade families: Please check your email for important fundraising information that was sent on Wednesday, October 14. The message came from Nick Schumann using a Student Adventures email address.

If you don’t see it in your inbox, please be sure to check your spam or junk folder as well.

If you have not yet signed up for the Washington, D.C. Trip in May, please see the info below from trip coordinators Nick Schumann and Austin Elam:

Dates: 5/18-5/21

Registration - www.studentadventures.org

Click MyTrip

Trip ID: BMS2927

Field Hockey: Steve Blum (sblum@chelseaschools.org)

Cheer: Sami Hamblin (chelseacheerleading@gmail.com)

Cross Country: Sam Angus (sangus@chelseaschools.org)

Football: David Slusser (dslusser@chelseaschools.org)

Volleyball: Ryann Skrypec (rskrypec@chelseaschools.org) / Corynne Eder (ceder@chelseaschools.org)

Adam Schilt, Principal <aschilt@chelseaschools.org>

Kaitlyn Gasparovich, Assistant Principal <kgasparovich@chelseaschools.org>

Erika Clark, Administrative Assistant <eclark@chelseaschools.org>

Amanda Syrovy, Office Clerk <asyrovy@chelseaschools.org>

Carla Freeman, Grades 6/7 Counselor <cfreeman@chelseaschools.org>

Austin Elam, Grade 8 Counselor <aelam@chelseaschools.org>

Noelle Rager, School Social Worker <nrager@chelseaschools.org>

Ryan Michaud, School Psychologist <rmichaud@chelseaschools.org>

Kristen Chandler, Project Success Coordinator <kchandler@chelseaschools.org>

Marie Larson, Youth Mental Health Coordinator <mlarson@chelseaschools.org>

Follow Us on Instagram: beach_bulldogs

Volunteering to help with a school trip or event? Find the ICHAT form here.

If you'd like to drop in and chat about something, I hold "coffee with the principal" meetings on Tuesdays and Fridays. These are 30-minute time slots, and I have four available each week.

I can do these in person or virtually. If you need to meet outside of these times, please reach out to my assistant, Erika Clark, to set up an appointment.

For Chelsea kids,

Adam Schilt

Kaitlyn Gasparovich