Sweet Treats at the Cookie Exchange– looking forward to January’s Culture Exchange

We had a great turn-out of families from The Spanish School and The French School for the first Parents’ Assembly Cookie Exchange Monday night. Parents brought a wide variety of cookies and kids enjoyed juice, cider, cocoa and of, course, the gift exchange. Mil gracias et mille mercis to the School Promotions task force for initiating and hosting this event. It was great to see families have one more opportunity to get to know each other. And speaking of getting to know you, don’t miss out on the second half of this experience: Culture Exchange. In January 2010, families from both schools will come together again to participate in a Culture Exchange. This time parents will choose a random number that matches them to another family. Together those two families will choose an activity to do together to get to know each other and at least one aspect of their culture. We know that our students come from 170 different home cultures and are looking forward to have our families learn a little bit more about each other through this activity. We’ll post the details for the Culture Exchange after the winter break.

Join us for The French School Winter Concert: Thursday, December 17th, 6pm-8pm

The French School will be hosting Fête d’hiver: A Winter Concert on Thursday, December 17th at 6:00 pm. Come and celebrate our students hard work this fall. During the Fête each class will perform winter songs and poems, and you will be able to tour a very nice gallery-style display of student work and art projects. For this event, we are asking parents to bring a light refreshment such as hot apple cider, hot chocolate, winter cookies, or other treats that are a part of your particular holiday/winter traditions. The more unique the better! We look forward to celebrating with the whole family!

Contact kindergarten teacher Ryan McNeil (ryan@sllis.org) with questions and to volunteer for the set-up and clean-up crew.

First Annual SLLIS Cookie and Gift Exchange: Monday, December 14th 5pm-7:30pm

The School Promotions Task Force of the Parents’ Assembly is sponsoring their first SLLIS-wide parent social.

Take a break from the holiday rush and share the spirit of the season.

Come and enjoy hot spiced cider, cocoa and sample delicious cookies! (Remember SLLIS is nut-free, please no peanuts, walnuts, pecans, etc.) Please bring 2 dozen of your favorite cookies to share.  If you would like to participate in the children’s gift exchange, please bring a $1 child’s gift as well.

This occaision is for parents for both The French School and The Spanish School and is the first of many opportunities to “Network with your Neighbor.”  We’re also inviting participants to our Cultural Exchange Celeberation (which we’ll explain at the Cookie Exchange).

We look forward to seeing you…and your cookies, of course!

Date: Monday, December 14, 2009

Time: 5:00pm-7:30pm

Place: SLLIS

RSVP: Front bulletin board by Thursday, December 10th or to Brandon Moore at b3enterprize@sbcglobal.net

Tapping Our Parental Power

Our first parent education program was very well-received.  The biggest suggestion that from parents was to schedule it for 6pm or later so that more parents are able to participate.  We haven’t yet scheduled the spring series, but as soon as we do we’ll communicate the details to families.  Until then, check out the testimonies of a few of the parents in our inaugural series.

1,2,3 Magic overview for parents: Dec. 2nd and 4th

The Spanish School is using  1, 2, 3 Magic as an effective solution for dealing with behavior in classrooms. This week administrators will host two overviews of the systems for parents to learn more about the underlying principles,  how teachers are implementing it and how they might support it at home.

Wednesday, December 2nd, 7pm

Friday, December 4th, 7:30am

 

Please RSVP at arlene@sllis.org, or call Monica Bolaños at (314)533-0975

The Spanish School’s First Annual Posada Celebration, Thursday, December 10th 6pm-8pm

Dear Parents and Caregivers -

Please join us for The Spanish School’s first annual Posada Party on December 10th!

This family party will be a chance to share potluck dishes and socialize with other families on a casual basis. Please bring a dish that serves 6-8 people.

We are adapting Posada, a traditional Mexican celebration, to share songs, piñata and food with the community. Traditionally Posadas incorporate a Christian element and a secular element.  We will only be including the secular fun of the Posada tradition.  Each class will present songs celebrating winter and will also explain the piñata that their class created.  This will be a wonderful time to celebrate the end of our first semester and our students’ learning!

 

Open House for The French School

Interested in learning more about The French School for your kindergarten-aged child? Meet the teachers, administrators and get a sense of the SLLIS spirit at Open House.

Open House for The French School

Thursday, December 3, 2009 7pm-9pm
Saturday, December 5, 2009 2pm-4pm

Please RSVP to enrollment@sllis.org.

Visits from Honorary Counsul to France and Brenda Warner

This week we had two special sets of visitors to our school.

