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Horizon West Middle School |
HWMS Community Member,
Happy New Year and I hope everyone has had a wonderful winter break! I am looking forward to an amazing school year ahead! We will make 2023 the best!
Report cards will be sent home on January 12th for quarter 2 and will be available on Skyward. Take some time today and review your child’s grades with them. Remember we are starting a new quarter. So, this is the time to break old habits, start fresh and finish the next semester with a positive outlook and focus on our academics.
Also, as you review grades with your child, please start to talk to your child about what classes they are interested in taking next year.
The Florida Assessment of Student Thinking (FAST) is a progress monitoring tool that will be administered three times per year to track your student’s progress in learning the Benchmarks of Excellent Student Thinking (B.E.S.T.)
Florida Assessment of Student Thinking (FAST) Reading assessment on January 9, 2023 and Math on January 10, 2023. FAST assessments are computer-adaptive tests taken on a computer and will contain 30-40 items. If you or your student would like to interact with the online testing platform or review FAST Reading sample items at home, sample test materials are available at https://flfast.org/families.html. For more information about the FAST program, please visit the portal at FLFAST.org.
We will continue our homework help program in the mornings offering support for students that need help with their Math, Language Arts, Science, and/or Social Studies and now Spanish 1 homework/classwork. This support will be from 8:00 am - 9:00 am in the Horizon West Middle School cafeteria.
The support schedule is as follows:
- Mondays - Science support
- Tuesdays - Social Studies and Spanish 1 support
- Wednesdays - Language Arts support
- Thursdays - Math support
Again, Happy New Year! Looking forward to a wonderful year with our Hornets!
Your Proud Principal,
Michelle Thomas
Horizon West Middle School
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8200 Tattant Drive
Orlando, FL 37486
(407) 554-1570
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Jan. 6: Rising 7th and 8th grade student elective forms due by the end of the day
Jan. 9: National Law Enforcement Appreciation Day
Jan. 9: FAST Reading assessment
Jan. 10: FAST Math assessment
Jan. 12: Quarter 2 Report Cards
Jan. 16: Dr. MLK, Jr. Holiday - No School
Jan. 18: No early dismissal on this Wednesday
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Jan. 23: PTSO meeting, 4:30pm in the Media Center |
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REVISED OCPS 2022-2023 School Calendar:
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Our next SAC and PTSO meeting will take place Monday, January 23rd beginning at 4:30 pm in the Media Center. All members of our Horizon West school community are welcome and encouraged to attend! |
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A Night Under the Stars (May 19): |
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Congratulations to our Students of the Week! |
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Month of December nominations: |
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Nominated by Ms. Ferrand-
“I nominated Lea because she is a dedicated, kind, and an overall wonderful student. She has been working hard over the past couple weeks academically, and I am so proud of her growth.”
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Nominated by Ms. DeLury-
“I love that Kiana always comes to school with a great attitude. She is friendly and kind to everyone, and always has a big smile on her face! Kiana is overall a great student and she deserves this week’s student of the week.”
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Nominated by Ms. Dunn-
"Bruna Baroni is a wonderful student. She is very hardworking and respectful, and always helps those around her. She goes above and beyond expectations and is a pleasure to have in class."
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On January 14th the Theatre department will be taking students to state competition for acting events. This is a picture from districts on December 2nd. We are proud of our thespian students, they did great and represented our school well! |
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HWMS Dancers will have their DANCE PERFORMANCE assessment on Monday, January 9th.
Best of luck to all of our Dancers!
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Our 2021-22 HWMS Boys Basketball County Champions from last year!
Basketball tryouts took place this week. Once the teams are chosen, coaches may opt for morning OR afternoon practices; students on the team will be notified. Please refer to the schedule below for games. Boys play first @ 5:00, girls play immediately following the conclusion of the boys'game.
