As many people may have heard, GFK School will be making some changes to the scheduling for Semester 2. Semester 2 begins on Tuesday, Jan.31. A letter has been sent home to parents and further details are available on the school blog: gfkells.wordpress.com. There will not be classes on Monday, January 30 due to a staff development day.
School clothing has arrived. For anyone interested in buying school clothes, extras have been purchased. Please check out all of the pictures of the school clothing located on the school blog.
The Junior and Senior Drama Clubs continue to meet Monday evenings. They are looking forward to competing at festivals this spring.
The curling teams have started to practise. They are looking forward to a terrific season.
Meditation classes are being offered. For time and locations, please contact the school.
Buy a yearbook during the month of January and your name will be entered into a draw to win a gift certificate in the amount of $40.00 from Life Touch Photography. The gift certificate can be used for school pictures if you wish. The winner of the free yearbook for the December promotion was Kiri Biberdorf. Local businesses can have a business-card size advertisement placed in the yearbook for $20 or they can sponsor a photo page for $30. Half-page and full-page advertisements are also available. If you are interested in placing an ad in the GFK yearbook please contact Melissa Sweet for details. If anyone has taken pictures of GFK students which might be of interest to the Yearbook Committee, please email them to Melissa Sweet at melissa.sweet@cornerstonesd.ca so the pictures can be included in the 2011-2012 yearbook. The 2010/2011 yearbooks will be available in mid-November.
As parents consider the hours of work their sons or daughters engage in while school is on, it might be useful to know the following. Most research shows that there is a detrimental effect on achievement if secondary students work for over 15 hours per week. Such students have lower grades, do less homework, are more likely to drop out, and are less likely to enter post-secondary education. For example, StatsCan reports that males who worked fewer than 20 hours per week while attending school had a general dropout rate of 16% and males who work more than 20 hours while attending school had a 33% dropout rate. Another study (Barone, 1993) found that consequences for younger students working longer hours could be more severe than for older students. Working less than 15 hours per week can be beneficial to students as well. A quick survey of students in our school shows that more students work part time as they get older. We do have students who work more than 20 hours a week but the vast majority of students in our school have no part-time jobs. Interesting stuff to consider as your son or daughter enters the world of work.
