Schools
July 21
2022
11
Schools Update: Summer Activities
By Superintendent Jim Helmen
I am excited to be writing
my first Vernonia’s Voice column.
I want to thank everyone in the
community for being so welcom-
ing. There are a few events that I
want to highlight.
Our principals and staff have
worked hard to develop summer
learning opportunities for our
K-12 students.
A little background on sum-
mer learning grants funds: in
2022, the Oregon legislature ap-
propriated $100 million for sum-
mer learning programs for Oregon
schools focused on high school
students and enrichment programs
for K-8 students.
With Vernonia Schools’ sum-
mer learning grant funds we will
be providing the following activi-
ties for K-12 students:
Aug. 1-4 – Volleyball Skills Camp
Aug. 8-26 – Special Education
Summer School/ Extended School
Year Services
Aug. 8-18 – High School Credit
Recovery/9 th -grade On-track pro-
gram
Aug, 8-12 – Nature Art
Creative Writing - Graphic Novels
Football/ Track Clinic
Legos and Engineering
Math is Fun
Aug. 8-11 – Art & Juggling 1
Aug. 8-19 – (M-F) Kinder Camp
Aug. 15-18 – Art & Juggling 2
Aug. 15-19 – Creative Chemistry
Aug. 15-24 – Credit Recovery 2
Aug. 22-24 – AVID/Boot Camp
Summer Learning Details
ALL Summer Learning in-
formation, such as activity times
and dates, grade levels for each
activity, location of events, staff
assigned, and ACTIVITY PAR-
ENTS SIGN-UP FORMS, will
be located on the district web-
site under the Heading “SUM-
MER LEARNING PROGRAM-
2022”
2022 Summer Lunch Program
We want to remind everyone
of our Summer Meals Program
hosted by Vernonia Schools.
We have FREE meals daily
for every student ages 1-18 and
adult meals for $4.50!
LOCATION: Vernonia Schools
Commons area
DATES: June 27 - August 19,
Monday -Friday
TIME: 11 am - 12:30 pm
We have a fantastic summer
school staff that is excited to serve
you. We hope to see you soon.
Please visit https://www.ver-
nonia.k12.or.us/foodservice to see
our Summer Meals Menu.
Our summer lunch program
team is working extremely hard
to ensure all our community chil-
dren have access to free nutritious
meals and fun activities for ALL.
We understand that the current lo-
cation at the school may be a bar-
rier for families, so the summer
program is currently working with
the Oregon Department of Educa-
tion to find alternatives to adding
another Summer Meals location.
We will keep everyone posted as
this process develops.
Vernonia Schools Website
I encourage everyone to vis-
it our District website for ALL
school information (www.verno-
niak12.org). We are updating the
website daily to better support
easy access to District informa-
tion. If you have any questions
or need help, please contact Barb
Carr at bcarr@vernoniak12.org .
I want to send an open invita-
tion to community members and
students to email, call, or set a
meeting with me.
Go, Logger Nation!
Jim Helmen
Superintendent Vernonia School
District
jhelmen@vernoniak12.org
(503) 429-5891
School Board Report
At the July 14, 2022 School Board Meet-
ing:
Superintendent Report – Superinten-
dent Jim Helmen attended his first official
meeting since starting in his new position.
Helmen updated the Board on summer ac-
tivities around the District.
Pelster Elected Board Chair, Wagner
Elected Vice Chair – The Board voted to
elect Stacey Pelster as Chair of the School
Board and Susan Wagner as Vice Chair.
Board Approves Substitute Teacher Pay
– The Board approved Licensed Substitute
Teacher Pay at $201.01 per day.
Board Approves Board Meeting Schedule
– The Board approved the Board meeting
schedule for the 2022-23 school year. The
Board will continue to meet at 6:00 pm on
the second Thursday of the month. Meet-
ings will be held in the Schools Library,
except for the October and April meetings,
which will be held at the Mist School. The
Board also scheduled a workshop for Thurs-
day, September 29 from 5:00-9:00 pm.
Board Accepts Staff Resignations – The
Board voted to accept the resignation of
VHS math instructor Robin Manning, and
VES 2 nd grade teacher Taylor Obley.
Board Makes Superintendent Advisory
Assignments – The Board approved the
following volunteer advisory committee as-
signments:
Safety Committee – Susan Wagner
Talented and Gifted Committee – Susan
Wagner, Joanie Jones, Amy Cieloha
Policy Review Committee – Amy Cieloha,
Javoss, Susan Wagner
Curriculum Committee – Joanie Jones, Ja-
voss McGuire
The Board also approved the fol-
lowing Board Assignments:
Negotiations Team for Classified & Li-
censed Union Groups – Stacey Pelster, Su-
san Wagner, Greg Kintz, Javoss McGuire
Scholarship Committee – Javoss McGuire,
Scott Rickard, Greg Kintz
Board Approves District Designations –
The Board designated the following: Dis-
trict Chief Administrative & Budget Of-
ficer/Clerk , Custodian of Funds, and Rep-
resentative of Federal/State Fund & Grant
Applications – James Helmen; Depository
of Funds – US Bank & Government Pool;
District Auditors – Pauly, Rogers & Co.
P.C.; Insurance Agent of Record – Brown
& Brown Northwest; Attorney of Record
– Garrett, Hemann, Robertson, Jennings,
Comstock & Trethewy, P.C.; Newspaper of
Record – Vernonia’s Voice.
Board Chair Thanks Students for Vol-
unteer Help – Board Chair Stacey Pelster
thanked high school students who volun-
teered during the 4 th of July Great American
Bash event. “It was awesome!” said Pelster.
