When the snow falls it’s time to play outside! This year’s November snowfall gave the children of Moran Elementary school an opportunity to put on their snow suits and enjoy some winter fun.

Whether it’s sliding on their bellies acting like penguins, making snow angels, or just running around, playing in the snow gives students a fun recess break before returning back to the classroom.

To download high resolution jpg files from the photo gallery below, just simply click the “DOWNLOAD” button on the bottom right-hand corner of the photo while viewing it in the Photo Gallery function. We are happy to provide this service to you free of charge. 

Do you like to dance? Do you want to learn how to spin a flag? Do you like to perform?

All levels are welcome to come to the Penn Winter Guard Call-Out at Bittersweet Elementary School (next to Penn HS). The call-out will be on Tuesday, November 27^th at 6:00 – 8:00 p.m.

Girls and boys, grades 4-12, will be accepted. 

Come be a part of this incredible performing arts group!

Click here to download and print the flyer.
 

The IDOE released the 2017-18 Accountability grades on Wednesday, November 14 and once again the Indiana Department of Education has recognized the Penn-Harris-Madison School Corporation as an “A” rated school district! Along with the district’s “A” rating, Moran Elementary and six other schools also received “A” letter grades:

• Elsie Rogers Elementary School
• Horizon Elementary School
• Northpoint Elementary School
• Prairie Vista Elementary School
• Discovery Middle School
• Penn High School

This is a tremendous achievement for Moran as a Title I school! For more information on Moran’s rating and 2017-18 ISTEP+ scores, please click here.

P-H-M has received an “A” rating every year since 2011—making this the seventh consecutive year!

Overall, nearly 64 percent of Indiana Schools received an A or B. For more information on and to view the 2017-18 School Accountability Grades, please click here to visit the IDOE website. 

Penn-Harris-Madison School Corporation serves more than 11,100 students in 11 elementary schools, three middle schools and Penn High School. With the release of the Spring 2018 ISTEP+ results, Penn-Harris-Madison School Corporation ranks in the state’s Top 5% of public school districts for grade 10 ISTEP+ results and in the Top 6% for grades 3-8.

Penn High School ranks in the Top 5% of all Indiana public high schools and has a 97% graduation rate, exceeding the state’s graduation rate.

P-H-M’s “Triangle of Success” connects students, teachers and parents for excellence in education.

Dear Parents/Guardians:

Playgrounds: We ask that parent/guardians not visit our playgrounds during recess time or when school is in session. This policy is for your child’s safety and security as well as those of other parents.

Focused Instruction: Are you curious about what skill your child is working on and if they have mastered it or not? Teachers in grades K-5 are sending this information home. If you’re not seeing your child’s information coming home contact their teacher. FI skills are those state mandated skills we want all students to know and be able to perform.

Picking Up/Dropping off Your Child: Only bused students should use the front drop off area of our school. Students in cars, vans or trucks should be dropped off and picked up at the south entrance or exit. Please do not drop off students prior to 8:25 a.m. Help keep our students safe. Your cooperation is appreciated.

Parent/Teacher Conferences: We appreciated your attendance during our two evenings of parent/teacher conferences. Working together, in partnership, we can help your child reach their learning potential. We hope you found your conference helpful.

Picture Retakes: Retakes were completed on Wednesday, October 10.

Daylight Savings Time: November 4, at 2:00 a.m., marks the end of daylight savings time. Don’t forget to set your clocks back one hour.

D.A.R.E. Graduation: Tuesday, November 27, is D.A.R.E. graduation for 5th graders. Graduation starts at 11:30 a.m. in the IMR. Seating is limited.

Don’t forget to come visit us. We’d love to have you visit or volunteer. Please remember only approved volunteers may participate. If you have not been approved please stop by our office and pick up the forms you need in order to serve. Moran Elementary School is dedicated to serving its students and families. Please do not hesitate to call or stop by if we can be of service.

Sincerely,

Frank Anglin, Ed.S.

Breakfast with Santa is an annual beloved family event sponsored by P-H-M’s Community Education Department held at Bittersweet Elementary. The program is only for children in grades kindergarten through 3^rd grade and all children must be accompanied by an adult. Tickets must be purchased for each person attending.

Breakfast with Santa event

Saturday, Dec. 1

8 a.m., 9:30 a.m., & 11 a.m.

