School pictures today

[tar heel]

I go follow my kid's schedule and meet his teachers twice a year since we're on block scheduling, and I don't even live in Minnesota! The halls are full when the bell rings but I have absolutely no idea what percentage of parents are there -- how in the world would a parent know that? Some classes have all the desks full, and others have just a handful of parents -- can you guess which classes are which? We do this about three weeks after the semester begins instead of before school starts.

Alas, our school pictures are made after school starts, though, except for seniors. I don't know (or really care) how long it takes. It's not like they line every student up at once and let them stand there for two hours.

 

[allison443]

It isn't physically possible to move 2000 kids through pictures in 30 minutes.

Yes, but only the photographers would be there the whole time, the kids would come to the gym or wherever to get their picture taken, and then go back to class. The students certainly wouldn't miss a day of instruction, would they?

 

[golfgal]

No but all 2000 kids don't all go stand in line at the same time. It called scheduling a class or two at a time.

No, but the constant interruptions of "Room 211 can no go down for pictures" through out the day is annoying. Like I said, it works so much better this way.

 

[golfgal]

So there is 2000 kids at their school and you can tell the percentages of all the parents who attend the open House?
amazing

Amazingly the teachers and administrators at our school can figure percentages--I know, TOTALLY bizarre that they can do that but they have all the student schedules in a box and the parents go and pick one up to use for the evening. At the end of the evening they count how many are left and figure out the percentage of parents that were there. Maybe they bring the math teachers in on that I suppose

 

[Liberty Belle]

No, but the constant interruptions of "Room 211 can no go down for pictures" through out the day is annoying. Like I said, it works so much better this way.

That's not the way it works at my school. We have a set time to take the kids down. Sometimes we have to wait a few minutes, but it's never been very long. The movement break is nice and it really doesn't take much time away from instruction.

 

[Liberty Belle]

Amazingly the teachers and administrators at our school can figure percentages--I know, TOTALLY bizarre that they can do that but they have all the student schedules in a box and the parents go and pick one up to use for the evening. At the end of the evening they count how many are left and figure out the percentage of parents that were there. Maybe they bring the math teachers in on that I suppose

 

[Mimi1965]

Amazingly the teachers and administrators at our school can figure percentages--I know, TOTALLY bizarre that they can do that but they have all the student schedules in a box and the parents go and pick one up to use for the evening. At the end of the evening they count how many are left and figure out the percentage of parents that were there. Maybe they bring the math teachers in on that I suppose

And then they report the percentage to the2000 parentsin a newsletter? This is a Public School YOU are talking about-right?


Its just odd -we have this every year and I never heard how many attend-our private school has a monthly newsletter-never anything in it about how many parents attend Open House

 

[golfgal]

And then they report the percentage to the2000 parentsin a newsletter? This is a Public School YOU are talking about-right?


Its just odd -we have this every year and I never heard how many attend-our private school has a monthly newsletter-never anything in it about how many parents attend Open House

No, it gets reported in the email communications that go out pretty much every day. We don't have a monthly newsletter, we have an email system for that information. At the high school it is an email of the daily announcements and that information in in there. Yes, it is a public school.

 

[declansdad]

No, but the constant interruptions of "Room 211 can no go down for pictures" through out the day is annoying. Like I said, it works so much better this way.

PA systems in our schools can actually call into the specific room. THis way ther is no annoying 5 second announcement to the rest of the school. Classes are also told a time to make their way down for pictures. Both of these methods work very well.

 

[sunnyday123]

Just looked at DD's school schedule-I KNOW, they have it printed before hand! Amazing-they must have got that idea from those wonderful schools in MN.

They actually have her school pictures already scheduled-another amazing feat. I've volunteered for this day before, and the kids don't have to make any days up for the amount of time lost from going to the classsroom to the picture room and back. It's actually very well-planned and the kids behave nicely. And that's k through 8th grade.

But maybe East Coast kids behave better than MN kids.

And we do have a parent night at her school, where the parents go in and meet the teachers and hear a brief summary of what is going to happen that year. Amazingly enough, parents show up. But this is K-8th grade. At the high-school level, I will expect my DD to behave and relay information to me. If I need a daily email from her school, there's a problem with her or the school. I haven't received daily reports since she was a toddler.

 

[jme829]

You never met any of your girls' teachers when they were in high school .

You didn't quote me but I just want to add that my dd is a Senior this year and the only reason I know who "some" of her teachers are (I've never met them personally and I don't know all of them) is because I work in the HS kitchen, so some of them come through my line. From what I have seen and have been told (we're usually at the HS twice a week or so for volleyball games) there isn't a huge turnout for open house at the HS.

I've never been to a HS conference or open house for her. I can track her grades online and she is very strict of her own grades, so I have no cause to worry. I do check in with her counselor now and again when I see her because dd is taking college classes and I want to make sure every thing is on track for that.

I do go to meet the teacher day for ds (gr 4) a week before school starts to drop off supplies and find his classroom.

