Attention drivers: IMPORTANT!
We are all in a rush this time of year but please make sure safety around the school comes first. There have been many reported incidences of unsafe driving near the school. LAST WEEK A STUDENT WAS HURT RESULTING IN STITCHES BECAUSE OF AN ILLEGAL U-TURN DURING DROP-OFF.
Please make sure you drive with extra care around the school, within safe walk routes and pay close attention to the Crossing Guards. Do not make illegal turns, u turns or allow children to walk between parked cars.
Despite the "5 minute limit" sign YOU MAY NOT PARK IN THE GO ZONE TO WALK YOUR CHILD INTO THE SCHOOL DURING PICK-UP and DROP-OFF TIMES. Please inform all drivers of your children! Please help us avoid dangerous situations for all children that are driven or walk to school.
Unfortunately, those that have ignored the municipality created GO ZONE for all schools in Mt. Lebanon and simple safe driving has resulted in police presence and license plate number collection. Please realize our goal is to keep all children safe. Feel free to contact me with any concerns.
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| Parents waiting for other parents to move on so they can have their 30 seconds in the Go Zone. Walking here is faster. |
December 10, 2013
"Seems to me the YSA and now the SAB have consistently supported improved quality *and* quality of fields.
Contrary to Kelly's blog post, the Robb Hollow field would *not* have been a full-sized field. So the ROI of developing it would have been pretty low, with respect to gains for organized sports.
So Kelly's plan was not "exactly what they [SAB] asked for." It would have left essentially unchanged the burden on existing fields for games, which would do little to improve the state of overuse which you rightly mention as a concern of YSA/SAB.
Just wanted to set that straight.
December 16, 2013 at 6:12 PM"Trib reporter Matt Santoni asked Commission Kelly Fraasch about the Commission's decision to turf Middle and Wildcat, instead of spending the money on improving Robb Hollow Park and the municipal golf course. Mt. Lebanon leader questions turf fund
“From a field-sports, development perspective, it doesn't bother me that those restrictions are there on McNeilly,” Franklin said. “There's nothing to suggest we can't develop it five, 10, 15 years from now.”I don't know what else to do, to get the community to see how we are being taken for a bunch of chumps. Linfante, Bendel, and Brumfield should be ashamed of themselves.
So I promised my kids that I would set up the motion sensor cameras to see if the Elf really moved. I let it run all day and when we got home, we found that something triggered the sensor on the kitchen cam. The kids are totally freaked out now.
The Elf is kinda hard to see, sitting to the right of the sink, between the pantry and the blender.
If I'd have heard about what this guy was planning to do before it all played out, I might have thought he was unrealistic or maybe even condescending. But after watching the video, I realized that there's a much bigger thing at play here: We need to remember that every human being is unique and full of potential. We don't know other people's stories.
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| Change Order |
Dan Remely mentioned at last night's meeting (which was televised this evening) that "the blogs" have lists of numbers for change orders. Just numbers, with no explanations given. In the small space that is available, that is all I can do. I post the agendas which provide the explanations. Dan spoke of a detailed list that will be on the School District website. When he questioned the availability of that list, President Cappucci replied that the list has not been developed. So I guess we are just stuck with a list of numbers.Poor Dan. That list was never developed, at least for the public to see...until now.
The pale yellow cells represent the change orders for the HS "Renovation" project from June 2012 through December 2013. The pale green cells are change orders sorted from lowest (maximum refund) to highest (greatest single expense). Please note that the number in the pale green cells do not represent the cost or refund of the change order as described in that particular row; ergo, the color coding.
