Parent Open House School Dance

Well, there’s an idea!  A Parent Open House Dance!  Should we try it in the spring?  Are you breaking into a cold sweat with "Sixteen Candles"-like memories?  No worries, I won’t make you dance next time.  My rewrite of the title is: Parent Open House; School Dance.  And what I mean to speak of is in two parts:

Parent Open House

First of all, what a pleasure it was to see so many parents at Friday’s Open House!  I know work schedules keep many parents from attending, for which I am sorry and fully understanding, as I am sure you would have loved to be there!  To those who were able to attend, thank you for sharing your time with the Coolidge community.  Some children openly welcome parents; many others seem to cringe at the sight of anyone over the age of 30!  Whether they admit it or not, they feel supported to see you walking their middle school halls and sharing in their school experience.  So thank you for sharing their experience, celebrating their wonderful teachers, and for being part of our Coolidge Community in this way!  In addition, thank you to the various PTO members and parents who donated coffee, snacks, and time to make the experience flow!

I personally enjoyed experiencing the Open House from two new perspectives this year.  Firstly, as an administrator, I was able to spend more time than usual visiting with parents and sharing in the all-school excitement.  I also had the opportunity to be a part of a (faulty fire alarm-induced) fire evacuation during the Open House, timed perfectly so that parents and district administrators could participate!  How fun!  And well done, everyone!!!  Secondly, as a parent, I enjoyed attending the parent coffee hosted by Team Voyager, I sat in on a few classes, and saw my son and his teachers “in action”.  It was great!

And as if the day wasn’t long enough, we got to cap it off with the first school dance of the 2013-2014 school year!

In attendance included: a darkly-shrouded ghost-type persona; a Mario character; an Ironman figure; a riddling elf; an alien; a Monster High girl; and 125 other characters (some in costume).  I was “on the alert”, paying close attention to the distance between girls and boys.  What I didn’t expect was that I would have to instead monitor the running AWAY of girls from boys, boys from girls, and so on.  There was a lot of running!  And a lot of fun was had by all.  Thanks to the Student Council, and to this year’s Student Council advisors, Mrs. DeBenedetto and Mrs. Herlihy, for organizing/coordinating/ chaperoning!!!!  In addition, thanks to Mrs. Warren and Mr. Bernard for chaperoning, to Mrs. Pink, who kept tabs on the money and the doors, to Rafael Mercado, who helped to set up, break down, etc., and to  Mr. Martin, who tried to show up in disguise as an administrator, but we recognized him immediately as a child at heart.  :)