The middle school doesn't have any meet the teacher...they had registration last week, but no orientation type thing to let them find their classes etc...so I'm not sure how the first week of school goes (dd17 didn't go to ms here). They do have open house at the ms in Sept. to which I will go to get a feel for the school.

 

[jme829]

What happens if the time you are assigned doesn't work for you. I have for the last 3 years taken off from work the Friday that our schools do registration. We go when we get around and both kids are ready to go. And we get there at some time between their hours of 8 am and 1 pm. I would hate to have assigned times. With my luck, DD at one school and DS at another school, would get the same time slots. That doesn't work.

You would think that the schools would send home the medical forms before registration for the parents to fill out. NO....you have to go to the school and get the form and fill it out ON THE DAY OF REGISTRATION - can't get it early. And why, oh why can't they print out the information that I gave them last year, ask me to verify that the information is still the same or if corrections need to be made, make them and turn in the sheet. My kids have had the same Dr with the same phone number for 8 years. The same emergancy contact for 10 years. Why do I every year have to keep regiving you this information????? It would make it so much easier and faster.

And for all that is holy - I am sorry, but I will NEVER send a blank signed check in with either of my kids. The schools have preprinted receipts, that you mark what you are buying - so why in the world doesn't the office have these on hand the weeks leading up to registration. You would think that it would be a piece of cake to call and ask how much this cost or that cost - or heck even better, put the thing on the schools website and let me look it up myself.

There were every few kids at the HS registration that didn't have atleast one parent with them. That was upper and lower classmen. They all go on the same day - it's a free for all.

At our school, all the paperwork (all grade levels k-12 ) is sent out a couple weeks before registration with a list of all fees, so you can just fill in the checks with the amounts and send the kid off to register. Also, if you can't make your assigned time, you are free to come in at another time that works better. They just suggest you come in on your assigned day/time to help with traffic flow...they try to make it as efficient as possible and they really do a good job.

Each school has its own registration days and you come in, turn in your paper work, pictures, fees, get schedules (HS and MS). Took us 10 minutes at the elementary, about 20 at the HS and about 45 minutes at the MS (longer lines..lol).

School supply lists are sent home the last day of school for the following year,
HS kids pick their classes in April and then by registration day their schedules are ready to go and they have a small timeframe to make necessary changes. DD11 picked her electives in May for MS and got her schedule at registration as well.

I guess its not an issue here doing it a few weeks before school starts, mostly because thats just the way they do it and everybody knows about it and is prepared for it. Several notices are sent reminding people of days and times and its in the local paper. It just works here.

 

[NHdisneylover]

I assume we are talking high school here, right? that makes it harder to have classes go down on a schedule because kids are in classes with different people all day. My high school, back in the day, just had the photographer there for 4 periods in the middle of the day (the three that nearly everyone had lunch in plus the one before that which a decent number of people had free). They were there over three days. The first day all the seniors were expected to get their photos during whichever of those periods they had free on day one, juniors on day two and sophomores on day 3. Those few you did not have any of those times off (me during my senior year--I had 1-6 with no breaks and got off two hours early so I could work more) were expected to figure out which class they could afford to miss a few minutes of, speak to the teacher ahead of time, find someone to give them notes, and then go then.
The photographers were set up on one side of the cafeteria and you could grab a number and then sit to eat until your number came up (which meant they were 5-10 people away from you and you needed to come turn in your folder and fix hair, etc). I think the cafeteria made a point of serving less messy options those days, but overall they trusted us to manage to eat without destroying our clothes.
It worked fine for our school of about 2100 kids and it only took about 10 minutes out of our 45 minute lunch--no class time was lost. Only one typed note came out about the system--I don't think most parents ever saw it.

A far as daily emails from a high school. Honestly? I think that is seriously encouraging helicopter parents. We did not even have daily announcements at that age--maybe one every week or two. What can they possibly need to tell you about DAILY? Our high school expected kids to know when cheer practice, theatrical rehearsals, sports practices, Spanish club, etc took place if they were in those clubs00no need to announce it to the entire school. We were also expected to check the calendar that came out at the beginning of the year (now you could put that online even) for things like dances, pep ralleys, games, shows and back to school nights. Only a change of plans or random issue (entrance to the parking lot is going to be closed due to construction go in the exit next week, or some such) needed to be communicated in between. I would think things have not changed so much that this much information has to come out daily and get into parents hands. It is like spoon feeding the parents stuff that they should be able to look up online and which they should be able to count on their kids telling them about anyway. I would really be mad if my tax dollars were going for someone to type that email every day and send it out to parents and kids who would not bother to find out for themselves.

 

[hereyago]

DD is in middle school, she is going into 7th grade this year. School starts on the 7th of September and the 10th they will have their fall pictures taken.

