Animashighschool.org

Jesse Hutt, Amy Hewitt, Katherine (Jeffrey), Danielle Sullivan (fresh), Flow Wolf (fresh), Cate Smock, Jessi Kileene (frosh), Diane Gray (10th), Cari Harrison, Kristina Monroe,Meghan McGrath, Tiare Flora, Carin Garcia, Kate McGrath, Jane Katz, Lynn
Arava, School Counselor – Report on Mental Health Survey
Jake noted that we are in 5th year at AHS, and this is first year we have had a counselor, which is making a huge impact. Mental health and emotional well-being are of vital concern for parents, teachers and administrators. Arava is focusing on social/emotional well-being and health; she is a licensed social October was mental health screening month. She did mental health screening for General mental health issues: anxiety and depression (about 13%, which trends slightly higher than national number of 10%)– school stress, family issues, pressure around drugs and alcohol here in Durango (she recommended that parents/families offer more Drug/alcohol-free activities like bowling, movie, game nights). Seniors have more skills for dealing with these issues. In teenagers depression typically manifests itself as irritability and anger and sleep Amy recommended using SJ Basin Health statistics, which has been studying drug/alcohol use and it might be helpful to show that the majority of kids in community aren’t partaking in drug and alcohol. Arava started POW: Peer advocacy and wellness club. Planning an alcohol/drug- free event for Snowdown and an event that will help freshman get to know Mindfulness activities for staff meetings: Arava has been working with staff and focusing on mindfulness to focus staff and more readily address topics at hand. In giving advice for teens, when the child is stressed, don’t get straight to problem- solving, slow down and both of you pay attention to what’s going on in your bodies to help get you out of reactionary mode, focus on quieting down. Issues of bullying among freshman this year were discussed. This would be expected because it is a bigger group. Jake and Arava pulled 9th grade boys into meeting last week to discuss 5 things about bullying. The next step is to bring SASO in to do bystander training. The goal is to give all students tools to use when they see bullying. Teaching empathy is a big part of 9th grade curriculum. Jane recommends
Jake’s visit to High Tech High:
It was afantastic experience. Larry Rosenstock and Rob Riordan started HTH as PBL school. Jake shadowed Brett Peterson at the original HTH. He is hoping to bring him here in the spring. When Jake returned he emphasized: 1)strong sense of collaboration among teachers across content areas, which increases student engagement and forces children to do more real world learning, 2) placing a lot of value in celebrating student work. Jake wants to create opportunities for staff to celebrate student work so they have begun a process wherein at staff meetings one teacher shares exceptional work of one student, 3) He was really inspired by how HTH teachers are thinking big about projects and how they can have real world Jesse spoke about her experience at HTH when she visited 4 years ago: Close faculty/student relationships, relevant learning, internships are all important parts
Teacher Appreciation Luncheon: Friday, December 20 from 11:30-1:00.
Ceci and Jessie Kileen are organizing the food. They passed around a sign-up for entrees. The menu is Italian, and they will be soliciting participation from parents after Thanksgiving. They have arranged to have student musicians at the event. Meghan is handling decorations. Carin G. is making gifts for teachers.
Fall Friendraiser Report:
Jesse reported that Friend-Raiser raised $60,000. Will stay at Strater for next year. Kathy Setka gets a big hats off, say thanks if you see her.
Coffee fundraiser:
1. Student Coffee Sale-January 10-31,2014:
This is an opportunity to partner with a local fair trade organic coffee roaster, Desert Sun Coffee, where our students actively participate in fundraising. Our goal is for each student to sell a minimum of 6 bags of coffee.

Order Deadline: Monday, February 3rd, 2014
Price: $12 per bag; make checks payable to AHS-all money should be paid at the
Delivery: February 12-Juniors and Seniors; February 19-Freshman and
Proceeds from coffee fundraiser are earmarked for Osprey Week. Osprey Week is time in May where students choose a particular activity. They spend time together pursuing something of particular interest to them, ie. College visit tour, art museum tour, back-country skiing trip, mountain biking, horseback riding. The idea is to really engage students and enhance a love of learning. Kids love it! Some of the experiences cost money. AHS is trying to lower that cost by raising funds during the
Unstructured social activities: Jake agrees that this is important. If anyone wants
to get involved emailto help with the current parent Amy will touch base with the student government to work more closely with them. Members of Culture Club will attend and offer our support and discuss a survey to get better idea of what kids would be interested in
Music at AHS. We place strong emphasis on pretty traditional academics, we don’t
want to limit our students opportunities for music, art… Jam SIG is one opportunity for playing music, Honors Orchestra is another way. Rock and Roll academy proved too expensive for this year. Jake has been talking to Stillwater and IAMusic about music. Jake is looking at designing a SIG in the future, but it is unlikely to happen during this academic year. Speech club was suggested. Jake said if we had enough student interest we could get something like that going. We have to be very intentional about what we do as we have such limited time and resources, must be student generated so we know there is strong student interest.

Source: http://www.animashighschool.org/OurParents/pacminutes/pac1113.pdf