Bittersweet Elementary School

$7 for all tickets

Online ticket sales begin on Thursday, November 1 at 9:00 a.m. Tickets will only be sold online through phm.revtrak.net. We strongly encourage that those wishing to buy tickets go online to phm.revtrak.net prior to Nov. 1 and create their account if they don’t already have one. This will save time and ensure a speedier online checkout. Tickets are online on a first-come, first-served basis and space is limited to 100 participants for each time slot. Online payment can be done with an eCheck, Discover, Visa or MasterCard credit cards as well as debit cards. Please note there is a 3.49% fee for using this service. Tickets will be mailed to you prior to the event on Dec. 1. 

There will be no refunds and tickets will not be available at the door.

Penn High School’s Drama Club will present “Boo Bash”  in the Studio Theater on Thursday, Oct. 25.

“Boo Bash” features two shows, and admission is free.

The first show, “Wren and Moose”, is scheduled for 6 p.m. on Thursday, Oct. 25. It is a 25-minute children’s Halloween show written by Penn High School student Kenny Collymore-Williams. After the show, there will be Halloween candy and a short meet-and-greet with the characters.

The second show, “Death and All His Nonexistent Friends”, is a 30-minute young adult Halloween show, also written by Kenny Collymore-Williams. It is scheduled to start at 7 p.m., and features a few more jumps, bumps, and scares.

According to Drama Club Sponsor Crystal Ryan, “Boo Bash” is a student-led project. It is student-written, directed, acted, and teched.

“The Drama Club developed this event as a way to have a fun, free event for the community, but more importantly, the Drama Board members wanted a low pressure, fun way to engage incoming theatre students,” Ryan said. “With such a large program, it is a great way to get our “Intro to Theatre” involved in a performance situation. 

“The other unique thing about this event it is Penn’s first stage reading!” Ryan said. “Stage readings are how most professional playwrights get their works initially read before they go on to a huge, full production. Having several aspiring playwrights in our program, I would like begin implementing this more in our program to teach students how to get their work read, produced, and out in the professional world.“

Monday, Nov. 5
5:30 p.m.
Schmucker Middle School, 56045 N Bittersweet Rd.

Indiana law (IC 20-19-3-11) now requires that all schools provide age appropriate and research based instruction on child abuse and child sexual abuse to students in grades kindergarten through 12th. Penn-Harris-Madison has partnered with the Family Justice Center, Youth Service Bureau of St. Joseph County and the St. Joseph County Special Victims Unit to provide this instruction for our students.  

In November and early December, staff from the Family Justice Center and Youth Service Bureau St. Joseph County will present a series of age appropriate curriculum to elementary students in grades K-5. Each unit is age appropriate specific to the grade level.

To learn more about the new State mandated child abuse/sexual abuse prevention curriculum, all P-H-M parents are invited to attend an optional parent information night on Monday, November 5, 5:30 p.m., at Schmucker Middle School, 56045 N Bittersweet Rd.

Parents have the option to have their student(s) participate in the state mandated educational program.

Parents are asked to return either a paper version of the permission slip or click here to submit it electronically through our school website. *Please note a permission form needs to be returned for each individual child enrolled in a Penn-Harris-Madison School.

If you wish to fill out the electronic version of the form, please click here. 

To download and print a pdf copy of the elementary (grades K-5) permission form, please click here.

Adobe Acrobat Reader will be required to view the pdfs. If you do not have Adobe Acrobat Reader, please visit Adobe’s website, at this link www.get.adobe.com/reader/, to download your free version.

If you opt to fill out the paper form, you will need to print the form, fill it out and return it to the school.

Once again Penn-Harris-Madison School Corporation schools, in all grade levels tested, scored above Indiana’s averages. The variance between P-H-M’s pass rate over the state is at least 10% or higher across all grade levels and subjects.

For grade 10, 75.6% of P-H-M students passed the ELA test and 58.4% passed the Math portion. The district’s overall pass rate for grade 10 was 56.4%.

For grades 3-8, 78.0% of P-H-M students passed the ELA test and 74.8% passed the Math test. P-H-M’s overall district pass rate for grades 3-8 was 68.3%.

For grade 10, P-H-M ranks in the Top 5% out of 291 public school corporations. In grades 3-8, P-H-M is in the Top 6% of public school districts out of 294 public school corporations.