Jim Cooper, St. Louis’ Honorary Counsul to France visited The French School in preparation of a visit by the French Ambassador to the US, Pierre Vimont in February.  He was quite impressed with our students’ skills and, if scheduling permits, looks forward to bringing the Ambassador to spend some time our students in February.

Brenda Warner, wife of former St. Louis Ram Kurt Warner, visited The French School and The Spanish School to promote their Warner’s Warm-Up and Coat Drive.  She and her daughter had a great time giving coats away to our students and José Manuel’s class serenaded them.  Fox2 news covered the event, so check it out on the 5pm news.  Warner’s Warm-Up works with Operation Food Search to coat drives throughout the season and provide even more families with extra warmth this winter.

I Bring What I Love and La Reine Soleil

We can’t say enough about all of the amazing films that are part of this year’s International Film Festival.  The festival actually launched a French Film Festival in August that we’ll have to pay closer attention to next fall.  If you haven’t made it to any films yet, here are two of the 20 showing this weekend (the children’s movie is free!).  Enjoy!

This weekend Cinema St. Louis’s International Film Festival features two new-to-St. Louis French African films: I Bring What I Love and La Reine Soleil.

For those interested in Senegal and West African Music:
Friday night Webster University will screen, “I Bring what I Love,” a documentary about mbalax and world-music start Youssou Ndour.  He is probably the most known of the Senegalese musicians and this film captures rare footage of Youssou in the very early 70s when he began his career.  It also pays particular attention to his Grammy winning album, “Egypt,” which caused some controversy in  Senegal about the role of music and religion.  Ndour maintains that he used that album to bring attention to African Islam – highlighting spiritual leaders important in the creation of brotherhoods founded in Senegal, which now have a large international following.
The screening begins at 7pm and Peace Corps representatives will  be there talking about their program as they are co-sponsoring this screening.

 

Full-length animated children’s feature:

Saturday morning Washington University will screen La Reine Soleil (Princess of the Sun) at 10am.

In 18th century Egypt Queen Nefertiti’s daughter sets off to find out why she has been exiled and return her to her rightful place.

Annual Board Meeting and Retreat Notice, November 21, 2009

Annual Meeting Agenda

St. Louis Language Immersion Schools

9:00am, Saturday, November 21, 2009

1 North Brentwood, Clayton, Mo 63105–Shaw Park Room 12^th floor

I.     Call to Order and Roll Call

II.    Approval of Minutes

III.         Board Business

§         Assignment of Terms

§         Appointment of Committee Members and Chairpersons

§         Election of Officers

§         Discuss Length of Officer Terms

§         Approval of Employees and Consultants

§         Conflict of Interest Waiver

VI.            Consideration of Bylaws Changes

§         Number of Terms

§         Change the Corporate Address

§         Expanding Numbers of Standing Committees

§         Composition of Standing & Special Committees

§         Clarify Advisory Committees

§         Length of Officer Terms

§         Approval of Employees and Consultants

§         Conflict of Interest Waiver

VII.            Unscheduled Business

VIII.            Executive Session

A. Legal Matters

B. Real Estate Matters

C. Personnel Matters

__________________________________________________________

Board Retreat Agenda

St. Louis Language Immersion Schools

11:00am, Saturday, November 21, 2009

1 North Brentwood, Clayton, Mo 63105 – Shaw Park Room 12^th floor

 

I.  The role of the Board in governance

a.  Presentation by Doug Thaman,

National Association of Charter School Authorizers

b.  Performance dashboard – What should we measure, how often and how?

c.  Business issues dashboard-What should we measure, how often and how?

d.  Annual calendar of meetings and schedule of reports at each meeting?

e.  Content of regular meetings –

i.      Committees – Are these necessary? On what should they focus

ii.      President’s report – On what should this focus?

iii.     COO Report – Should we have this? On what should it focus?

f.   Frequency of Board meetings and committee meetings

g.  Roles of Standing Committees

h.  Executive Committee

i.      Should we have one?

ii.      If so, what should it do?

h.  Board staffing

II.  SLLIS’s Unique Market Proposition

a.   How are we different from other schools?

b.  How does this influence location of schools?

c.  How does this impact expansion strategy?

III.  What is our expansion strategy?

a.  Timing of expansion?

b.  How do we staff for expansion?

c.  Sequence of languages in expansion?

d.  Location of schools moving forward?

e.  Financial Implications of each expansion strategy?

IV.  Miscellaneous

a.  Timing and scope of the annual audit

b.  Discuss Sunshine Law compliance

c.  Confirm that we have adequate D&O Insurance

d.  Development Coordinator/Director