Oak Grove News

Saturday evening the Illinois State Board of Education hosted its annual "Those Who Excel" banquet. Each year the State honors its "best of the best" school personnel. This year, Oak Grove kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Jenna Sobey, received an award in the Early Career Educator category. This recognizes teachers who are in the first five years of their careers. Administrators, parents, and Mrs. Sobey's colleagues nominated her for the award.

State Superintendent of Schools, Dr. Carmen Ayala, presented the awards. Additionally, Governor J.B. Pritzker made a surprise appearance at the banquet and addressed the audience. Dr. Lemon and principal Nick Heckel attended the banquet with Mrs. Sobey and her husband, Austin. It was a proud night for the Sobeys and Oak Grove. Congratulations, Mrs. Sobey!

Hello! I hope everyone enjoyed the weekend. I can't believe the holiday season is nearly upon us. Soon, I expect winter will arrive to stay, so I thought I would share the procedures for canceling school, in case we have inclement weather ahead of us.

The area superintendents work together to make decisions about canceling school. I work closely with the D128 high school district superintendent as well as the three other “feeder” school superintendents. Whenever bad winter weather is predicted, or occurs, we are in constant contact with each other. We also use up-to-date information provided to us by local weather agencies and county officials.

First, and foremost, it is our obligation to keep students safe as they wait at bus stops and travel to school. There are times when the area high schools choose to remain open, but the elementary schools cancel. However, we do try to avoid this, if possible. There is no “exact” temperature, or wind chill factor that causes cancellation of school. We make our decision based upon a myriad of factors, with each weather event being analyzed on an individual basis.

We are cognizant of your need to make supervision plans as we make our decision. If school is canceled, I will utilize our School Messenger phone messaging system first. We will also try to send an e-mail to you, as well as update our website. Please know that those methods take a bit more time, so please don’t rely upon them as your first source of information. If your

phone contact information has been changed, please inform the school as soon as possible, so that we may update your contact information on the phone messaging system.

In my 37 years in education, the decision to cancel school, or not, can be one of the most difficult. Either way, people are disappointed. Experience tells me that the most important

factor is student safety, so it will be the determining factor in our local decision to hold classes, or not. Hopefully, our winter will be mild and we will not have to cancel classes often.

Attention 5th, 6th and 7th graders:

Come by and grab a permission slip before our first meeting from Mrs. Pusateri in room 207. You must bring a signed permission slip to our first meeting on October 29th to be able to stay after school. There is a limited of just 12 students for this club because there are only 6 robots.

• Meeting Place: Mrs. Pusateri’s Classroom
• Activities: Club members will build the EV3 robot and learn the basic functions, create challenges, and navigate the robot through the Lego challenge board. This club prepares students for advanced grouping in 8th grade Robotics rotation.

2019-20 meeting dates are on Tuesdays (2nd and 3rd quarter only): October 29th, November 5th & 19th, December 10th, January 14th & 28th, February 11th & 25th, March 10th is our last meeting.

Attention 6th grade parents:

The sixth grade is going on a field trip on Friday, October 25. An e-permission slip was sent to the email you provided at registration. If you did not receive it or cannot find it, here is a quick link for you. Please read the letter and fill in the required information. https://forms.gle/syHQtE8yLL3UprVf9

PTO Directories

The PTO directories were distributed last week to the youngest child in the family. If you have any questions, please contact Dana Huennekens at pto@ogschool.org.

It has been a busy past couple of weeks for XC! Conference, sectionals, end of the season party and State!

Congratulations to 8th grader, Ava Torres, who competed in the IESA State Cross Country meet on Saturday in Normal, IL. Ava represented Oak Grove and set a new personal record. She ran the 2 mile course in 13 minutes! Way to go, Ava!

Thank you for another wonderful season!

Runners, please return your uniforms to Coach Sonshine or Coach Loch by the end of the week.

The sixth grade had a wonderful after school dance and open gym on Friday afternoon. Students snacked, danced, laughed, played basketball, and some dressed up in their costumes! We are happy to announce that our sixth grade student council reps have chosen to have our profits donated in memory of Mrs. Timony, and in honor of Mrs. Klunder and Mrs. Savage to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation. Thank you to all who participated!

Hello Oak Grove Community,

As the air gets cooler and holiday decorations start appearing in stores, consider the gift of books as a great way to share the love of reading. The PTO book fair is coming up and you can always set a few aside for a special occasion, an accomplishment, a rainy day or just to have more books around the house. You can never have too many books according to Jessica Stillman who applauded homes with stacks of books and vast book lists of so many titles that you could never get through them all. She calls it an “anti-library.” By having so many titles at your disposal, it becomes a research tool and reminder of your limitations. There is always more to learn and more to read. So, don’t feel bad about filling up your families Kindles, NOOK's or night stands. There is so little time and so much to read! For the full article, check out ‘Why you should surround yourself with more books than you’ll ever have time to read,’ by Jessica Stillman.

Please click HERE to view the flyers in our virtual backpack. Flyers are updated weekly, so please check back often so you won't miss any of the events going on in our community.

Click HERE to view Board Agenda and Minutes

Email: boe@ogschool.org
Website: www.ogschool.org
Location: 1700 S. O'Plaine Rd. Green Oaks, IL 60048
Phone: 847.367.4120