On September 12, DCPS held a meeting with Miner parents, staff, and administrators to kick off Miner's 2019 "Master Site Planning" process. The school community has now officially begun a discussion about the future of Miner’s outdoor campus and playgrounds, and the changes desired to see happen for Miner students. At the meeting, DCPS presented their plan to have equipment ordered in January 2019 so construction can begin in March or April, with completion before school starts in August 2019.
This fall and winter, DCPS will continue to hold monthly meetings open to the entire Miner community, including families, staff, and community members. These forums are an your opportunity to provide feedback and share your vision and ideas for what you'd like to see changed about Miner’s outdoor campus and playgrounds. The Miner PTO will provide further details about these meetings and how to participate as the particulars are finalized with DCPS. In addition to public forums, Miner will establish a smaller "Master Site Planning Team" who will meet regularly with DCPS, the DC Department of General Services (DGS), site architects, and general contractors for detailed discussions and decision-making. This team will consist of 3 teachers, 3 parents, 1 student, 1 staff, and the custodial foreman. DCPS and the Miner administration has asked the PTO to guide the process for choosing parents to be on the Master Site Planning Team. If you are a parent or guardian who is interested in serving on this team, just email [email protected] and include which days of the week work best for you for evening meetings. Ideally the team will consist of parents with children from as many grade levels as possible. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about this topic, please feel free to reach out to Miner PTO President Julie Muir ([email protected]). Thank you to everyone who joined us for Miner’s first ever Grandparents Day Breakfast! We had an amazing turnout and we hope to make this an annual event. It was wonderful to see so many grandparents spend the morning at school with their grandchildren. Grandparents are such an amazing part of our students’ lives and can often have a very important role in a student’s education. Grandparents, we are honored that you could join us and we thank you for your presence!
The event would not have been possible without the leadership of Miner’s Director of Strategy & Logistics, Dr. King, and his amazing team of teachers and staff. Special thanks goes out to Ms. Bonilla, Ms. Stapleton, Ms. Kirby, Ms. Rosettie, Ms. Kraemer, Ms. Foskin, Mr. Faison, Ms. Cain, Ms. Amaya, Mr. Yoho, Ms. Poblete, Ms. Taylor, Mr. Jenkins, Ms. Turingan, and Ms. Kirby. Thank you for taking such great care of our grandparents The Miner Parent Teacher Organization would like to express our sincere gratitude to Mr. Michael Greer of People. Animals. Love. (PAL) for his two years of dedication and service to the Miner family in his role of site coordinator for PAL’s afterschool program. PAL came to Miner at the beginning of the 2016 school year to help revitalize Miner’s afterschool programming, and Mr. Greer has been an integral part of that improvement since that time. Whether lending a sympathetic ear to a student who just needed someone to listen, to offering firm but fair guidance to little Bears who needed just a bit of direction, to working with families to help resolve aftercare issues, Mr. Greer has been an invaluable member of the Miner family and will be missed.
