Elementary Done Different "LEE": Week of August 5, 2024

It has been a wonderful week back for your Admin Team. We have been working behind the scenes to set up the 2024-2025 school year. We are super excited for the upcoming school year with all of you being part of our FamiLEE! We had our Administrator's Academy last week, so I am sharing information as I get it from CISD. I hope you will drop by the office to say HI when you are here. It's nice to have a minute with each of you to catch up and hear about your time off.

Being the Principal of this school is a dream come true. I have the BEST JOB in the world at the most INCREDIBLE school on the planet. I have no children of my own, so birthing this school is one of my hugest accomplishments. WHY am I here? I'm here because of our beautiful children. I'm here because I want to make a difference. I'm here because of each and every one of YOU. You are FamiLEE to me, and I would have it no other way. Cheers to #rjlyear11. There is NO PLACE LIKE LEE TO BE!

DID YOU KNOW:

we hired a new special education teacher? Her name is Hany Rosiano and we are excited to have her joining our FamiLEE!
that instructional coaches are being rebranded by CISD? Samira is now one of our four learning coaches that we share with CRE and VRE. Here is the Learning Coach job description for you to review before we share more about our new coaches and their levels of support. Please welcome Shayla Fortenbery, D'ann Felux, and DianaLyn Perkins to our FamiLEE!
our AMAZING PTO will be gifting classroom teachers a $50 Amazon Gift Card as a Back to School Gift to purchase items for your classroom? Fill up your cart, now!
communication from CK was sent out to parents about "all things beginning of the year?" Here is the link if you want to include in your introduction email to parents. Content is continually added and updated.

NEW HIRE INFORMATION

For those of you new to CISD. Here is information about New Hire training. This is for full time teaching staff, not instructional paraprofessionals. Hany and Jacky, I will see you both at the breakfast and then Friday afternoon back at Lee.

PROFESSIONAL LEARNING DAYS

Here is an overview of information for the first week back. We will give you more details about Welcome Week in next week's blog. Please KNOW we value time spent in your classrooms and planning with your houses and grades.

FLEX LEARNING FOR 2024-2025

Thank you to those of you that have already submitted for flex hour credit this summer. We have gone in and approved all submissions. Remember that this year there are more flex hours than last year.

TO DO FOR NEW HIRES

As a new hire, I am sure you are thinking about what you can do to start getting ready for your new adventure at Lee. Each blog I pepper out some suggestions so that you are not too overwhelmed during Back to School time. This blog I would encourage you to:

Set up your Twitter account. Add a profile picture of yourself and follow @NetZeroLee.
We also have a Richard J. Lee Elementary Facebook and Instagram if you want to follow those.

TO DO FOR ALL STAFF:

Please fill out this form if you want to make any changes from last year. If nothing has changed, cross this task off of your "to do" list.
Finish reviewing the RJL Campus Handbook so you don't have to worry about it when school is in session. This gives you ALL the ins and outs of Lee Elementary. You will want to be logged into your CISD google account to access linked documents. We request you read the handbook by August 16. New/changed items are highlighted in yellow. Any new district policies that are in the 2024-2025 CISD Employee Handbook supersede our campus handbook. We do not have access to the new handbook yet, so they are not reflected in our campus one. All staff can submit for flex credit after they complete reading the handbook.
Add the Lee Staff Calendar to your Outlook Calendar. Thanks for new directions, Kat!

Go to your Calendar in Outlook
On the left hand side, click Add Calendar
Select your account with your email.
Type in "Lee Calendar" and select the email with leecalendar@coppellisd.com
Click Add

RJL ROADSHOW

We can't wait to see you on our first day back. We will kick our week off with our annual bus tour through our neighborhoods. Dress is casual as we will be hopping on and off of the charted bus. Please bring signs, balloons, and your school spirit- it will be loads of fun! Please plan to be at our school cafeteria by 8:00 AM so we can load up the bus and depart on time.

WHAT IS HAPPENING THE WEEK WE COME BACK?

For those of you that like to plan, like me, here is an outline for our back to school days. We are OVER THE RAINBOW for us all to be together next week! If you are not sure where to be, and when to be places, please ask. Bring your charged technology each day. Please know our plan is subject to change as more information comes in from CISD. We also were SUPER INTENTIONAL to give you as much time as we could in your grades and houses to be able to be ready for the first day. Special Education, Specials, and paraprofessionals, if you get different information than listed on my outline from your department heads, please follow their directions.

CONVOCATION

On Friday, you can get into CHS arena starting 7:30. Wear your Lee Convocation t-shirt that we gave you on Monday. It is advised to carpool because traffic is a BEAST when you depart.

KEYS AND BADGES

Each staff member will have keys to your Design Studio and Storage Room for your House. If you are in a classroom, you should also have a key to the classroom door. If you are in need of these keys (or any others), please indicate that on this form or reach out to Angel.

CLASS LISTS

Next week class lists will start to be populated in eSchool Plus. Remember these are constantly changing, so please do not make class labels or schedule emails until we give you the "all clear." All grade level designers will email a welcome to their learners and parents to be scheduled to send out at 3:00 PM on Friday, August 9. Time will be provided, on Wednesday, to design your communication so you can have your welcome email started.

BACK TO SCHOOL SAVE THE DATE

Please share this graphic on your social media. We will wear our LEE spirit shirts (we will give you this shirt on Friday) on this night. Remember that your room does not have to be PERFECT for Meet the Designer Night, just tidy. First impressions are first impressions. Think about how your famiLEEs can capture a memory in your space/house.

SYNCING YOUR GMAIL TO OUTLOOK
New hires, you will want to sync your CISD Gmail account with your Outlook account so that you only have one email account to monitor. Here are the steps to accomplish this task:

On your computer, open Gmail using the account you want to forward messages from. You can only forward messages for a single Gmail address, and not an email group or alias.
In the top right, click Settings See all settings.
Click the Forwarding and POP/IMAPtab.
In the "Forwarding" section, click Add a forwarding address.
Enter the email address you want to forward messages to.
Click Next Proceed OK.
A verification message will be sent to that address. Click the verification link in that message.
Go back to the settings page for the Gmail account you want to forward messages from, and refresh your browser.
Click the Forwarding and POP/IMAP tab.
In the "Forwarding" section, select Forward a copy of incoming mail to.
Choose what you want to happen with the Gmail copy of your emails. We recommend Keep Gmail's copy in the Inbox.
At the bottom of the page, click Save Changes.