“They were down there participating, they
were respectful and responsible, they helped
clean up. They did a fantastic job.”
Vernonia School Board Meetings are held on
the second Thursday of each month. The next
meeting is scheduled for August 11, 6:00 pm.
Please check the District’s website for updates/
changes: www.vernonia.k12.or.us .
“It’s All About Culture” continued from front page
to Lock-down, Lock-out, and evacuation
and ensuring our systems are solid. I am
currently working with the School Board
and administration on planning safety
training – we want to ensure we are ready
when it is time to respond to any emergency.
We are currently investigating getting
school shooter training for all staff members
in our District. We will be meeting with
the local police department and County
Sheriff’s department to begin planning for
this training. We hope to get this training for
our staff before school starts and provide
ongoing training options throughout the
school year. We will also work with our local
city government, transportation department,
and fire/rescue to review our current crisis
management plan.”
VV: Teachers and public school systems
across the country have been targeted and
accused of indoctrinating students with a
liberal agenda. There are also questions
about Critical Race Theory, the “Don’t Say
Gay” law in Florida, the banning of politi-
cal symbols in the Newberg School District,
and other controversial political issues be-
ing taught or discussed in schools. How
would you respond to those concerns?
JH: “We will be focusing on educating
our students to meet and exceed the state
of Oregon educational standards identified
through the common core state standards
and developing high-quality students that
can meet the demands of this world, and
what pathway they choose, once they gradu-
ate from high school. There is an expecta-
tion across the board for everyone that we
will be teaching to a high level of rigor and
following the Oregon Department of Edu-
cation (ODE) guidelines and recommenda-
tions for how to do that.
Anything outside of that and how we
educate our kids – that is going to be de-
cided by the School Board and educational
community.”
VV: Coming out of COVID it feels like
there is a morale problem across the teach-
ing profession – teaching through COVID
was hard. How can you try to address this
moving forward?
JH: “My take on COVID is it was tough on
everyone. But, one thing I believe is tough
times make tough people – this includes our
students, staff, and families. You learn a lot
about yourself when you are taken out of
your comfort zone.
I think it is impossible for morale not to
be impacted when you go through what ev-
eryone did with the COVID Pandemic. We
need to make sure that we are being very
intentional about communication and de-
veloping consistent and supportive systems
for staff. Paying attention to staff’s wellness
and mental health is very important, and
it directly impacts our students. Teachers
and staff have an enormous responsibility
in educating kids, especially coming out of
COVID – they need tools and supportive
systems to ensure they can do that.
As we are evaluating our systems, be-
havior support needs are continuously com-
ing to the forefront of district-wide needs
– this priority is not unique to Vernonia.
One of the tools identified for supporting
elementary behavioral needs is training op-
portunities for staff and skills building. To
increase training and support options for
staff and students, Dr. Jen Cooper, a trained
clinical psychologist with significant expe-
rience in working with adolescent behavior,
has been hired. Dr. Cooper is also a Lieu-
tenant Colonel in the Army National Guard
as a med unit psychologist, so she brings a
wide array of skills to support our students
and staff. Dr. Cooper will work closely with
Jaime Hamsa, School Wellness Director,
and Rachel Wilson, K-12 Assistant Princi-
pal, to identify and support students with
social-emotional health needs and develop
school readiness skills for grades K-12. We
do not want to be reactive to behavior prob-
lems, but proactive in our student support
and staff training.”
VV: What other priorities are you working
on?
JH: “We are currently looking at school
Smarter Balanced, graduation percentages,
On-Track to Graduate 9 th graders, atten-
dance, and behavior data to determine and
develop a baseline on how our students
are performing. We are also evaluating our
ODE grants and are beginning the process
of evaluating how these funds are support-
ing our students. To reach our goals set by
the School Board and the state of Oregon,
we have to know where we are at right now.
There are a couple of professional de-
velopment areas we will focus on imme-
diately. One of those is ‘Depth of Knowl-
edge (DOK).’ DOK is simply identifying
what level of rigor and critical thinking
our students are required to perform in the
classroom daily. We want to ensure that we
provide teachers the training they need to
continuously challenge students in every
academic area. I strongly believe that how
intentional we are with our classroom plan-
ning related to standards and rigor, the
more engaged kids are in the classroom
and the fewer behavior issues we may see.
We have a fantastic administration, teach-
ers, and staff, so this should be an easy lift
for everyone.
In early August, our administrative
staff will be developing a yearly profes-
sional development calendar focused on
training all staff around effective instruc-
tional practices, behavior management
strategies, and student social-emotional
learning training. I am very excited to get
this underway.
We have a significant focus on de-
veloping a district-wide continuous im-
provement plan focused on goals related
to instructional practices, socio-emotional
learning, and career and technical educa-
tion (CTE). Through direction from the
Board and input from staff and the com-
munity, structuring a three-year ‘Continu-
ous Improvement Plan’, is very exciting.
Most importantly, we’re making sure
that our systems and expectations for ad-
ministrators, teachers, students, and com-
munity members, and exactly what we’re
doing daily, are clearly communicated, even
over-communicated, and that everybody is
on the same page.
To build a positive and productive
school culture, everyone needs to know
what is expected of them, and it’s consis-
tently supported and reinforced.
I am very thankful and appreciative of
the warm welcome from the Vernonia and
Mist staff and community. I hope everyone
knows and becomes a leader in our District
goals as they relate to success in all parts of
District achievement – in the classroom, in
the hallway, on the sports fields, in the com-
munity, at fine arts events – everywhere.
When we say Logger Nation, everyone will
know what that means! So, I am very ex-
cited about what we will accomplish this
school year.”
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