Dear Parents and Guardians,
I hope this message finds you well. I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate our instrumental teachers Mr. and Mrs. Costello, Mr. Galvin, Mr. Hachten, and Ms. Snodgrass for teaching and preparing our students so that they could perform at such an outstanding level during this past Wednesday's winter concert. I would also like to congratulate Ms. Sebastian for preparing our Solo Voci singers to sing so well during the Festival of Lights performance at the Jenks Center this past Tuesday. I once heard a comedian joking about how middle school music teachers are like animal-lovers who work at a slaughterhouse. This certainly is an exaggeration, but I am always impressed by the patience our music department colleagues need to possess in order to get our students to advance from being novice musicians to high level performers. The skills that our music teachers teach our students go beyond being able to play music. They also teach our students critical life lessons such as self-regulation and the value of practice. I thank all our music teachers for their continued hard work and I also thank all parents and guardians for your continued support of our music programs.
As some of you know, this past Wednesday morning Ms. Madden, our Special Education Supervisor, and I did an one hour presentation on the Middle School Special Education program during the monthly Parent’s Coffee. Quite a few of you contacted me asking if it could be rescheduled because they could not attend due to work. Since there is a high level of interest for informational session like the one Ms. Madden and I presented this past week, we will schedule an encore performance in January after the holiday madness is over. We will schedule that session in the evening in order to accommodate for working parents.
Lastly, I would like everyone to know that our Lost and Found area in the cafeteria is getting to be quite full. I encourage all of you to remind your students to stop by and claim any lost items before the winter vacation. We are planning to donate all remaining items to charity during the upcoming break.
Thank you and enjoy the upcoming week.
James Lin
Principal
McCall Middle School
