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Students and staff at DGH will be practising Fire Drills and Lockdown Drills over the course of the school year.  For those with older students, you know that we hold several practices for both situations early on in the school year and then a few more as the year continues.  We update and maintain our emergency procedures each year.

The goal in doing so is to give students and staff the knowledge and confidence to react appropriately should the need arise.

Students become quite good at knowing how to react in these situations and the practices help to reduce a great deal of stress.

Should your daughter or son come home and mention having taken part in these practices, please feel free to discuss what has taken place.

Should you have any questions, please feel free to contact the school at 705-786-1915.

A letter with additional information on Police and Vulnerable Sector Checks has either already been sent home or will be sent home soon.  The same letter can be obtained by clicking on the link below:

Criminal Record and Vulnerable Sector Check Letter

Please be aware that Police and Vulnerable Sector checks can take several weeks to be completed and returned to the applicant.

Police Checks continue to be processed in the manner they have been previously.  However, volunteers now must also have a Vulnerable Sector search completed.  A volunteer would typically have the Police Check and Vulnerable Sector search completed at the same time.  We have heard that the Vulnerable Sector search can take several weeks to process, so if you are interested in volunteering in the school (e.g., in classrooms, for class trips, the snack program) you will need to have both checks completed.

Volunteers at the school must have both the Police Check and the Vulnerable Sector search done.  If you need these checks to be completed, please request the letter from our office indicating that you wish to volunteer at the school.

Please be aware that DGH will continue to follow a “NO POLICE CHECK – NO VOLUNTEERING AT THE SCHOOL OR FOR CLASS TRIPS THIS YEAR” (this is a board policy).  If you think that you may volunteer at DGH in any way this year, you MUST have an original and updated police and vulnerable check completed and on file at the office.

The DGH parking lot is a busy place in the morning and afternoon!  For that reason we are asking that all visitors to our school respect our parking lot routines.  This will help to keep our students safe during drop off and pick up times.

• ONLY buses should be coming into the area immediately beside the school (the bus loading zone) between 8:30 a.m. and 8:55 a.m. and 3:00 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.

• If your vehicle is parked in the bus loading zone when the buses arrive and students are loading, please leave your vehicle parked until the buses have completely loaded or unloaded and have left the area.

• Cars should NOT be parking along the north side of the parking lot in front of the garbage containers and along the grass leading to the road.  A number of our students walk along this area (especially in winter) and it is dangerous to have cars parking and exiting here.  We usually place orange traffic cones in this area; however, even if the cones are not out there people should not park along there.

The parking lot area directly in front of the school is designated as a “fire truck zone” – meaning that any vehicle (other than a bus) that is parked there can be ticketed.  A number of tickets have been issued in the past few years.

DGH community, the TLDSB has adopted an additional communication tool: text messages via the SchoolMessenger program.  Below you will find a link to the brochure that will be sent home during the week of September 10th to 14th.  Below the link you will find information regarding the app.

This looks to be a great program/app; however, please read the brochure/information CAREFULLY as there are a number of steps that need to be followed.

Also, please fill out the consent form on the BACK of the brochure and return to the school as soon as possible.

In addition, there is information on the FRONT of the brochure regarding downloading the SchoolMessenger app which allows parents to manager their SchoolMessenger notifications.

SchoolMessenger Text Opt-In Information Brochure

SchoolMessenger Text Opt-In Information

Technology has made communication easier than ever before. Today, many parents use email,

websites, social media, and/or text subscriptions when they want to receive important news. Trillium Lakelands District School Board wants you to receive information when you want, and how you want through SchoolMessenger.

SchoolMessenger is a parent notification service that lets us communicate easily with you about

the things that matter most. Things like school news and events, emergencies, and news from

our board. SchoolMessenger has taken over SchoolConnects, our previous messenger service. For that reason, all existing users who wish to receive text messages will need to opt-in again. New users will also opt-in to receive text messages.

Here’s How to Opt-In for Alerts From Your School and TLDSB:

• First, ensure that your school has your preferred contact number(s) on record. Once your cell

number has been entered by the school, they will keep it on file.

• If you have provided your school with your cell phone number, you should receive a text from

978338 on September 17, 2018 requesting you to opt-in to receive important information

from your child’s school. Reply ‘Y’.

• If you wish to opt-in after September 17, 2018, text ‘Y’ to 978338.

