Link to Meeting Videos

We are halfway through our third quarter of the year -- time is flying by! Students have adjusted to the routine of being back in school and it is good to see students in the buildings. It is our hope that we are able to stay in school without having to go remote for an extended period of time the remainder of the year. Thankfully, our staff will be able to receive the COVID-19 vaccine at the end of the month, which will be a huge help. 

At their February 2, 2021 meeting, the Madison Local Schools Board of Education voted unanimously to place a 6.99 mill operating levy on the ballot for the May 4 election. If passed, the levy will generate $2,782,740 annually for the district and cost residents $20.39/month per $100,000 of assessed home value. 

This week was PBIS’s Extra Degree of Effort Week at Madison High School. Our PBIS model is STREAK: Safety, Teamwork, Responsibility, Effort, And Kindness, and this event week is focused on the “E,” Effort. 

Congratulations to Auburn Career Center’s students who were inducted into the National Technical Honor Society! The National Technical Honor Society (NTHS) is an educational non-profit that exists to honor, recognize, and empower students and teachers in Career & Technical Education.

This week, North Elementary encouraged their students to promote kindness with a school Spirit Week! Students dressed up for exciting kindness theme days, listed below: 

Click HERE 

Madison Local Schools utilizes Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) within its buildings to create and encourage a successful and supportive atmosphere for its students. PBIS is an evidence-based three-tiered framework that focuses on nurturing the desired behaviors of our students and staff.

Click HERE to view the school calendars

Attendance at and guidelines for our Winter Sports Season will look a little different this season in order to maintain safety precautions for our students, parents, and community. Please see the updated guidelines below: 

In Conjunction with NBD Medical/International:

VIDEO

Click HERE to find the bus routes for the 2020-2021 school year. Please see the revision on NES Route 4.  

2020 - 2021

Scheduling

Information

February 8th-February 19th

Last Friday, North Elementary held a Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) Jeopardy Review Day. Students reviewed all the STREAK behaviors by competing against each other! The competitions were held within each grade. 

Congratulations to Ms. Liz Nainiger, science teacher at Madison Middle School, who was recently approved for the Martha Holden Jennings grant. This grant covers licenses to explorelearning.com for an entire year. 

Congratulations to all students who participated in the Madison Local Schools District Spelling Bee! The Bee was held at Madison Middle School on Tuesday, January 26, at 9:00 A.M. 

Virtual District Spelling Bee January 26th

Thank you for a successful first week back with in person learning.  We know there were many changes to work out, and I applaud you and our staff for their efforts this week.  

Congratulations to our Spelling Bee Champions and runners-up! Our little “spelling bees” really spelled their way to V-I-C-T-O-R-Y!

Happy Holidays to you all from Madison Local Schools! It’s the most wonderful time of the year, and we are happy to be able to celebrate with our families. We know this year has looked extremely different than any other year, but we encourage you to find some positivity this holiday season and spread the love -- to your families, your friends, and to others in your circles! 

MHS has had a large number of families reach out to me lately with needs. Around this time of the year, we always support a few families and get them gifts. The staff is always generous in their giving. 

The MHS art students have taken on numerous projects during the first semester of the 2020-2021 school year, and they certainly haven’t let the back and forth of in-person to remote learning slow them down! 

You may remember this past October as “SOCKtober,” where Madison Local students were encouraged to bring in new or unused socks to be donated to the homeless. SOCKtober was created by MHS sophomore, Nadia Cruz, the founder of Nadia’s Soft Smiles, a charity that donates socks to the homeless.

Thank you again for your efforts during this period of remote learning. I know for the families that have had to make the switch to remote learning, this has been a challenge. As of this writing, the plan is for our students to return to in-person instruction for those who have selected that option on Monday, January 11. Second semester will begin remotely for all students on January 6.

First, I want to thank each and every family and staff member for your efforts in making the transition to virtual learning last week successful.  I know that for those who chose in-person learning, this was a transition that happened very quickly; I appreciate everyone’s ability to adapt and support one another.  

