Pictured above: On May 15th, students in the MPS Auto Tech program were surprised with the donation of a 2024 Mustang Convertible by The Ford Motor Company and Midland Ford!
Midland Public Schools District Vision Statement: Lead with respect, trust and courage. Ensure an equitable, collaborative and inclusive culture. Enable all to achieve success.
May 20, 2024
Volume 11 Edition 38
MPS Multicultural Calendar - May
- Memorial Day: May 27 - A day to commemorate and honor those lost while serving in the US Armed Forces. For more information, visit the link here.
Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month: May is Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. May was chosen to commemorate the immigration of the first Japanese to the U.S. on May 7, 1843, and to mark the anniversary of the completion of the transcontinental railroad on May 10, 1869—an achievement that relied on the labor of Chinese workers. For more information, visit the link here.
Jewish American Heritage Month:A time to commemorate and celebrate the contributions and achievements of American Jews while also acknowledging the struggles. For more information, visit the link here.
National Mental Health Month: This includes May 9 which is designated as National Children’s Mental Health Awareness Day. For more information, visit the link here.
Don't Forget! Nominate Exemplary MPS Staff for Gerstacker, Distinguished Service, and NEW Administrators Inspiring Excellence Awards
Nomination Deadline is this Friday, May 24!
Please see the nomination announcements for these three awards as well as links to the nomination forms below. Thank you for your help in recommending our MPS staff who go above and beyond each day to support our staff, students, and community! The deadline to submit nominations is Friday, May 24th, 2024. Awards will be presented to the winners at our opening staff meeting in August.
Midland High BPA Wins at Nationals
Congratulations to the 23 Midland High Business Professionals of America (BPA) National Qualifiers who attended the National Leadership Conference in Chicago, Illinois May 10-14. Qualifying for this competition ranks these students in the top tier of Business Students in the Nation, all having advanced from Regional and State level competitions earlier this year. The conference brought together over six thousand students from across the country to compete in business, finance, technology, marketing, and health administration events.
The results from the Midland High BPA chapter were:
- FIRST place: Advanced Accounting-Bo Brutyn
- FIRST place: Presentation Team-Braiden Katzinger, Alex Ritter, Josh Thurlow, & Eli Woods
- FOURTH place: Economic Research Team-Elly Black, Addisyn McLaughlin, Mya Presley, & Keira Shaffner
- FOURTH place: Fundamentals of Web Design-Rori McCubbin-Green
- FIFTH place: Human Resource Management-Isla McCubbin-Green
- SIXTH place: Parliamentary Procedure Team-Autumn Brutyn, Bo Brutyn, Claire Carpenter, Logan Gessford, Luke James, Maisy Matthews, & Porter Pritchard
- SEVENTH place: Administration Support Concepts-Isla McCubbin-Green
- SEVENTH place: Digital Marketing Concepts-Rori McCubbin-Green
- TENTH place: SQL Database Fundamentals-Adil Seidazymov
In addition to 18 of the MHS competitors medaling in their events, multiple members also earned internationally recognized industry certifications during the conference. While in Chicago, the students also had opportunities to network with other BPA members and business leaders, visit famous attractions in the region, and participate in several community service activities honoring the Special Olympics, BPA’s national service project. The Midland High Chapter of BPA would not have been able to experience Nationals if it wasn’t for the generous sponsorships of our local community including Gougeon Employees Foundation, Dr. Paula Druskins, Great Lakes Bay Orthodontics, and multiple friends and local business supporters of the Chemic Family. The Chemic Chapter of BPA is truly grateful for their support! Way to go, Chemics!
Midland High Student Council Helps Midland Bloom
This past weekend, the Midland High School Student Council served the community by participating in the annual Midland Blooms community effort to beautify Eastman Avenue. The group represents the incoming 2024-25 MHS Student Council classes of 2025, 2026, and 2027. Executive officers Josie Cripe, Ella Karbowski, Porter Prichard, and Leighna Eastman will lead the group.
Chinese Culture from Chengdu, China at Woodcrest
On May 10th, Woodcrest Elementary student Aiden (周方隅), and his father, Zhou Xiaoyuan, came to the 5th Grade class taught by Chinese teacher Jingcheng Wang to share some Chinese culture. Recently, the class has been learning about the culture in Chengdu, China, and Aiden's father is originally from there. He talked about the city's food, attractions, and history. Students learned a lot about Chinese culture and signed a thank you card to show appreciation.