When reviewing the Corporation’s performance on the last round of ISTEP+ (grades 3-8) test results, P-H-M Superintendent Dr. Jerry Thacker commented “P-H-M teachers and administrators are incredibly committed to our vision of excellence and offer the best education in the Michiana area. I am very proud of the fact that P-H-M is one of the state’s top performing school districts. The credit goes to our outstanding teachers, students and parents.”

Dear Parents/Guardians:

The 2018-2019 school year is off to a great start. I’d like to thank all our parents and staff who have made this possible. Our enrollment (471) is up 30 students over last year (441). This year we have three sections of kindergarten and four sections of first and second grades. All other grades have three sections.

ISTEP: We hope to have school wide ISTEP results from the 2018-2019 school year soon. Individual student reports will be mailed to parents. We continue to get mixed messages from the DOE on a release date.

Exact Path Replaced: This has been replaced by AirWays. This will give us an opportunity monitor student progress as they master state standards at their grade level. Teachers are challenging students by setting individual learning goals.

Transportation (Buses): If your child is experiencing problems on the bus contact your child’s driver and discuss the problem with him/her. Most all problems can be resolved by working with your child’s bus driver. If you need further assistance concerning safety or drop off/pick up locations the transportation office (258-9565) can assist you.

Attendance: Regular school attendance is crucial to your child’s learning and achievement. Indiana schools are expected to maintain a 96% attendance rate in order to meet state and federal mandates. After four unexcused absences parents may be referred to Child Protective Services for truancy. Please read carefully the section on attendance in your child’s planner, pgs. 19-20. Please be sure to verify your child’s absence (pg 20). Absences are unexcused if not verified. Thank you.

Lunch/Recess Times: Lunch/Recess times are: Grades K/1: 10:45-11:40 a.m., Grades 2/3: 11:40-12:30 p.m. and Grades 4/5: 12:30-1:20 p.m. Lunch/Recess periods are a combined fifty minutes (Kindergarten is fifty-five) in length. If you plan to visit for lunch please contact your child’s teacher in advance to get the correct time for the lunch period. We enjoy visitors. Thank you.

Crossing Guard: Students who walk or ride their bikes to school will find Mr. Wolf on duty from 8:15 a.m. to 8:40 a.m. in the morning and from 3:05 p.m. to 3:15 p.m. in the afternoon. All students are encouraged to cross Beech Road when Mr. Wolf is on duty.

AM Drop Off: Our back door, south end of the building, locks at 8:40 a.m. Students are tardy after 8:40 a.m. and will need to report to the front entrance to enter school. Please be respectful of others behind you in line when dropping off your child. Many of our parents have other morning stops too. Be safe!

New Staff Members: Teachers are: Laura Mason-K, Kate MacFarlane-1st, Karin Logan-2nd, Kristi Vandygriff-Sp.Ed., Laura Scott-Music, Alexandra McKenzie-SpH and Rylee Jacobson-ENL. Support Staff are: Imelda Robles-Henry, Brian Kennel, Ben Lawecki, Joanne Schloss, Kerin Fulton and Erica Barkley

I would again like to thank everyone for a smooth start to a new school year. Moran Elementary School is dedicated to serving its students and families. Please do not hesitate to call or stop by if we can be of service.

Sincerely,

Frank Anglin, Ed.S.

Students in Grades 3-8 and students enrolled in Biology at Penn will take ILEARN Indiana’s, new computer-adaptive standardized test, this spring (April 22 – May 17) replacing the state’s previous test, ISTEP+. To see what subjects students will be tested per their grade level, please click to visit the IDOE website. 

To help parents better understand how their children will be tested and to help them prepare their students for the test, the IDOE has put together a quick one page guide. Click here to download the pdf copy.

The ISTEP+ Grade 10 assessment will be administered during the 2018-2019 and 2019-2020 school years. Click here for more information on the transition from the ISTEP+ Grade10 assessment to the College Entrance Exam.

IREAD-3 for Grade 3 will continue as is. Click for more details.

Starting this spring, the Indiana Department of Education will also transition to a new test to assess students with significant cognitive disabilities in Grades 3-8 and 10. IAM is the new summative accountability assessment. Click here for more details on IAM.

Click to view all the testing dates on the P-H-M Corporate Calendar or reference the 2018-19 P-H-M District Activities Wall Calendar.