As I shared with you this yesterday, the situation in our school community is beginning to mirror what is happening in the rest of the state. While cases among students are beginning to increase, we are also having to quarantine personnel. This is limiting our ability to continue our face-to-face instruction. Therefore, beginning Monday,  November 16, 2020, we are going to pause our in-person learning model for all buildings through November 30, 2020, with the intention of resuming face to face learning December 1, 2020.

Both elementary buildings held their fall family literacy nights at the end of October. Families were able to attend face-to-face and virtually! At South Elementary, staff decorated their cars for families to drive by and guess the book they were depicting.

CHECK OUT PHOTO GALLERY FOR MORE PICS

Following state funding cuts this past spring due to the pandemic, combined with a tight budget before the cuts and the potential for further reductions this fiscal year, the Madison Local School District is facing a critical juncture in funding and the quality of what is able to be provided to our 3,058 students.

Happy Halloween! While many things have looked different due to COVID-19, we are excited to celebrate a little bit of normalcy with Halloween -- a time to hang out with your families, eat candy, and watch spooky movies. 

We would like to remind all Madison Local Schools staff and students to continue practicing health and safety habits and social distancing protocols. We have procedures in place to limit contact from student to student on our campuses, but we cannot control what anyone else does outside of the school environment. We need to remember to remain vigilant to the real possibility of being exposed to COVID-19 as we go about our daily lives. 

I hope that everyone has had the opportunity to enjoy this beautiful fall season. The colors have been spectacular and have provided me a sense of hope as we go into the colder months of late fall and early winter. We are fortunate here in Lake County: while the virus is with us, we are working hard to keep it at bay.  

Crossroad Health Center is facilitating a Trauma Sensitive Schools grant, which is available to all Lake County Schools (K-12). The grant is focused on mental health in students, as studies have shown that mental health problems can affect many areas in a student’s life.

It was only a few months ago that many of us were just hoping to start the fall sports season -- fast-forward to the present, and the season is coming to a close! We’ve had an amazing run; with all of the COVID-19 restrictions and protocols, it has been a successful season. All of our teams were able to have a full season and play all of their contests, which is more than we could have hoped for. 

Now - more than five months after their original performance dates - Madison Theatre is attempting to be the first area high school in Northeast Ohio to return live musical theatre performances to the area. With protocols approved by the Lake County Health Department and using their original cast from the spring production, Madison Theatre is proud to lead the way on the return of live high school theatre.

In the midst of the pandemic, it is really easy to become overwhelmed with negativity and anxiety. We always welcome the little things, but in a time like this, positivity and generosity are needed more than ever. This is why MHS Art & Design has been recognizing students as “Positive Student of the Week.” To earn this award, students have gone out of their way to help someone without being prompted, bring a positive attitude to the classroom, and put effort into what they do, taking guidance and pushing themselves to be better. 

This October, we welcome SOCKtober -- send in a donation of new or unused socks with your students to any Madison Local School! Socks will be collected and donated to the homeless.

Hello, Madison Community! We here at the middle school have had a fantastic start. We have two formats for students this year: a virtual at home learning environment and the traditional in-person learning. Both formats are working well and our teachers are doing an amazing job. Here are some other activities that are going smoothly at the middle school... 

I want to take the time to thank all the students and families who participated in our graduation ceremony last week.

The plans for next school year are still in flux as we wait for guidance from the state of Ohio. Superintendent Angela Smith will be sending out updates this summer as information becomes available.

Summer is just around the corner -- can you believe it? We can’t! -- and our minds have been buzzing with the question: what will this summer look like? 

I want to take this opportunity to thank you for all your efforts these past two months.  So many in the community have reached out to help our students and our soon-to-be-graduates during this extremely challenging time.

We want to take a moment to celebrate Teacher Appreciation Week, which was last week. Our teachers are the backbone of our schools; without you all, our students would be lost!

We’ll say it once and we’ll say it again: this is a difficult period in our lives. Between limited social interactions, being stuck in the house with our dear, but annoying, loved ones (we joke!) – oh, and the national pandemic – we are all overdue for a mental health check up. 

It has been a busy week.  We have worked with Lake County Health Department, our senior class, and our administrative team to plan a commencement ceremony that captures all the pieces of what makes our Madison Commencement Ceremony special. 

