GSD E-Blast January 2025

Dear Parents and Guardians,

Happy New Year, and welcome to 2025! The first half of this school year has been nothing short of extraordinary for our district. Together, we celebrated the successful passage of our renewals, ensuring ongoing opportunities and lasting benefits for our students, staff, and the entire community. Our athletic teams have excelled, achieving remarkable finishes, while our outstanding band continued to captivate audiences and proudly earned the title of #1 Band in the Land for the second consecutive year!

The spirit of generosity was especially evident this holiday season as our buildings, staff, students, and community organizations came together to provide food, gifts, and essential support to families in need. These efforts reflect the heart of our community—a dedicated village that consistently uplifts and supports one another.

Gibraltar continues to lead the way in educational excellence across the Downriver area. The accomplishments of our students, staff, and families fill us with pride and reinforce our shared commitment to creating an environment where everyone can succeed. Thank you for being part of this amazing journey and for making our district a place to learn, work, and thrive!

Your partner in education,

Amy Conway

Superintendent

Research shows that being happy and positive primes the brain to be more successful and productive. Promoting positivity will enhance our student’s academic ability and develop them into happy and positive thinkers and leaders. Each month we will highlight a building or staff member that is spreading “The Orange” (Happiness) through Gibraltar!

We are thrilled to share the joy of the season through our winter music concerts across at Chapman, Parsons, Hunter, and Downriver STEM @ Weiss. These performances were a beautiful celebration of our students’ hard work and talent, bringing festive cheer to our community. We extend our heartfelt gratitude to our incredible music teachers — Mrs. Monticello, Mrs. Arndt, and Mrs. Pogrmich — for putting in weeks of effort and patience to prepare our students. Your dedication, hard work, and creativity is appreciated by our school communities! Last, thank you to our shining stars - our amazing students - for their inspiring performances and to all our families for joining us and supporting the arts in our schools. Your presence make these moments even more special!

The Unified Basketball team triumphed over the First Responders with an impressive score of 95-65. This exciting and spirited game brought together members of the community in a fun and engaging way. First Responders from Rockwood, Woodhaven, Wyandotte, Southgate, and Dearborn participated, showcasing their athletic skills while fostering camaraderie and support for an inclusive sports event. The game highlighted the power of unity and sportsmanship, as the Unified Basketball team demonstrated their dedication and teamwork on the court. It was a memorable event that celebrated community connections, inclusion, and the shared joy of competition.

In 8th-grade science, students dive into an engaging, hands-on exploration of body systems by working with their “surgical teams” to dissect frogs and compare their anatomy to the human body. This immersive experience begins with students studying human body systems and learning a detailed “surgical protocol,” guiding them on how to locate and examine similar systems in frogs. Through the dissection, students discover the relationship between organs and how body systems interact, applying their knowledge to diagnose patients using evidence from medical charts, test results, and fact sheets. This unit introduces the anchoring phenomenon of how illnesses arise when body systems malfunction, challenging students to create models explaining these processes and design solutions, such as a prosthetic hand. Additionally, students analyze tissues, study the nervous system's role in controlling other systems, and ultimately demonstrate their learning by developing a diagnosis for a complex medical case. Beyond the scientific skills, this unit encourages students to step out of their comfort zones and rise to challenges they may have initially found daunting, fostering both confidence and curiosity.

Our building has been intentionally increasing student engagement through hands-on, interactive learning activities. Teachers have been focusing on trying new strategies with students to increase collaboration, critical thinking, and creativity in the classroom. From creating science experiments and building models, playing phonics games, and exploring math concepts through manipulatives, students are actively engaged in their learning. These activities not only make learning fun but also deepen understanding and encourage problem-solving skills. We’re proud of the innovative ways our Chapman Chargers are growing every day and we thank our teaching staff for being willing to take risks by trying new strategies with their students!

Every single minute of December was filled with learning and memory-making at Hunter Elementary. The school celebrated Grinch Day, had a holiday-themed spirit week, played Bingo for books, sang their hearts out at the Christmas concert, created special gifts for their parents, visited the Henry Ford Museum, turned their classroom into a coffee shop, and shopped at the Elf Shop hosted by the HFSA. And much more!

Hunter staff and families also adopted 19 children and collected Christmas gifts to share with them.

Finally, to celebrate positive behavior and responsible choices, students decorated Christmas Cookies as a PBIS whole school celebration.

December is a great month to be a Hornet!

The Cookies with Santa event was a wonderful success, bringing the Parsons school community together to celebrate the holiday season in style! Chaired by our amazing PTO, the event welcomed hundreds of students and their families on Tuesday night. Children enjoyed taking pictures with Santa and Mrs. Claus, savoring delicious cookies, creating festive crafts, and listening to a heartwarming holiday story. Thank you to everyone who attended and to the PTO and volunteers who made this magical evening possible—it was a joyful celebration of the Christmas spirit that truly brought smiles to all!

Weiss Elementary School’s Winter Wonderland was a tremendous success, bringing together our Weiss community and friends for a night filled with festive fun! Guests enjoyed hay rides, exciting "snowball fights", holiday shopping at the Santa Shop, and heartwarming visits with Santa. Creative crafts, warm hot chocolate, donuts, and apple cider delighted attendees of all ages, while the petting zoo provided unforgettable moments for families. Thank you to everyone who helped make this event so special, especially our Weiss PTO—we’re grateful for the opportunity to celebrate the season with our amazing community!

This holiday season, a group of thoughtful students came together to create festive ornaments for elderly members of our community. Their hard work and creativity resulted in beautiful, handcrafted decorations that will bring smiles and warmth to many. These young volunteers demonstrated the true spirit of the holidays by sharing their time and talents to spread joy. Thank you to everyone involved for making a meaningful difference in our community!

We are excited to introduce a new resource for our students: Varsity Tutors. This online platform offers live, chat-based tutoring across a wide range of subjects and grade levels, tailored to meet each student's unique needs. Whether your child needs help with a challenging topic or wants to dive deeper into a subject, Varsity Tutors provides support when they need it most.

This service is completely free and serves as an additional tool for learning, complementing our existing programs. Students can access Varsity Tutors independently through their Classlink Dashboard. Rest assured, student privacy is always protected—tutors do not have access to personal information.

If you have any questions, please reach out to me or your principal. We’re here to help!

We would like to thank all of the volunteers who donated candy and decorated the bus to have a successful Gibraltar Christmas Parade this year. We also had another successful year for our Gibraltar Rockwood Rotary and GSD food drive. We have collected over 33,000 pounds over the last twelve years.

A special thank you to our Carlson Hockey Team for their donations and for helping us load boxes and bags of food on the bus. Thank you to all the staff, students and families for spreading kindness, happiness and holiday cheer.

Bonnie Trottier will be retiring from the Food Service Department at the end of December. She has been a loyal Gibraltar/Chartwells employee since 2000. She started as a lunchroom aid and has held many positions since. We will miss her! Kristina MacBride will be stepping up to fill the open position in the Food Service office. Congratulations to both!

A fun GSD logo has been added to our new Food Service truck. Looking forward to serving the district from the Hungry Marauder food truck in the upcoming year.