Hello SAU 34 Families, Students, and Staff,

The second round of SAFE Grant awards were approved by Governor and Council on Nov. 22, providing funding for 335 safety and security projects in 249 schools (231 public schools and 18 non-public schools). The list of approved projects can be found here. Despite what you may have read in the Messenger, two grants were awarded to SAU 34 Schools.

Please scroll down to access a wide range of information and links about what is happening all across SAU #34. If you have trouble opening any of the links, please scroll to the top and click on the picture of the SAU sign. That will bring you out of the email preview and into the actual newsletter, all the links will work from there.

Have a wonderful weekend!

• Dec 5 Hillsboro-Deering School Board 6:00pm HDES Library
• Dec 7 Early Release for students - Staff Professional Development
• Dec 12 Washington School Board Meeting 6:00pm WES
• Dec 15 Windsor School Board Meeting 5:15 pm HDHS Media Center
• Dec 15 SAU 34 Public Budget Hearing and Meeting 6:00pm HDHS Media Center
• Dec 19 Hillsboro-Deering School Board 6:00pm HDES Media Center
• Dec 22-Jan 1 No school - Holiday Break

The Hillsboro Deering Elementary School (HDES) Library thanks the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) for its three years of spectacular support. In June 2019, IMLS granted $50,000.00 to the HDES library to fund STEAM programming. Students in grades 1 through 5 participated in five creative engineering projects from the prestigious Boston Museum of Science. Students went on to participate in 19 shorter projects based on books and building. This programming was directed by elementary school librarian Meg Jones with the support of STEAM Associates Deanna Neal and Emily Primrose.

The program was a huge success due to the creativity and hard work of the wonderful students. They were able to complete their building projects in diverse settings such as the library, or their classrooms, or even at home during the pandemic thanks to materials kits. When you ask students today about what they enjoyed about the projects, many students talk about how fun they were. In their words, they liked learning new things and are looking forward to more projects. They even have their own ideas for the future, like creating an origami zoo or city.

Enriching projects like this continue into the future with the book and build program, where students listen to a book and follow on with a project. In November 2022, students created 289 Warrior Holiday Cards for troops who cannot go home over the holidays. This generous grant accelerated promising practices in our small library, and the learning has been very agreeable to our students. Thank you to IMLS!

This year at Washington Elementary School (WES), students are learning how to become leaders through a program called “Leader in Me” published by FranklinCovey Education. Based on the 7 Habits of Happy Kids created by Sean Covey, students learn, through a series of lessons, how they can be a leader. These 7 habits are WES’s school-wide behavior expectations and are known as the “Habits of Wolf Leaders” (HOWL). Students are encouraged to help each other develop in each of the habits and to lead by example.

During their whole school morning meeting on Fridays, staff members give out HOWLer awards that are tied to at least one of the 7 habits - Be Proactive®, Begin with the End in Mind®, Put First Things First®, Think Win-Win®, Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood®, Synergize®, and Sharpen the Saw®. Each student who receives an award throughout the month is put into a drawing to represent our school at a lunch with a local police officer. The police officer orders takeout from a local restaurant, brings it to the school, and has a special lunch with the students to congratulate them for their work with the 7 habits.

“I feel that the HOWLer lunch is a very positive program where students are recognized for outstanding efforts they displayed in the previous month. It gives Chief Murdough and I the opportunity to be involved with these students where they get to see the local police as regular people. I feel that this assists in the fostering of a great relationship between the students, the school, and the police. This is the sixth year I have participated in this program as a Police Officer for the Town of Washington, and I very much look forward to spending time with these students every month to recognize them for their achievements,” says Officer Mark Dressel.

In previous years, a student of the month was chosen to have lunch with a police officer. WES hopes that the new structure this year will show all students that anyone can be a leader!

Food Services has been working with the H-DSD IT Department on setting up automated messages sent via email and text as a second layer of updating families, parents, and guardians about school lunch account balances.

This past Tuesday, a successful message was sent to families regarding negative account balances. We are still working to address who gets the automated messages. The only other notice that has been successfully sent this school year was in early September.

Moving forward, our goal is to have automated messages sent out on Mondays at approximately 6 pm with student lunch account balance information. We appreciate your patience and understanding as we work to get this process and system up and running smoothly!

To regularly monitor a student's lunch account and individual purchases, please create an account with "School EZ Pay". To create an account, you will need your student's school issued ID number. If you need an ID number or assistance creating an account please let me know as I am very happy to help you! This app will allow you to also upload money using a card if you choose (service fee of $2.50).

If you have any questions regarding a student school lunch account, school lunches, Free and Reduced School Price Lunch Applications, or anything relating to Food Services, please contact me at amuncy@hdsd.org or 464-1160.

Thank you,

• The NH Department of Health and Human Services has an important update for families with children covered by NH Medicaid. During the COVID-19 federal Public Health Emergency (PHE), New Hampshire has provided continuous health care coverage for children and families that receive Medicaid. When the PHE ends, this extended coverage will end too, and families may need to complete a renewal to re-certify their children’s Medicaid eligibility. Learn more about planning for the end of the PHE here.

The calendar on the SAU website has been updated to be more user-friendly and to provide selectable event views by building. In addition, the individual school calendars have also been updated to include events that are occurring in the other schools. These changes enable a single view for everyone to see what is happening across the SAU and District.

By clicking on the calendar name on the left-hand panel, you can hide that particular calendar's events from the larger view. You also can subscribe to a calendar to receive updates and changes to events.

HDSD.org

Watch Video

Our district has moved to an online registration process and it is so very important for parents and guardians to log in to https://hdsd.web2school.com/ and update all information. DO NOT click on the new student registration button. Simply log in with your username and password and follow the prompts. If you have any issues or do not remember your login information, please contact the school office below for assistance:

• Hillsboro-Deering Elementary School, PreK-5, alemkau@hdsd.org , 603-464-1122

• Hillsboro-Deering Middle School, 6-8, sbelida@hdsd.org, 603-464-1120

• Hillsboro-Deering High School, 9-12, pkallander@hdsd.org , 603-464-1184

• Washington Elementary School, K-5, dbilski@hdsd.org , 603-495-3463

The document links below, which are also in Web2School under Announcements, will be helpful for you to review prior completing your information update:

H-D – Washington Student Electronic Device Agreement

Notification of Video and Audio Recording

Opt-Out of SORA Digital Library

HDSD Annual Parent Guardian Notice of Policies

Washington SD Annual Parent Guardian Notice of Policies