Thank you again Mr. Greer, and best wishes on all your future endeavors! UPDATE 8/17: School Beautification Day planned for tomorrow, August 18, is cancelled. Much of the work we had planned for has already been completed by the city, such as picking up trash and tidying up the landscaping around the school. Inside, volunteers did a great job of removing the various spots of tape and adhesives from the walls. Plus, there are two “work zones” at the school which limit access at this time:
So although we won’t have an opportunity to come together as a community to lend a hand, overall Miner is in great shape to welcome our scholars back to school for another great year! ORIGINAL POST: Join us as we work to make Miner shine for the first day of school! As you may know, the city government had planned to give Miner a fresh coat of paint in the interior hallways over the summer - that’s why Miner couldn’t host any summer programming this year. Unfortunately that didn’t happen, so the Miner administration and custodial staff are planning to scrub the walls thoroughly to match the incredible shine they’ve been able to give to the floors. However, it’s a big job and there are only 2 weeks left until school starts on August 20th. We could definitely use your help! The Miner administration invites any person interested in lending an hour or so of their time to come to the school any weekday starting Tuesday, August 7 through Friday, August 17, from 9:00 AM until 3:00 PM. The PTO will be providing all the cleaning supplies needed to spot clean the hundreds of spots of tape, blue tack, stickers, and other adhesives on the hallway walls. We’re also going to tackle that line of grime between the floor and the baseboards. If you can’t make it during the week, no problem. The PTO and school will co-host a “School Beautification Day” on Saturday, August 18 to finish up any remaining cleaning inside, PLUS cleaning up the grounds outside. Luckily the trash situation around the school is pretty minimal, but there are overgrown shrubs, weeds, and other areas that could use some love. If you have any questions, please contact the PTO at [email protected], or Miner’s Director of Strategy & Logistics, Dr. Simon King at [email protected]. Thank you so much for supporting Miner Elementary! We looking forward to a truly great year and can’t wait to see everyone back at school. Before everyone heads off for the summer, the Miner PTO would like to take a moment to congratulate all of our Miner Bear graduates:
To those of you entering 6th grade and leaving Miner for Middle School, we wish you the best of luck. We are so proud of what you accomplished at Miner and can’t wait to see the bright future in store for you! To our Kindergarten students who will be entering 1st grade this fall, we welcome you into the first of five amazing years of grade school and we look forward to watching you grow and learn. Finally, to our PreK4 students who have just graduated from preschool, we welcome you into the elementary school. We hope your time in the ECE program was filled with joy, laughter, and lots of exploration. We are so glad that so many of you have chosen to make Miner your home for the rest of your elementary school education! We are proud of all of our Mighty Miner Bears and we hope everyone has a fantastic summer. See you in August! At lunch on Wednesday, June 6, Miner students participated in the 6th Annual Strawberries and Salad Greens Day. This DC tradition is sponsored by the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) and is designed to "to showcase locally grown produce in school meals. This event will educate students about both the health and environmental benefits of eating locally grown fruits and vegetables, and how healthy eating leads to healthy educational outcomes."
Strawberries and greens were served as part of the students' regular lunches. In addition, OSSE provided root pouches containing salad greens (collard greens. flashy trout lettuce, red Russian kale and butter crunch lettuce), and a strawberry plant was on display on the stage. The kids were THRILLED to have strawberries with their meal and many asked for seconds. Unfortunately, the excitement for greens was not quite the same caliber! As part of the event, students were quizzed with strawberry-related trivia questions such as:
Over the past month, teachers, staff, and parents at Miner have held elections for their respective representatives to Miner's LSAT for SY18-19. Results from these elections were announced last night at the final LSAT meeting of the year. LSAT representatives for SY18-19 are:
Teachers
Staff
Parents
Community Member
Their terms begin July 1. Congratulations! Results from the election for SY18-19 PTO Executive Board were announced last night at the final PTO General Meeting of the year. Those elected to the Board are:
Their terms began at the conclusion of the meeting. Congratulations! Last week was Teacher Appreciation Week, so the Miner administration and PTO worked together to host a variety of meals, snacks, and surprises to let our teachers and staff know just how special they are. The PTO sponsored a waffle bar breakfast Monday morning to start the week off right. Throughout the week we provided goodies to teachers such as granola bars (because our teachers "raise the bar"), delivered thank you cards hand-made by some of our Miner Bears, passed out sweet treats (because we wanted our teachers to know just how "sweet it is" to be taught by them), and created a beautiful thank you banner with the help of some young student artists.
On the school side, Dr. King and his team planned special events and meals, and left gifts and momentos in teacher mailboxes every day. The PTO owes a very special thank you to Jessica and Justin Burniske of the Appreciation & Recognition Committee who planned and coordinated all of the PTO activities this week. And we also want to say THANK YOU SO MUCH to our incredible teachers for everything you do for our students. You truly are the best! On Wednesday, May 9, the Miner family was excited to once again participate in the annual Bike to School Day festivities with our fellow Capitol Hill schools and community members. The fun began in Lincoln Park with the JO Wilson cheerleaders and warmups with local fitness instructors and bicycle advocates. We also heard from Mayor Bowser, Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen, and DCPS Interim Chancellor Dr. Amanda Alexander.
For even more photos, see the CHPSPO gallery on Flickr.
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