- Wednesday, 1/18 @ Lakeview Middle
- Monday, 1/23 @ Sun Ridge Middle
- Wednesday, 1/25 Bye
- Monday, 1/30 vs. Ocoee Middle
- Wednesday, 2/1 vs. Hamlin Middle
- Monday, 2/6 vs. Water Spring
- Wednesday, 2/8 @ Bridgewater Middle
Monday games start @ 5:30
Wednesday games start @ 5:00
Girls play first, followed by boys
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Congratulations to Mr. Chad Ryan, HWMS boys’ basketball coach who was honored as the JR. NBA Coach of the Year at the Orlando Magic Basketball game on December 30th. Here Mr. Ryan is pictured center court receiving his award from former NBA star Bo Outlaw. |
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Jan. 9th is National Law Enforcement Appreciation Day. We’d like to thank our School Resource Officer Deputy Grange for his commitment to keeping Horizon West Middle School safe. We appreciate you Deputy Grange!! |
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Student Government Association News |
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How does your garden grow? The SGA Environmental Committee working in the garden on campus! |
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Above and just below:
Ms. Parrish and her Chorus went around spreading holiday cheer before break singing carols to staff members and students.
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Before Winter Break, the teachers in our Science Department did some team-bonding with a “Pass the Present” activity! |
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Before Winter Break, the teachers in our Science Department did some team-bonding with a “Pass the Present” activity! |
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Students in 6th grade Life Science with Ms. McCallister spent the day before break learning about Dichotomous Keys and Binominal Nomenclature by finding the correct genus and species names for snowflakes! |
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Food for Thought at the New Year |
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Achieving Your 2023 Goals |
Many of our Hornets have already set out goals for the new year or may sometime this week. Here are some tips to help achieve those goals and to help repeat any successes from 2022.
Don't Underestimate Your Possibilities Hornets!
1) You are setting your 2023 goals for you—not for anyone else. 2) Anything is possible. 3) You have much more potential than you realize. 4) Success is really your duty to yourself and your responsibility. You deserve success. 5) There is no secret to success. It is available to anyone who takes action. 6) Remember that regardless of the size of your goal, it will require discipline and effort. However, our Hornets have the grit to achieve their goals if they will also write them down and review their goals each morning and then again at night before they go to sleep.
Energize Your Goals
Make sure whatever goals you have set for 2023 are tied to something bigger. For instance, one of our Hornets may want to see great gains this year in their musical or choral talents. They might set a goal for the amount of time they practice each week as a goal, but the larger objective is really to earn a spot on the OCPS All County Band or the OCPS All County Chorus. When you are setting goals always be sure you are clear about what you want it for, and then tie it to a larger purpose.
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Inspirational quotes for our Hornets about putting in top effort, investing in yourself, avoiding excuses this year, preparing for success, and stirring up passion today.
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Michael Jordan On Effort
Sometimes things may not go your way, but the effort should be there every single night.
~ Michael Jordan, six-time NBA champion
Beyonce Knowles On Investment
I don't like to gamble, but if there's one thing I'm willing to bet on, it's myself.
~ Beyonce Knowles, award-winning performer
Henry Cloud On Responsibility
An excuse is a way of promising ourselves today that we will have the same issue again tomorrow.
~ Henry Cloud, psychologist
Bobby Knight On Preparation
The will to win is not nearly as important as the will to prepare to win. Everyone wants to win, but not everyone wants to prepare to win.
~ Bobby Knight, NCAA champion basketball coach and Hall of Fame member
Karen Lamb On Taking Action
One year from now you may wish you had started today.
~ Karen Lamb, author
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Welcome Back and Happy New Year Hornets!
Ms. Thomas, Principal
Horizon West Middle School
Friday, January 6, 2023
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Horizon West Leadership Team |
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This communication may contain information that is legally privileged, confidential or exempt from disclosure, and intended only for the use of the addressee(s) named above. If you are not the intended recipient, please note that any dissemination, distribution, or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. Anyone who receives this message in error should notify the sender immediately by telephone or by return e-mail, and delete the message from their computer and any printout thereof. Please note that OCPS utilizes spam and junk e-mail filtration applications in its e-mail systems. That filtering process may prevent or delay delivery of certain e-mail communications. If you do not receive a timely response to an e-mail communication, please contact the intended recipient by phone. |
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Copyright Notice
Reproduction of this material, either written or electronically, including the general layout, graphics, analyses, and content topics without the express approval of Target Performance Systems, Inc., a Florida corporation, and OCPS-Horizon West Middle School is forbidden without written consent. Thank you for your support of the Orange County Public Schools and OCPS-Horizon West Middle School. Please contact Ms. Tiffany Stanley at tiffany.stanley@ocps.net with any questions.
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