At the end, you'll find both average and median prices. Those in the pale yellow areas are across the board; those in the pale green areas are sequestered into refunds only vs. costs only.(No TERC math was used, nor any standard American algorithm harmed, in the preparation of this table)
LeboMathFacts.org
Important Update |
| It's hard to believe that it's been one year since we launched lebomathfacts.org. Today we have good news to report. At the present time, the Mt Lebanon School District is beginning to implement changes to the math curriculum that should address many of the concerns that parents had with the math program. These changes include not only curriculum content, but increased teacher support, teacher training and updated classroom materials aligned with the Common Core. Although changes to the math curriculum have begun this school year, the updated curriculum will not be fully implemented until the 2014-2015 school year. The updated math curriculum will meet and, in some areas, exceed Common Core standards. We should begin to see the following changes in our schools. Math Facts The mastery targets for addition, subtraction, multiplication and division basic facts have been updated, made more robust, and accelerated. Math fact instruction will occur both in the classroom and as homework. Testing of math facts will include a pre-test and both timed and untimed assessments. Standard Algorithms Standard US algorithms for addition, subtraction, multiplication and long division will be taught as part of the math curriculum and presented to students following a conceptual foundation of math functions. The Common Core curriculum calls for fluency in addition and subtraction using the standard algorithms by 4th grade, fluency in multiplication by 5th grade, and fluency in division by 6th grade. The district expects to introduce standard algorithms in earlier grade levels than the Common Core standards. Fractions and Decimals Instruction in fractions and decimals will be significantly expanded and more rigorous in the updated curriculum. By the end of grade 5 students will be expected to add, subtract, multiply and divide with both fractions and decimals in plain computation and in problems solving settings. We look forward to these changes, and thank you for your interest and support. |
Historically, the IRS has considered volunteer firefighters employees for tax purposes, regardless of whether they receive compensation, said Douglas Smith, managing shareholder of Downtown law firm Jackson Lewis PC.
Unless the agency updates its ruling or the regulations that are being written specifically exclude volunteer firefighters, “they're going to have to provide insurance to a group of volunteers,” he said.
Mt. Lebanon's staff of 17 paid firefighters is supplemented by about 50 volunteer firefighters, Chief Nick Sohyda said.
While Sohyda said he's “not panicking” over the situation yet, he said he will have to track the hours of all volunteers to make sure they are serving fewer than 30 hours a week — the threshold above which workers are considered full-time under the law and eligible for health insurance. That task alone would be difficult and costly, he said.
“What most fire companies would do is limit the number of hours to keep them under the threshold,” he said.Three commissioners had no problem allocating $637,400 from the unassigned funds on Tuesday evening for artificial turf at Middle and Wildcat Fields. In fact, the Commission is considering borrowing $900,000 for storm sewer repairs on Longuevue, Marlin, and Mapleton. But our new Finance Director Andrew McCreery suggested adding that to the new $4 million bond issue that the Commission will be voting on this year for a new roof for the municipal building and maintenance for both parking garages. The money from the storm water fee can go toward the storm sewer repairs portion of the bond issue. It is unclear to me why the revenue from parking isn't going toward the parking garages.
The results available today show that Mt. Lebanon High School is the top performing school in Allegheny County with an academic score of 99.5. Six other schools, including elementary schools, in the state performed higher, with the Downingtown STEM Academy in Chester County at the top with 101.4.See Mr. Ewing? I can give credit where it is due. I guess this is when you make your pitch for PK. Good luck with that. Now if we could just hang on to our principals or is it principles?
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| Photo Courtesy of Weber Murphy Fox |
 |  | Mt. Lebanon Aqua Club |
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| Balcony at the Pool |
| Members Well, two nights in the new pool and I think it is safe to say we are thrilled with our new home. There are a couple of items we want to remind everyone of. First we ask that parents do not go on deck if possible. Obivously with the work still left to do in the new athletic building still to complete, a lot of dust and dirt will be generated. This dirt will easily be tracked on the pool deck and by limiting access to coaches and swimmers we can help the District keep the pool clean. We understrand this is a big change from old pool and at times parents will need to be on deck. We just ask you limit this as much as possible. Next just a reminder to please confine yourself to the pool, balcony and locker rooms only. We are all very curious to see the rest of the building but we need to refrain from exploring. Lastly several members have raised a concern with the height of the railing at the front of the seating balcony. We have shared this concern with the district and they in turn have passed along our concern to their construction team. In the mean time, we ask that all be very careful around the railing and if possible refrain from sitting in the front row. This is not to say the building or pool is unsafe, we only suggest this as a precaution to avoid any accidents. Thanks Mike Mike Chiappetta President, Board of Directors Mt. Lebanon Aqua Club. |
"They [are} also majorly cheap out in the restrooms. [One would think that] for all of that money that they would have the kind of sinks where the water turned on automatically due to motion. Or the kind of paper towel [hand waving] containers that would spit out paper towels due to motion.... Or those super powered turbo hand dryers. [There] are also only five showers in the girls locker room. The girls were even complaining about that on the first day."
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| Notice the glass rail in the spectator area. |
