A few community members have made us aware of an issue with the Google Form that can be used to submit items for the Curriculum Connection. We have fixed the form, which can be accessed by visiting https://bit.ly/3I4lAwd.

We thank those who brought this issue to our attention, and apologize for any inconvenience it caused.

During the past few years, our teachers, department chairs and administrators have been engaged in important work on a variety of curriculum-related issues that play a critical role in the growth, development and success of our students. A key component of this work has been identifying ways to keep the community updated on our progress. Our efforts have included giving presentations during board meetings, sharing information during curriculum nights and participating in forums with our stakeholders.

While we greatly value and will continue to take part in public conversations about our work on curriculum and instruction, we recognize and respect that our stakeholders do not always have the time or ability to attend these events. We also understand that the information we provide may lead to questions, concerns or suggestions about how to best support student learning. With this in mind, we have created a new resource we are calling the Curriculum Connection.

The Curriculum Connection is designed to provide our families with an additional source for information, as well as another avenue they can use to reach and interact with the members of our curriculum leadership team. Our initial plan is to collect curriculum-related questions from our stakeholders on a monthly basis, and use this space to share our answers with the community. We will also use this feature to identify issues or topics that would benefit from a more in-depth dialogue or conversation. 

There are a couple things we ask everyone to please consider/keep in mind as we launch this new endeavor. First, there have been several detailed discussions about the curriculum work we have been doing the past few years. Rather than rehash them in this space, we would invite and encourage those who are interested in learning more about this work to use the links below to access the information we presented to the board and shared with the public. 

Second, we want to use this resource to address questions, issues or ideas that impact the district as a whole. With that goal in mind, we ask that you continue to contact your child’s teacher if you have questions or concerns about their individual performance or coursework.

If you have a curriculum-related question, concern or idea you would like to share, please use this form (https://bit.ly/3vZFCG6) or send an email to ccovino@hinsdale86.org with the subject line: Curriculum Connection. Any messages we receive will be shared with the members of our academic leadership team, who will respond to questions, comments or suggestions in this space on a monthly basis. We look forward to hearing from you.

During its meeting on March 10, the District 86 Board of Education talked about a proposed three-year calendar that covers the 2022-23, 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years. One of the main changes being recommended is the conversion of all Late Arrival Mondays and Flex Learning Wednesdays into Early Release Wednesdays.

The anticipated benefits of making this change include:

The anticipated disadvantages of making this change include:

Some of our families have expressed concern that this change will result in a significant decrease in instructional time. Per the chart below, which was shared during the meeting, shifting to Early Release Wednesdays would reduce instructional minutes by a total of one hour for the entire school year.

The board members were scheduled to take action on the proposed three-year calendar during their meeting on March 24. However, they decided to move the vote to one of their meetings in April so that families would have additional time to review the recommendations and provide feedback. If you would like to share your thoughts/feedback on Early Release Wednesdays or other aspects of the calendar, please email Dr. Chris Covino at ccovino@hinsdale86.org.

Reminder - registration for the district's summer school program is scheduled to open tomorrow (March 15). The first semester will take place June 13-30, while the second semester will be held July 5-21. Bus transportation will be available to all students at no additional cost.

You can access additional information about or our summer school program, including the program of studies, by visiting https://d86.hinsdale86.org/domain/641.

Last week, we let families know that we will be administering the Panorama Social-Emotional Learning (SEL): Student Competency & Well-Being Measures Survey to all students during their physical education classes on April 4. We will be using the results from this survey to:

While we are excited to offer this opportunity to our students and look forward to getting their feedback, we respect that some people may not want their children to take part in this activity. With this in mind, we want to let parents/guardians know that they can opt their children out by contacting the assistant principal for operations (APO) at their school by noon on March 25. The APO for Hinsdale South is Dr. Kari Peronto (kperonto@hinsdale86.org), and the APO for Hinsdale Central is Ryan Maita (rmaita@hinsdale86.org).

The newest “Inside the Classroom” video, which you can check out by visiting https://youtu.be/motNh7Qd8NI, highlights the knowledge and creativity of the students in Alisha McCloud’s Latin class at Hinsdale Central. 

During our visit, the students, with encouragement and guidance from Ms. McCloud, created pop-up picture books that represented their interpretation of a story they read in class. The lesson not only helped the students explore their talents, it also enabled them to experience how repeated exposure to Latin text can aid their mastery of the language and deepen their understanding of different literary works.  