If you have done this correctly, you will receive the following message:

“You’ve registered 4 SchoolMessenger. Txt STOP to quit, HELP for help. Std msg/data rates apply. Freq varies. schoolmessenger.com/smsca.”

Any text messages from your school will come from the number 978338. We suggest that you add this to your contact list in your cell phone with the name “TLDSB”. This way, the caller ID feature on your phone will show that the message is from Trillium Lakelands District School Board.

A reminder that students are encouraged to NOT to bring valuables (e.g., money, jewellery, expensive sports equipment) or electronic devices such as cell phones, iPods, and MP3 players to school.  We cannot be responsible for the loss of any of these articles and the cost of these items can run into the hundreds of dollars.

Please click on the link below to view a letter that was sent home (or will be soon)  with students with respect to technology use at our school.

DGH Letterhead Cell Phones and Electronics 2018

Individual staff members may give permission for certain electronics to be used in the classroom (e.g., a phone).  Students (and parents) should be aware that:

• this permission may be revoked (on an individual or class basis),

• this permission applies during specific class times and may not be given during nutrition breaks or indoor recesses,

• these electronics should not be taken outside of the classroom (e.g., because you are permitted to use a phone in class does not mean that you can take it outside onto the yard) and

• the school cannot be held responsible for damaged or lost items.

All of the above being written, the majority of our students do a great job with technology – which we greatly appreciate!

DGH community, please find attached to this post the letter from Director Larry Hope which was sent home to all TLDSB families last week.  The letter contains information regarding the updated Health and Physical Education curriculum.  Click here to obtain a copy of the letter.

Thank you, Mrs. Starr, for once again organizing DGH’s Fall Scholastic Book Fair!  The Book Fair will run from Wednesday, September 12th to Monday, September 17th (it will be open on the evening of September 12th if the Book Fair materials arrive early in the day).  Students will have the opportunity to visit the Book Fair during recess.  As always, all profits from the Book Fair will go into purchasing books for our school’s library.

Welcome back!  Week one of the 2018-2019 school year has already taken place!

The slightly cooler days and earlier arrival of night as August progressed were sure signs that school would be starting soon!  While summer vacation is a wonderful time of the year and one that we know our students love, we also know that most of our students are happy to come back, meet their friends and hit the books.  Over the next 10 months our students will undergo an incredible transformation.  Our Kindergarten students perhaps undergo the most extraordinary changes.  Our Junior Kindergarteners enter school knowing nothing of our routines and perhaps only a few letters and numbers; they leave in June often being able to read and write a number of words!  Our grade 8s will hit a magical maturity stage around March – hoping that high school could come even sooner.

Thanks to the hard work of our custodial staff (Mr. Florence, Mrs. Johnston and Mr. Sheehey) our school looks wonderful!  Thank you for your, efforts.  All of our desks, chairs and tables are in their proper places and the school has that great September shine.  Our teaching staff had the first few days of lessons planned and ready to go, and were excited for the upcoming year.  We have a talented group of staff members who are looking forward to encouraging a love of learning in their students.

Whether your child is a returning student to DGH or a brand new one, we encourage them to become involved in all that our school has to offer.  Our Junior and Intermediate students have a wide variety of sports teams that they can try out for, not to mention a number of clubs and activities that they can join over the course of the year.  DGH is a school with a tremendous sense of community – the more our students become involved, the stronger our community is built.

Our Meet the Staff night will take place on Wednesday, September 12th.  We hope to see all of our families on this evening.  This is a great opportunity for families to meet their child’s homeroom staff, along with our larger DGH staff and community.

Please remember that our school website, Facebook page and Twitter account is the best way to keep up to date with everything going on at our school.  Information on this be sent home in a letter; however, you can easily search for and locate Dr. George Hall PS on social media.

DGH community, our Meet the Staff Night will take place this Wednesday, September 12th from 5:30 pm to 7:00 pm.  The intent of the evening is for parents and guardians to have the opportunity to visit their child’s classroom and meet our staff.  Should you desire a longer meeting with your child’s teacher, please arrange for a separate meeting.  We truly look forward to meeting both our returning family members and our new families!  As well, Mrs. Starr is hoping to have the Fall Scholastic Book Fair up and running by the evening of September 12th.  Directions to the Book Fair will be posted.

DGH Letterhead Meet the Staff Night 2018-2019