Hello parents,

I’d like to commend our students, parents and staff for the tremendous efforts they’ve put forth so far this school year. The first two trimesters of the school year have gone by quickly. Please take the time to acknowledge the hard work students have put in so far and keep encouraging them to give their best effort through the final trimester.

Our 1-1 computer laptop initiative is now in year seven at FCMS. I would like to thank our students, parents, teachers, school board and community for their continued support regarding the 1-1 laptop initiative. This initiative has afforded our students and staff numerous educational opportunities. The laptop computer has been a tool that has improved classroom instruction, helped improve student engagement, improved student collaboration and creativity, helped improve each student’s technology skills and helped integrate the most relevant information into our middle school classrooms.  While there have been some minor issues along the way, the benefits of this initiative have far outweighed the challenges.

Spring break will run from March 8-10 this year. I am hopeful that families will have the opportunity to use some of this time to be together. Don’t underestimate the power that you have as parents/guardians to influence your children’s decision making and values.

With the students, parents, and school staff working together the Forest City Middle School will continue to be a positive and caring learning community.

Respectfully,

Zach Dillavou

By: Olivia Gayther

On January 23, five Forest City Middle School students traveled to the Iowa state capitol. The students that went were Olivia Gayther, Jordan Anderson, Laura Harms, Keevan Jones, and Adisyn Erdman. The purpose of this trip was to attend the event Iowa Day At The Capitol  for the American Cancer Society (ACS). This was the first year that the Forest City Middle School participated in anything like this, so teachers Mrs. Olson and Mrs. Ziesmer were unsure what to expect. When they arrived, to their surprise, the people there were all adults that were either physicians or family members of those who were fighting cancer. Someone soon told them that they were the first ever middle school group to come to an event like this, and just a year before they had their first high school group attend.

Throughout the day, they were approached by multiple people asking where they came from and why they were there. They answered by talking about the Mini Relay for Life that the middle school does every year.  The Forest City Middle School has raised thousands of dollars and is the only middle school in the state of Iowa that conducts a Mini Relay for Life. They learned about Palliative Care for terminal patients, and other cancer related subjects that they could use to help them talk to their representative. With this, they also learned some speaking skills that they would use; the most important being ‘lobbying’. Lobbying is to seek to influence on an issue. The time eventually came to travel to the Capitol and talk to Representative Tedd Gassman where they would listen to his view on the issue and tell him the details about tanning beds, skin cancer, and tobacco use in teens.

The day was an amazing experience for the girls and now they can easily share their opinion along with facts on an issue. They met very supportive people, some of them wanting to change the way kids are living so they can prevent the fight against cancer.