We would like to thank Ms. McCloud, freshman Yicole Ng and the rest of the class for allowing us to share this unique and innovative project with the District 86 community. 

Last week's edition of The Hinsdalean featured a great article about the district's Transition Center, which helps young adults with disabilities develop critical life and vocational skills.

The piece showcased the tremendous growth the center has experienced during the past nine years (started with 26 students during the 2013-14 school year; currently has 115). It detailed how the staff have partnered with local businesses to provide young adults with access to valuable job opportunities. It also highlighted how the program supports students in the areas of employment, training, education, and independent living skills so they can enjoy productive and successful futures.

You can check out the story by visiting https://bit.ly/3q12pxd (photo credit to Jim Slonoff from The Hinsdalean). You can also learn more about the Transition Center by visiting https://d86.hinsdale86.org/Domain/10.

The numbers certainly added up for Hinsdale Central and Hinsdale South at their regional math tournaments. Both teams took home the title for their respective division (4AA for Central and 3AA for South). They also took first or second place in every individual event. Below is a summary of the results for each team.

Algebra 1 Team - First Place

Nathaniel Maydanchik (first place), Richard Chen (first place), Yash Gupta (fourth place), Anaya Muzaffar, Noor Pirzada and James Philipneri

Geometry Team - First Place

Wilbert Chu (first place), Anjali Jejurikar (second place), Godlyn D'Souza (fourth place), Amy Chen (fifth place), Mittal Aarav (fifth place) and Adele Groom

Algebra 2 Team - First Place

Sebastian Attlan (first place), Alex Yang (second place), Kevin Zhang (fourth place), Arjun Saini (fourth place), Jeffrey Liu and Ediz Canigur

Precalculus - First Place

Grant Zhang (first place), Jiming Chen (second place), Alex Jiang (second place), Max Lai (fifth place), Rishabh Ranganathan and Jackson Brown

Frosh-Soph 8-Person Team - Second Place

Anjali Jejurikar, Adele Groom, Amy Chen, Yash Gupta, Noor Pirzada, Richard Chen and Nathaniel Lin

Junior-Senior 8-Person Team - First Place

Max Lai, Rishabh Ranganathan, Jiming Chen, Sebastian Attlan, Alex Jiang, Alex Yang and Kevin Zhang

Calculator Team - First Place

Grant Zhang, Wilbert Chu, Nate Maydanchik, Aiste Austrevicius and Daniel Lee

Oralist - Second Place

Sebastian Attlan and Alex Yang

Algebra 1 Team - First Place

Eli Carder (first place), Pranav Goel (third place), Alex Siarny (sixth place), Adolph Galinski (seventh place), Brian Leong and

Haidee Yan

Geometry Team - First Place

Eva Marie Louis (first place), Duyen Millon (second place) Abigail Lu (fourth place), Parth Joshi (eighth place), Ann Valiathara (eighth place) and Sophia Zakar

Algebra 2 Team - Second Place

Anastasia Galinski (fourth place), Adi Patel (eighth place), Jaitin Pallath (eighth place), Aryan Patel, Nithin Reddy and Zachary Carder

Precalculus - First Place

Elijah John (first place), Matthew Leonardson (second place), Andrew Metzger (third place), Zeeshan Razzaq (fifth place) and Alec Andrulis

Frosh-Soph 8-Person Team - First Place

Eli Carder, Adolph Galinski, Pranav Goel, Alex Siarny, Eva Marie Louis, Abby Lu, Duyen Millon and Ann Valiathara

Junior-Senior 8-Person Team - First Place

Andrew Metzger, Elijah John, Matthew Leonardson, Alec Andrulis, Anastasia Galinski, Jaitin Pallath, Nithin Reddy and Adi Patel

Calculator Team - First Place

Andrew Metzger, Matthew Leonardson, Jaitin Pallath, Eli Carder and Eva Marie Louis

Oralist - Second Place

Anastasia Galinski and Elijah John

We congratulate both teams on their dominance at regionals, and wish them the best of luck at state.

The Daily Herald recently announced the names of the student-athletes who were selected for its 2021-2022 DuPage County All-Area Boys Basketball Team. We want to congratulate senior Garrett Bolte from Hinsdale South and junior Ben Oosterbaan from Hinsdale Central on being chosen for the team.

