Bruin Point starts off year with new students, teachers

By CARBON SCHOOL DISTRICT

The beginning of any school year is a transition and this year Bruin Point Elementary has made some big changes at the school. There are two new teachers as well as a new secretary in the building. Just as important though, is the school is growing.
“We have 20 new students in the building this fall,” said Dina Wise, the Principal of Bruin Point. “This means because of our size, a fifth of our students are brand new students this year. Some are students that were local, but we also have new students who came from Montana, Pennsylvania and other parts of the country. We lost a large fifth grade class of 22 students last year and worried that our enrollment would be down. This is not the case. Our enrollment for Kindergarten-fifth grade is at 106 students. We ended last year with 92 students.”
Wise said the two new teachers are new to the building, but not new to the profession.
“Alison Montgomery our second grade teacher is originally from Monticello so she understands small schools,” said Wise. “She had been teaching in Box Elder School District for the last two years. In third grade we have Camille Scow, who came to us from Jordan School District where she taught for five years. Mrs. Scow has her masters degree and is now working towards her STEM endorsement. We are very lucky to have both of these amazing teachers at Bruin.”
The new secretary is Samie Howell who worked at the school as an aide in past years and is familiar with the staff and students.
“Her friendly demeanor and helpful personality has helped make the transition easier for everyone,” stated Wise.  “But we all still miss Miss. Ricki greatly.”
Wise said the staff has worked together and made all the school rules and consequences for not following the rules the same school wide. She said the rules are now the same for the classrooms, the halls, the cafeteria etc. That gives the students consistency no matter where they go. This helps level the playing field for all students.
“We have been practicing and modeling those behaviors so we all have the same mental model of what it looks like,” she stated.
One of those things that has changed is that there are different voices used in the school depending on where one is at.
“We made sure our voice level charts were all the same,” she explained. “We had to come to an agreement on this. Zero voice is easy to agree on because it is no voice. But then when you start to say this is a number one voice or a two, three or four, there are different interpretations. In the classroom everyone should be using a number two voice or a number three if they are responding to the entire class. In a small group a number two voice is appropriate. We have been practicing in the lunchroom so everyone knows what voices are appropriate. It’s amazing that you can have every student in the cafeteria talking in a number two voice and it is still quiet.”
The idea is to train everyone in the building, students, staff and others that the right voice makes for a better school environment.
“Our focus this year with our behavior plan is to protect the students right to learn, enjoy school and to give teachers the freedom to teach,” said Wise. “We want to create a safe, caring, community environment in our school.”
The main learning goals in the school this year is fluency and getting kids to read on the right reading level for their age. This was chosen as the goal within the new management plan the district has in place.
“I was lucky because with such a small staff, I was able to take every teacher, except the two new ones, to the trainings we had with Ed Direction (the school districts management plan consultants) last spring after school was out,” she said. “Reading levels are the district goal this year. We wanted to keep it simple and concentrate on that one learning goal.”
The district has purchased mass quantities of on-level reading materials for the schools across the district. This helps kids to grow beyond their present reading level to higher levels by giving them enormous quantities of it from which to choose reading text that falls within their interests. Every child has a bag in which they keep the books they are reading. If a student is on level in reading they read 60 minutes per day. If they are below level they read 90 minutes per day.
“It is based on self selected, high interest books that students want to read,” she said. “We are really promoting the ‘why’ of reading. We want kids to learn that reading is a way to find how to do things, learn more about a subject and for entertainment. There is nothing like a good book to get lost in and escape day to day life.”
There is also something else that has happened that is exciting when it comes to reading.  Mrs. Grundy has transformed the library into Hogwarts (Harry Potter’s school in the fiction series) and it is complete with a Sorting Hat that she will use to sort students into Houses to build a senses of community across the grade levels.
Wise said that although many things are changing, the majority of the great things that have been going on in the past are still continuing. Miner’s Trading Post along withe multiple other businesses held their annual Parking Lot Party in July to raise funds for the school. Because it is so successful each year, it is the only fund raiser the school participates in.
The school is continuing their STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) partnership with Sunnyside Cogeneration Associates. The plant has asked for another proposal from the school for money to do something in that same realm this year. Last year the power plant gave the school a very generous donation. That money is presently being used toward building a Science Resource Closet that contains totes with all the materials and lesson plans to teach the Utah Science core content along with additional projects and experiment.
“It is still in its initial stages and we are still working through that and getting it set up,” said Wise.
Because of the growth the campus has made as a school family over the years they have decided it was time for the Baby Bear Logo to retire, Hence the school has moved to a more mature bear.
“Everyone who knows us knows we start each morning with our school Motto which starts with. WE ARE BRUIN POINT BEARS AND WE MEAN BUSINESS… We feel our new logo reflects this well,”  concluded Wise.