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March 4, 2018

Good evening-
I hope you all had a wonderful weekend!  I really enjoyed seeing the girls basketball team play and the AHSTS presentation of Pippin.  The girls played hard and should be proud of their season.  Pippin was a fantastic show!  The talent at AHS is outstanding.

Over the course of the past week I had several student discussions about the proposed student walk-out planned for the March 14, the one month anniversary of the shooting at Stoneman Douglass High School.  We are working with students to make sure all students feel safe and respected and that any actions students may take are handled in a responsible manner. Please let me know if you intend to or wish to walk with the students.  Student safety and supervision is the priority so I hope to work collaboratively to provide coverage for students who walk as well as those who stay in the classroom.  Please do everything you can to show your support for all students. 

Red Cross Blood Drive in Support of Jake on April 4th, 2 - 7 pm at AHS
Ashland High School is honored to be a part of the team supporting Jake by hosting a blood drive.  Please consider donating or offering your help in other ways if you are unable to do so.  Because of the time frame of this drive I will support students who sign up between 1-2:45pm.  This is a community event and I want to support students who may want to donate but can't do it after the school day is over.  Thanks for understanding.
-Student sign-up's will happen at lunch, more information to come (Note: you must be 17 years old to donate or 16 years old with written parental consent.)
-Adults can sign-up at https://www.redcrossblood.org/ Enter Sponsor Code: AshlandHS
(likewise, if you wish to donate but can't stay after school, please let us know and we will work to accommodate.) 

March 8 is a busy day! 
Faculty meeting at 7:10am.  Agenda coming soon!  Please let me know if you have anything you would like to add.


We will participate in a cross-district collaboration from 2:15-3:15pm on Student Voice  .  We have space for approximately 20 students and will hold the event at computer stations around the building.  Teachers are invited to attend.  Let me know if you are interested.  
This event is being held virtually with Holliston, Millbury, and Mendon-Upton. I, along with leaders of these schools, believe in the power of student voice.  Our hope is that this event is a chance for us to listen to each other and share ideas on how to have more student voice in what we do here at Ashland High School.

I also invite you all to join us at 7pm in the AHS cafeteria for a Courageous Conversation: Can It Happen Here?  This is a student run initiative to discuss school safety at AHS.  We will have a panel followed by round table discussion on how we all play a role in prevention.

Finally, I enjoyed this reminder that we are all "Someone else's whole world", so thought I'd share. Thanks for what you do each and every day.

Ashland Raises Healthy & Happy Kids:
This week is National Eating Disorders Awareness Week. Eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of all mental illnesses therefore prevention and recognition are vitally important.
Five Ways to Promote a Positive Body Image in Children
  1. Focus on health, not weight. Concentrate on delicious nutrition and fun physical activity, rather than the number on the scale or the size on the clothing tags.
  2. Compliment kids on what they do, not how they look.
  3. Myth-Bust the "Perfect Body". Help your child become a savvy media critic by talking about what they see on television, in magazines and online. Help them understand that the pictures of models they see in ads and on social media may have been retouched or otherwise manipulated to appear "perfect”.
  4. Discuss your child's struggles as they arise. Fight your knee-jerk reaction to immediately comfort your child and dismiss their concerns with comments such as, “No honey you're perfect”. Instead, respond with open-ended questions such as, “help me understand that comment” or “that surprises me, can you tell me more” in order to begin a dialogue about their concerns.
  5. Be aware of how you talk about your own body. If you are criticizing your body or others, expect that your children will mirror this thinking. You are the first window through which they view the world.

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