Garrett Bolte

Ben Oosterbaan

Below are some of the recent honors, awards and accolades that were earned by student-athletes and teams from Hinsdale Central.

The boys and girls soccer teams from Central both earned the United Soccer Coaches Team Academic Award for the 2020-21 school year. This honor is bestowed upon teams whose players all maintain a composite grade point average of 3.25 or better on a 4.0 scale for the entire year. The girls team has received this award two times, while the boys team has won it 15 years in a row.

The following students were named Central's athletes of the month for February:

We congratulate these student-athletes on their accomplishments on and off the field.

The members of Hinsdale South's Key Club recently made six blankets that will be donated to the Hinsdale Humane Society. 

The effort was led by members of the group's executive board, who bought the supplies, organized the event, and help make the blankets that will be used to keep several dogs warm and cozy.

Great job, Hornets.

Below are some of the recent honors, awards and accolades that were earned by students and staff who are involved in activities at Hinsdale Central.

The Hinsdale Central Scholastic Bowl team defeated their opponents from Lyons Township and Glenbrook South en route to the regional championship. We congratulate the members of the team on this impressive accomplishment.

The Hinsdale Central speech and debate teams combined forces to win the championship at the Illinois District Tournament. Several members of the teams will be heading to Louisville, Kentucky in June to compete at nationals. We congratulate both teams on their incredible success. We also congratulate Matthias Austin, who was named the Assistant Coach of the Year for the Illinois District.

Sally Phillip, who is the activities director at Hinsdale Central, was named the District Administrator of the Year by the Illinois District of the National Speech and Debate Association. We congratulate Ms. Phillip on this well-deserved honor, and thank her for all she does on behalf of our students.

District 86 was well represented among the presenters at the recent DuPage Countywide Institute Day. Below are descriptions of two sessions that were led by our students and staff.

The Hinsdale Central Gender Sexuality Alliance, Hinsdale South Prism Club and Youth Outlook hosted a professional development opportunity titled "Supporting LGBTQ+ Youth in Schools and Communities." More than 60 teachers, service providers and administrators took part in this session, which was focused on providing educators with knowledge, resources and techniques they can use to best support and advocate for LGBTQ+ youth.

Sarah Lombard, who is the world language department chair at Hinsdale South, and Sally Belter, who is a world language teacher at Hinsdale Central, were selected to present at the West Suburban World Language Conference that was held in conjunction with the DuPage Countywide Institute Day. Ms. Belter’s session, which was titled “Interactive Google Slides and Sheets,” highlighted how Google Sheets and Google Slides can be used to create engaging and visually appealing digital activities and assessments. Ms. Lombard’s session, which was titled “Culturally-responsive World Language Education,” provided attendees with classroom practices they can use to not only create independent learners of all backgrounds and identities, but also accelerate their progress.  

The District 86 and District 88 Transition Family Group will be hosting a virtual presentation about college experience programs on March 16 at 6:30 p.m.

During the event, representatives from Shepherds College in Wisconsin, PACE at National Louis University in Chicago, and Judson University in Elgin will talk about their college experience programs, which are geared toward individuals with intellectual disabilities who want to immerse

themselves in college life while attending classes to earn a certificate.

You can access additional information about this event by clicking the image on the right.

Jessica Lahey, an educator and New York Times bestselling author, will be the featured presenter for the final virtual event being held in conjunction with the 2021-22 Community Speaker Series.

During this event, Lahey, who wrote "The Gift of Failure: How Parents Learn to Let Go So Their Children Can Succeed," will help parents/guardians and educators understand the roots of substance abuse and identify who is most at risk for addiction. She will also provide evidence-based strategies and practical tools that can be used to support and educate resilient, addiction-resistant children.

This event is free and open to the public. However, registration is required if you want to take part in the livestream or watch the recording of it afterward.

You can register for the event by visiting https://bit.ly/35ESuGA. You can also access additional information about the Community Speaker Series by visiting http://www.d181foundation.org/.

If you missed the edition of Board Briefs for the board of education meeting on March 10, please visit https://conta.cc/35OcN4B.

Please visit https://bit.ly/3d93aws to access the latest COVID-19 data for our district, community and county. As a reminder, below are the metrics we plan to update on a weekly basis.