We are past the halfway point in the school year! I hope you are all doing well and for many of you, students have finished the first semester courses and have requested the second semester courses, or are past the halfway point in courses finished by June. With less than 5 months to go the summer holidays, its important for all students, parents and guardians to assess the progress made to date and make a plan for assignment and course completion for the remainder of the school year.
As we are at the halfway point in the school year, I will be updating student credit checks detailing your progress in the graduation program showing the courses and required assessments completed, courses you are registered in and what remains to be complete to meet graduation requirements. I am working on the grade 12s and then the grades 11s and 10s to ensure our students intending to graduate have a clear picture of their educational plans and to help with course planning for the next school year if relevant.
REQUESTING NEW COURSES
As you finish a current course or are 80+% complete, full time students can email me with new course requests. All grade 10, 11 and 12 courses are now open. Be sure to put the full student name and the specific course you are requesting, like English New Media 10 or Foundations Math 11. We do not automatically add new courses at the end of January for the beginning of Term 3. As students complete or drop courses they finish or are not interested in taking, that frees up a seat for another, so it is in all students’ interests to not have inactive courses on your dashboard and to finish courses as soon as you can. To drop a course, use the “drop course” button on your dashboard, but be sure to let me know first so I can check the implications of that on your graduation status. We plan that the latest courses will be added this school year is March 1st but recommend students have all courses added by mid-February. EBUS is intending to run Summer session this year, registration will open May 1 and I will have more info about that closer to the date.
COURSE SELECTIONS FOR SEPTEMBER 2022
For students continuing into the next school year, EBUS will be doing grade presentations and course selections in May or June. Watch for details announcing the presentation dates and process to select courses in MyEd in future newsletters.
Inspiring Pathways presentations
I am super excited to announce that EBUS Academy will be hosting a new speaker series called Inspiring Pathways with a focus on career choices, overcoming adversity and following your dreams.
We are very fortunate to have these three speakers present and share their stories.
We will also have draws for those students in attendance.
This series is open to all students in grade 7-12 and EBUS staff.
Wednesday February 9, 2022
2 pm
Susan has been with the RCMP for 36 years. Much of her time has been spent serving Indigenous communities throughout British Columbia in a variety of roles. Currently, Susan is attached to the RCMP Indigenous Policing Services Unit and is the Métis Community Liaison. She supports communities by delivering programs in crime prevention, recruiting, and Métis history. In times of natural disasters, Susan contributes to community health and support by attending affected areas to help citizens remain safe, secure and access resources.
Vclass link: https://bit.ly/3qO6t4H
link to sign up: https://forms.gle/vLjTxTigXcgbW8EGA
GRADUATION ASSESSMENT RESULTS
Students graduating under the 2018 graduation program will need to complete a possible total of 3 assessments to meet graduation requirements; Literacy 10, Numeracy and Literacy 12. These assessments must be written under the supervision of a teacher and are written generally in high schools across BC.
Results for the assessment are generally released 2-3 months after the session and are accessible on the student transcript with the Ministry of Education website, the Student Secure Web. To access your account, or set one up as a new student, check the homeroom on student dashboards and look for “Creating a Student Account with the Ministry of Education”
With the announced cancelation of the January 2022 session, many families have questions that we have put in to the ministry and are awaiting clarification. As soon as more details are available, they will be provided in a future newsletter.
The next session EBUS will arrange for students is June 2022. EBUS can help you find a school close by for you to write in. You can register for that at www.ebusgradassessment.weebly.com between April 15 and May 5.
You can get all the details at https://ebus.ca/welcome-package/grade-10-12-homeroomnews/graduation-assessments-provincial-exams/
WHAT ABOUT?
Lots of new things to being a fulltime online student. And often you only realize the questions you have after you’ve been in the learning trenches for a bit to then see the things you don’t know.
Sooo…what about scholarships and grad etc at EBUS?
Every year EBUS has up to $40 000 in scholarships and bursaries available for our full-time students who meet graduation requirements by June and the requirements listed in the scholarship booklet. The booklet will be released in the homeroom and our website very soon, and the deadline to apply is April 15. Scholarship winners are announced at our grad ceremonies. We strongly recommend all students who will graduate by June apply for any scholarships they are interested in as we often have scholarships not applied for each year.
With COVID considerations this year EBUS will be hosting one online grad ceremony June 5, but in non-COVID years we host a ceremony the last Saturday in May in Vanderhoof, our hometown, and then at Van Deusen Gardens in Vancouver the first Saturday in June. To participate, students need to be approximately 75% complete all grad requirements by the end of April. Notices to all grade 12 students will go out in February. If you have questions, contact your academic advisor.
MENTAL HEALTH MINUTE
Over the years we have collected a number of free online resources to help with mental health. I encourage you to email me if you have a great free resource not listed here!
UPCOMING IMPORTANT DATES
Tuesday Feb 8 school assembly 10:30am Click here to join the meeting
- Wednesday Feb 9 2pm Inspiring Pathways https://forms.gle/vLjTxTigXcgbW8EGA
- Thursday Feb 10 report cards available
- Friday Feb 11 Professional Development Day – EBUS staff unavailable, courses open
- Monday Feb 21 Family Day – EBUS staff unavailable, courses open
- March 1 deadline to request courses for this school year
- March 14 January grad assessment results released
- March 18 Professional Development Day – EBUS staff unavailable, courses open
- SPRING BREAK March 21-April 1 EBUS staff unavailable, courses open
- April 15 EBUS Scholarship application deadline
- April 15-18 Easter Break – EBUS staff unavailable, courses open
- April 22 Term 3 deadline for report cards
- April 29 Professional Development Day – EBUS staff unavailable, courses open
- Early May summer session registration opens
- May 5 Term 3 report cards available
- May 13 Professional Development Day – EBUS staff unavailable, courses open
- May 23 Victoria Day – EBUS staff unavailable, courses open
- June 17 Term 4, Semester 2 and yearend deadline
- June 27 report cards available
- June 29 EBUS closed for summer holidays – staff unavailable until Sept 6
- Note that Term end dates are guidelines for students to finish courses, if you do not finish by the November or January term end date, continue with your studies without penalty and finish the course(s) as soon as possible. New courses are not automatically added at the Term change, students must request them as they finish current courses.
You can find the full year school calendar at
PARENT ACCESS
Parents, you can access your student’s progress and report cards on the EBUS parent portal: https://my.ebus.ca/parentportal/login.php We recommend parents log in with their student at least once a week to stay actively engaged in their learning and progress. Students, you can access your report cards from your dashboard, look for the A+ icon in the upper right-hand corner. Report cards are published 5 times a year; November, January, March, June and for summer session courses only, September.
As I get asked this often, if your student plans to finish their course(s) in a quarterly fashion, meaning by the end of term 3 or on April 22 students should be 15% complete. Those working on a semester fashion just started. And for students working in a linear fashion to complete by the June deadlines, they should be about 55% complete at this time.
PHONE APPOINTMENTS
With COVID protocols, I am working from home. To book a phone appt with me, use https://tinyurl.com/yyrbnz7p and select the appropriate amount of time you need when you are available for my call. My calls will show as “no caller ID” but I will call at the time you request.
Keep well, the next newsletter will be Friday February 18.