BEACON NETWORK SCHOOLS

Grant Beacon Middle School

September 22, 2023

"Education is the foundation upon which we build our future."

Christine Gregoire

Our first School Advisory Board Meeting was a success. We appreciate the valuable input and support from our engaged parents and community members. Together, we are making a positive impact on our school's future. Our next SAB will be October 23,2023 at 3:20 pm. Let me know if you would like to join. 

Important Reminders:

Progress Reports: Progress reports were sent out on Thursday of this week. We kindly request that you take a moment to sit down with your students and discuss their grades. A student's status is based on four key components: GPA, LBA, CPA, and attendance. Your guidance and support are vital in their academic journey.

Lockdown Drill: We want to inform you that we will be conducting a lockdown drill on Tuesday, the 26th. Safety is our top priority, and this drill helps ensure we are well-prepared for any situation. Please reassure your students that this is a precautionary measure to keep everyone safe.

Encourage your students to reach out to their teachers if they need assistance with making up missing assignments or require additional help. We're here to support their growth and success.

Enjoy your 3 day weekend!

Mrs. Jennifer Anderson

Principal

Grant Beacon Middle School

jperea@dpsk12.net

Upcoming Events

Celebrate

We are excited to send you your child's first progress report for this school year. At Beacon, students are evaluated on four key metrics:



• Grade Point Average (GPA): Academic performance on tests and quizzes. 
• Learning Behavior Average (LBA): Things like class participation, homework completion, focus and effort
• Character Percentage Average (CPA): Demonstrating our school character traits of leadership, perseverance, curiosity, integrity and kindness.  
• Attendance: Being present and on time for classes

Looking at these measures holistically allows us to hold all students to high standards and ensure they are set up for success. See letter that went out with the progress report for more info.

Beacon Ambassadors

We are having our Southwest  DPS candidates that are running for the school board of education position for this November election. We want to thank Kimberlee Sia who is running for District 1 (Southeast)  for showing up to the event and having an amazing conversation with our SW parents/community. We want to also thank all the parents and community for showing up to represent our SW communities.

The next Candidates forum will be at the South High School for Southeast  (1700 E. Louisiana Ave.) onTuesday, Sept. 26th from 6-8pm. Please look at the flyers for more info.

If you want to get more info or who to get involved in our Beacon Parent Ambassadors. Please contact Mr. Boni Sanchez @ Mr.sanchez@Denverbeaconschools.org

Parenting Classes

We had our first education class-Parenting classes in Spanish this past Tuesday. We had an amazing turn out. We want to thank Monica Padilla M.A., LPC, a Trauma-Informed Practices Specialist who works for DPS for coming and having parents sharing the stories and how they can find strategies to find healing. If you want or are interested in getting  some support by learning new strategies of how to best support our kids at home and at school. Please come to our next parenting class, Tuesday Oct. 3rd from 9:15-10:30 am at Kepner.

Library and Technology

It is less than 3 weeks until the end of quarter 1! Students have access to lots of great books through their classrooms, the library, and Sora online. Encourage your student to read using any of these resources so that their reading skills are strengthened and their reading grade reflects growth.

Students should use the helpdesk button on the Moodle (our learning management system) for assistance with their device. Please remind your student to charge their Chromebook every night so that he/she is ready to participate in class every day.

Important: We need a signed Technology Contract for every student in the Beacon Network. You can access this document here. It can be printed and turned into the office.

Enrichments

This week in Cartoon U the students had a competition to see who could draw the best version of Mr. Cannon (who they know likes BBQ and whose son likes cars.) Which one do you think resembles Mr. Cannon the most?

We are finalizing our enrichment schedule for Quarter 2, all  students will make their selections in Advisory on Monday, October 2. On Friday, September 29 at lunch students will have the option to spend 60 Liveschool points to do early enrichment sign up. You can take a preliminary look at the catalog here - please note this may still be subject to some minor changes.

Athletics

Flag Football Tryouts start Tue. September 26. In order to tryout students must complete both this form from Coach Magana, and the DPS Sport Sign up form. 

Girls Volleyball Tryouts will start Wed. September 27. Please be sure to complete the DPS Sport Sign up form.

We are so excited for our GBMS Cross Country team, led by Coach Skeats! At the Sept. 19 North Viking Invitational 6th grader Lauren L. came in 21st out of all the girls, and coming in 2nd place out all of the boys was GBMS’ very own Flash, 7th grader Reed J! All of our runners are training hard during their practice sessions and we are proud of each and every one of them.

Questions?

Reach out to our athletic director:

Ms. CarolAnn Skeats carolann_skeats@dpsk12.net

Food Pantry

We got a lot of fresh food donated to us by LifeSpan Local. This included produce, eggs, milk and meat.  We had about 30 families show up to our food pantry to take some delicious food. Thank you, LifeSpan Local. 

Also, Target at Havana and Mississippi(1400 S Havana St. Aurora, CO, 80012) gave us more school supplies and other items. We would like to thank them for their generous donation and partnership with our Beacon Schools.

Remember that our next food distribution will be Thursday, Sept. 28th from 2-3 pm.  

Food distribution will be happening in the same place, on the Westside of Kentucky Ave and Irving St. 

If you need food before these two days of Food distributions, please get in touch with Mr. Boni Sanchez at 720-690-7964 or email at mr.sanchez@denverbeaconschools.org

Fundraising

Thank to everyone who visited Chook this week, our promo code had over $500 in sales, we hope you enjoyed your food and thank you for the support! Save the date for our next upcoming fundraiser dine out - October 11. Our student led conferences are on October 10 and 11, so you can plan to pick up some Birdcall before or after coming to conferences. Promo code and flyer coming soon.

We often have hungry students and tired teachers and would greatly appreciate donations of snacks and beverages to keep everyone energized throughout the day. You can order items from our BNS Wish List on Amazon or use it for ideas on your next Costco run. Thank you for your generosity!

www.bnsk12.org