 

[golfgal]

I assume we are talking high school here, right? that makes it harder to have classes go down on a schedule because kids are in classes with different people all day. My high school, back in the day, just had the photographer there for 4 periods in the middle of the day (the three that nearly everyone had lunch in plus the one before that which a decent number of people had free). They were there over three days. The first day all the seniors were expected to get their photos during whichever of those periods they had free on day one, juniors on day two and sophomores on day 3. Those few you did not have any of those times off (me during my senior year--I had 1-6 with no breaks and got off two hours early so I could work more) were expected to figure out which class they could afford to miss a few minutes of, speak to the teacher ahead of time, find someone to give them notes, and then go then.
The photographers were set up on one side of the cafeteria and you could grab a number and then sit to eat until your number came up (which meant they were 5-10 people away from you and you needed to come turn in your folder and fix hair, etc). I think the cafeteria made a point of serving less messy options those days, but overall they trusted us to manage to eat without destroying our clothes.
It worked fine for our school of about 2100 kids and it only took about 10 minutes out of our 45 minute lunch--no class time was lost. Only one typed note came out about the system--I don't think most parents ever saw it.

A far as daily emails from a high school. Honestly? I think that is seriously encouraging helicopter parents. We did not even have daily announcements at that age--maybe one every week or two. What can they possibly need to tell you about DAILY? Our high school expected kids to know when cheer practice, theatrical rehearsals, sports practices, Spanish club, etc took place if they were in those clubs00no need to announce it to the entire school. We were also expected to check the calendar that came out at the beginning of the year (now you could put that online even) for things like dances, pep ralleys, games, shows and back to school nights. Only a change of plans or random issue (entrance to the parking lot is going to be closed due to construction go in the exit next week, or some such) needed to be communicated in between. I would think things have not changed so much that this much information has to come out daily and get into parents hands. It is like spoon feeding the parents stuff that they should be able to look up online and which they should be able to count on their kids telling them about anyway. I would really be mad if my tax dollars were going for someone to type that email every day and send it out to parents and kids who would not bother to find out for themselves.

The email is the daily announcements that they have in the high school and they are very helpful actually-especially with the lists of scholarships available and the contact information for applications, etc. They also listed the colleges that would be visiting the schools in the next couple weeks so we could talk with DS about which ones he wanted to talk with. I am FAR from a helicopter parent but there are things going on in the schools that parents do need to know and this cuts down on the phone calls to the schools. No one makes you sign up for these notifications. In fact, there was a huge thread just a couple days ago about some kid that missed golf tryouts-that would have easily been remedied by a system such as this.

 

[bethbuchall]

It's interesting to read the different way schools run across the country.

We don't have a registration day for students/parents, and there are no fees to pay. There is a freshman orientation and an orientation for incoming middle school students (until this year most students started middle school in 6th grade, but one elementary school in the district went through the 6th grade. Now all will start in 6th grade.) Each Kindergarten teacher set up a little meeting before school, and I think that there was a general K orientation for parents as well.

School photos (except senior pictures) are done in September or October. The middle and high school students have theirs done in one of their gym periods. The elementary classrooms sign up for a time and go down. They do it quickly (and often you can tell that in the finish product), so there is little time lost or distraction to the rest of the school. Seniors need to have their photos done on their own, though I think that they do have a time set aside for anyone who just needs a yearbook shot.

 

[disykat]

The fact that this is turning into a fight is the most ridiculous thing I've seen on the DIS.

Our school does them at registration and it's very convenient because they immediately get their student ID. Kids that don't come for registration have them taken during the school day a few weeks after school starts. No big deal. Everyone's happy and there's less interuption during school than if the whole student body had to get them taken during class time.

We have open house, you go if you want. They send out a weekly email announcement to students and parents, you sign up for it if you want. You read it if you want. It's part of what goes out to staff anyway so there's no huge output of paying someone to do it. I'm guessing it takes 5 minutes a week to send part of the weekly announcements out to a mailing list?

I can't believe there are people actually arguing that it is "bad" to have registration day, open house, or parent emails.

 

[MichelleVW]

It's interesting to read the different way schools run across the country.

We don't have a registration day for students/parents, and there are no fees to pay. There is a freshman orientation and an orientation for incoming middle school students (until this year most students started middle school in 6th grade, but one elementary school in the district went through the 6th grade. Now all will start in 6th grade.) Each Kindergarten teacher set up a little meeting before school, and I think that there was a general K orientation for parents as well.

.

Your school has no fees at all?? I've never seen a school like that and being military my girls went to a ton of different school districts.

 

[golfgal]

Your school has no fees at all?? I've never seen a school like that and being military my girls went to a ton of different school districts.

Fees for things like books and supplies are illegal in MN. The only fees we pay are for voluntary things like parking passes or athletic fees. The only check we will have to send on the first day of school is for lunch money.

 

[bethbuchall]

Your school has no fees at all?? I've never seen a school like that and being military my girls went to a ton of different school districts.

Nope, no fees. I didn't even realize that public schools had fees until I read about them on these boards. I'm still trying to figure out what the fees are for. I think that I read some states charge you to use the public school books!

I don't think that any schools in NYS have fees...at least none in the districts around here or the other side of the state where I grew up. Of course, our taxes are plenty high.