2024 Chromebook Sticker Project
Over the past few weeks, the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion received 255 student-created sticker designs from 10 of our schools. Below is a sneak peek at these beautiful works of art from creative minds of all ages! Although this collage is only the tip of the iceberg of the large number of submissions, it showcases dynamic interpretations of DEI visualized in students’ unique ways: race, gender, religion, ability, languages, body image, geography, and nationalities. The possibilities are endless.
Thank you to all students for your hard work, parents for your support, and all art teachers, building principals, and office professionals for your guidance, patience, and teamwork. Please stay tuned as we go through the selection process, and the chosen design(s) will be printed and put on our student Chromebooks before the beginning of the fall semester. This is the 4th year MPS has partnered with MCIA (Midland County Inclusion Alliance) to promote diversity and student voices in our schools. We thank our community partner, MCIA, for making this project grow year after year.
Jefferson Students' Day at the Zoo
On May 16th, a group of students from Jefferson Middle School spent the day at the Saginaw Children’s Zoo. The mix of sixth, seventh, and eighth graders had gorgeous weather for their trip. The students spent the morning before their visit studying the different beaks and bills of native birds they might see at the zoo. Students practiced picking up different-sized seeds with various tools to simulate bird beaks and bills with Ms. Miller. The students brought clipboards and checklists to tally how many local birds they observed at the zoo. These students have been studying seed distribution with their science teacher, Ms. Partanen, as part of their plant unit.
The students have also been learning about various climates while studying countries in their social studies classes with Ms. Clunie. The three teachers collaborated to create a flip book about the various animals in the zoo, including their distinguishing features, traits, and natural habitats. Students had fun reading about each species as they completed their zoo books. Towards the end of the trip, each student could choose to ride the train or the carousel. Everyone had a great time. A highlight for many students was the American Bald Eagle exhibit, as they have been following a bald eagle family nest cam this semester.
Augmented Reality Sandbox Exploration
Northeast and Jefferson middle schools are utilizing an augmented reality sandbox (ARS) made available by Valerie Reisen at the Eaton Conservation District. The ARS creates topographic models by shaping sand, which is then augmented in real-time by an elevation color map and can simulate rain and flooding. Students learned how to read a topography map, create maps of particular cities, and test the watershed to identify areas of potential flooding. The students pictured are from Dr. Gayheart's sixth-hour science class.
FIRST Lego League Explore Festivals Celebrate the Arts in Science!
The Charge, Dow High’s robotics team, hosted two FIRST Lego League Explore Festivals celebrating our youngest robotics students in MPS (grades 2-3). During this year’s MASTERPIECE season, teams explored how technology can be used to incorporate or make more accessible, various arts and hobbies in our communities. Each team showcased their ideas using a moving Lego model and a show-me poster. Teams met with adult reviewers and explained how they used Gracious Professionalism, the FIRST Core Values, and the Engineering Design Process to solve a real-world art-technology problem.
Almost two hundred students representing 39 FIRST Lego League Explore teams from the Great Lakes Bay Region participated in the festivals. Midland Public Schools was well-represented with 31 of the teams coming from our six elementary schools. In addition to participating in review sessions, the teams and their families participated in interactive STEAM activities, including middle school and high school robot demonstrations, Lego Car Racing, and others. Special thanks to the Jefferson FIRST Tech Challenge teams, the CyDogs and the Wired Wolves, for showcasing our middle school robotics program, and The Charge for organizing and hosting the event, as well as demoing Resonance, this season’s robot.
Elementary students interested in participating in the FIRST Robotics program at their school should reach out to the FIRST Coordinator of their school.
Congratulations to the Midland Public Schools FLL Explore teams who won the following awards:
Dow High Space Farmers Won Top Award at the International Science Research Competition in Space Botany Research
The Dow High Space Farmers impressed NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) scientists and world-class engineers with their original research in space botany at the annual Growing Beyond Earth (GBE) Student Research Symposium on April 20, 2024. Out of 440 participating schools worldwide across 19 time zones this academic year, 119 competed in-person and virtually in this international science research competition.
The team, represented by Nimai Patel (junior), Sophie Cai (junior), Cailyn Liu (sophomore), Sanvi Patel (freshman), and Margaret E. Hitt (senior), focused their research on a practical application of spaceflight-grown fresh vegetables to improve astronaut cardiovascular health and mitigate carcinogenic effects during long-term space missions. To replicate growing conditions in space, the team cultivated irradiated leafy green vegetable seeds in simulated NASA growth chambers onboard the International Space Station (ISS). The irradiated seeds were pre-treated with neutron radiation, Californium-252, provided by Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, FL.
