By Tamas Mondovics
FDE Releases School Grades
The Florida Department of Education released the 2015-2016 school grades based on the Florida Standard Assessments (FSA) in English Language Arts, Mathematics, Algebra I, Algebra II, and Geometry End-of-Course.
Hillsborough County Public Schools (HCPS) had 51 schools that were graded an “A” and 43 schools received a “B” grade.
Six schools within the district improved their grade from an “F” to a “C”, including Bryan, Desoto Elementary, Ruskin, West Tampa Elementary schools along with two charter schools.
For more information about Hillsborough County Public Schools, visit www.sdhc.k12.fl.us.
Campo Y Summer Reading Program
The Campo Family YMCA in Valrico announced the hosting of a reading program “Bridging the Gap” for children K-5 to help youth YMCA members who struggle with reading.
According to YMCA Communications Director Lalita Llerena, as volunteers, local teachers, stay at home moms or dads, staff or high school students offer their time to tutor twice a week.
Classes are held on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 11 a.m.-12 Noon.
During the hour-long program, the participants read one-on-one with a teacher for the first 45 minutes and the last 15 minutes they learn basic Spanish.
The program began in June and will run for the first three weeks in July.
Y officials are also planning to host a small celebratory graduation at the end of the program.
WeatherSTEM, Instructure Partner
The Florida-based WeatherSTEM (Science Technology, Engineering and Math) has joined forces last month with Instructure, a software company to benefit students with a new streamlined approach to weather education.
WeatherSTEM’s interactive K-12 STEM atmospheric sciences and agriculture curriculum will now be integrated into Instructure’s award-winning learning management system, Canvas, which will allow students using to reference data from their local WeatherSTEM unit or any region’s station from within an online course.
The partnership will also allow teachers to incorporate WeatherSTEM, a division of Ucompass, a highly successful 20-year-old education technology company content into an online Canvas course.
The experiences and activities are powered by live data derived from site-based scientific instruments and sensors in 182 locations in 12 states, including 155 in Florida, as well as Penn State, Florida State, and many other universities in the Atlantic Coast Conference. Approximately 2,000 universities, school districts, and institutions around the world currently use Canvas as their learning management system.
For more information, visit www.weatherstem.com.
Online Report Cards
Hillsborough County Public Schools officials reported that beginning with the fourth quarter of the 2015-2016 school year, all middle and high school report cards become available for access online.
Links to access the report card will be available through the district website, mySPOT, and Edsby.
The new online report card will replace the previously mailed final report card.
To ensure that this confidential information is delivered securely, students were sent a letter (Sample Letter) containing a unique Personal Identification Number from their school.
Parents will need this PIN, along with other student specific information, to access the online report card.
As the electronic report card becomes available, notification will be sent by a phone call, email, and/or text message using the contact information listed on the Student Emergency Information Card.
If unable to access the report card electronically, a printed copy may be picked up from the school after they are made available online.
For more, visit www.sdhc.k12.fl.us.