With Mother’s Day coming up -- this Sunday, May 10 -- we wanted to give you all some ideas on how to make the day extra-special under these unusual circumstances. Our moms have had to pull double duty this year, not only keeping up with normal work and obligations, but helping to homeschool their students. We certainly appreciate all the work our mothers do for us daily, and we want to be sure they get a little extra loving this year. 

My goal throughout this process has been to provide you information in a timely fashion.  While the focus of the past several updates has been on graduation and seniors, today’s update is looking to closing this year and planning for next.  For seniors and their families, our team is still reviewing the guidance from the Ohio Department of Education and the Ohio Department of Health; we are looking at all the possibilities available to us, as well as how to move forward. 

Our hearts go out to our 2020 seniors for missing the remainder of their senior years and not getting a proper graduation ceremony. While we can never truly understand what that is like, we sympathize beyond measure, and we want to do everything we can to recognize our amazing graduating class of 2020. 

Each year, School Lunch Hero Day is a chance to showcase the difference school nutrition professionals make for every child who comes through the cafeteria. This year, with all that COVID-19 has brought upon us, School Lunch Hero Day brings a more significant  meaning.. Join us as we show some appreciation to all our School Lunch Heroes who have ‘geared up’ each week during the closure, to distribute safe and nutritious meals to our students.

It’s time to register your kindergartner for the 2020-2021 school year! Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the process will be different than other years - directions are below.

The community is working to stay positive throughout this period of at-home school, work, and limited social interactions. In order to add a little more fun to the car rides and walks outside, the community has enlisted a “Bear Hunt!”

While virtual education isn’t our preferred way to teach here at Madison, we are determined to become accustomed with as many virtual resources as we can! 

Due to COVID-19, voting is still open for the March 17 Primary election. The Madison School District is part of the Lake County Finance District, which has a renewal levy on this ballot. 

We love our staff here at Madison – and they love our students! To welcome our students back from spring break, the staff created a video compilation of short clips of teachers, photos, and more.

COVID-19 has changed a lot of plans – not only our own school schedule, but your individual spring break plans! It’s easy to get wrapped up in quarantine-demanded isolation, but it’s important to remember you can still do some of the things you love virtually. 

Dear Madison Community:

I hope that you found time today to get some much-needed fresh air. I know when I am done with this update, I am going to take a walk and celebrate the signs of spring. 

I have been getting many questions about Google Classroom and student expectations. This week was a week to learn not only for staff, but for students. Next week is our scheduled spring break; we want our students to enjoy as much as possible – and not be stressed over school work. However, we hope that on Monday, March 30, all students will have confirmed they can log on and “return to school” ready to learn. 

We understand that the school closure creates many challenges for our community members. One of the biggest is the lack of reliable meals for our students. We have several options available for students and families who are in need of meals during this time.

With the new adjustments to your students’ learning schedules and your work schedules, this is a stressful time for all of us. Not knowing when this will let up just adds to the anxiety. We wanted to share some tips for how to keep life as “normal” as possible with your kids – and yourself – through this period. 

Keeping your children occupied during this forced schooling-at-home can be a struggle - for them and for you! There are all kinds of web-based opportunities for your children to enhance their learning, and one of these websites might take the edge off their boredom when they’ve had enough of reading and other games around the house. Enjoy these options, and please share those you have found with us as well.

The Madison Local Schools District is part of the Lake County School Financing District renewal levy that will appear on the March 17, 2020 primary election ballot. This is a renewal levy therefore there is no tax increase for residents. 

This year marks the 29th Annual Juried Art Show, sponsored by the Rabbit Run Community Arts Association and the Madison Public Library. Applications for admission open March 9. 

Congratulations to Madison High School wrestler Logan Blough, he recently earned his 100th career win. He is one of five Madison wrestlers who qualified for the district tournament, which will be held this weekend, March 6th and 7th, in Mentor.

It’s that time of year -- the bad news is we lose the hour of the day we’ve been so enjoying… but the good news is we will have more daylight! While not every place in the United States observes Daylight Saving Time (and note, there is no “s” on Saving), we here in the Madison Local school district do.

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