Their year-long study revealed that leafy green vegetables, such as Red Romaine Lettuce, exhibit high iron and nitrate concentrations if grown under light intensity higher than 300 PAR (photosynthetically activate radiation), potentially posing a health risk to astronauts. The team's findings earned them Second Place in this competition.
Congratulations to our Chargers! We are proud of you!
Graduation is Quickly Approaching!
As we move closer to the end of the 2023-24 school year, we look forward to celebrating with our graduating class! Graduation ceremonies will be held at Dow Diamond on May 31st, 2024 as follows:
Midland High School - 4:15 PM
H.H. Dow High School - 7:15 PM
In the event of inclement weather, the graduation ceremonies will move to their respective buildings and take place at 5:30 p.m.
Kindergarten Camp!
For the 2024-2025 school year, our Kindergarten teams are excited to share a new approach to the start of the school year! The first two weeks of school will be referred to as CAMP! Students will be placed in a small group, or cabin, and will rotate and explore all Kindergarten classrooms for the first two weeks of school. Once camp is concluded, classroom assignments will be shared with parents. Here is our WHY and some of the benefits of Kindergarten Camp:
- The Kindergarten Camp approach embraces a whole-child education, prioritizing the full scope of a child’s developmental needs to ensure that every child reaches their fullest potential. The whole child approach encompasses cognitive, physical, behavioral, social, emotional, and academic development.
- An opportunity to build a community culture and develop relationships with all students and staff.
This approach is a new concept for Kindergarten teachers in Midland Public Schools, but it is becoming a commonly used practice in our county and surrounding areas in the state of Michigan. Last year, our Developmental Kindergarten teachers used this approach to kick off the school year and had extremely positive results. As a team, we’ve spent the last few months learning about this new approach, and we are excited to implement this in Kindergarten for the 24-25 school year. From what we’ve gathered, camp is a lasting memory for many students and something that they continue to talk about and reference all year long. You will receive more information about camp as the start of the school year approaches. If you have any questions, please contact your home school.
Eric Albright Inducted into Midland County Sports Hall of Fame
On May 18th, Eric Albright was inducted into the Midland County Sports Hall of Fame. Eric has spent his entire career in education at Midland High School. He served as a classroom teacher from 1997 - 2016, taking on the athletic director position in 2010 and adding assistant principal to his roles in 2016.
After serving as assistant baseball coach, Albright became the Chemics' varsity baseball coach in 2003 and has guided the program to great success. While at the helm, his teams have won seven Saginaw Valley League championships, four District titles, a Regional championship, and an appearance in the state semifinals. He has been named SVL Coach of the Year five times. In 2018 he was named the Bob Stoppert Midland Coach of the year. In 2023 he became the winningest baseball coach in Midland High history, surpassing the 500 win mark. That year he was inducted into the Michigan High School Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Fame.
As athletic director, Albright has led the MHS athletic department since 2010. Under his leadership, Midland High teams have enjoyed tremendous success. He has also been a leader statewide, promoting high school athletics. He served on the Michigan Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association executive board and was the president during the 2023-24 school year. He was first elected to the Michigan High School Athletic Association representative council in 2019, and in 2023 was presented with the Allen W. Bush Award. This prestigious honor is bestowed annually to an administrator who has at least 10 years of experience in Michigan interscholastic athletics with unusual frequent and significant contributions to the MHSAA. Congratulations on your induction, Coach Albright!
Congratulations to our MPS Shining Stars for May!
Once school has ended for the year, Midland Public Schools will once again offer the Summer eLearning Program. Through this program, online courses are available to high school students who wish to earn initial credit in select courses. The Virtual Summer Program is separate from the Credit Recovery Summer Program run by the buildings. Please contact your school building administration for their Credit Recovery Summer Program information.
While being on site is not a requirement for daily work or quizzes, tests and exams must be monitored. This can be by appointment onsite or by appointment virtually. Appointments will be scheduled with the teacher on duty between 9:00 AM and 12:00 PM Monday through Thursday unless other arrangements are made. Students should expect to invest 45-60 hours to complete each course, but they may work on their course anywhere they have an internet connection.
Courses will begin on June 3, 2024, and must be completed by August 8, 2024. Students may only register for one course at a time. The cost for each course is $150 for Standard Edgenuity courses (EDG - Edgenuity on course list) and $250 for Edgenuity Instructional Services courses (EDGIS - Edgenuity Instructional Services on course list) for Midland Public Schools students and $175 or $265 for students outside of the MPS district. Registration begins April 22, 2024. For more information, visit the eLearning webpage on our website here.