Congratulations 10th and 12th Grade Designers!
Fall 2023 Exhibition was a huge success! Your boats floated, your galleries were glowing, and your murals highlighted so much joy. You went above and beyond this year, and you have made your school community so proud!
See a photo gallery here from your Fall 2023 Exhibition:
Greetings Designers and Design Families!
This week was full of seasonal fun – from spooky lab experiments in Chemistry class to ofrenda building in Spanish class. Our students really had something each day to look forward to this past week at DVD. And, it was so much fun having our annual Halloween costume contest during lunch on Tuesday! Shout out to our winners – see a few photos below!
This week, also had our November edition of “Coffee with Admin”, where parents/guardians can meet with the admin team at DVD to hear updates and ask questions about all things DVD. Our agenda for this month’s edition was 1) Campus Updates & Highlights, 2) Upcoming Calendar Events, 3) Tardy and Absence Updates, 4) Red Ribbon Week: Key Resources, 5) Q&A. If you were not able to attend but would like to see a few campus, you can click here to find the slides from our November Coffee with Admin. Our next meeting will be on Wednesday, December 6th.
See the Bell Schedule for Week 12 here, as well key dates and events below:
Upcoming Dates and Events:
Week 12 Campus Highlight – Halloween Costume Contest!
Greetings Designers and Design Families!
This week at Da Vinci Schools, we celebrated Red Ribbon Week. There were several events on campus to bring awareness to and share resources about drug prevention awareness and health. The theme was “Be Kind To Your Mind”. Especially with Halloween around the corner, we ask all of our students to be safe and make good choices as they engage in holiday festivities and social gatherings. If you would like to review any of the resources shared, please click here.
We are excited to celebrate Halloween on our campus next week with a special dress up spirit day on Tuesday! Please help remind all students that while costumes are encouraged, students are not allowed to bring prop weapons, full face masks, or excessive gore/blood. All costumes must be school appropriate, and students not in costume must adhere to dress code. We will be having a costume contest at lunch in the outdoor quad for the most creative costumes!
Here is the bell schedule for Week 12 at Da Vinci Design:
Upcoming Dates and Events:
Hello Designers and Design Families,
Please join us in giving a big DVD welcome to Vannessa Ramos, our new Administrative Services Manager! Ms. Ramos started with us this week as part of our front office team. Parents/Guardians: there is a good chance that when you call DVD, it will be Ms. Ramos you are speaking to – so please say “hello” and make her feel welcome at our school.
From now on, please email Vannessa Ramos at vramos@davincischools.org for anything related to: excusing absences, excusing tardies, records requests, withdrawing students, or verification of education forms. She will be happy help!
Ms. Brianna Castaneda, formerly in this front office role, is staying with the DVD family and transitioning to her new role as Intervention Specialist in student support services.
One additional note: thank you to all of you who have completed the biannual family survey via Kelvin! We moved to a new platform this year, so please double-check your spam/junk folders, to make sure that you do not miss out on this important feedback opportunity. Your positive feedback helps us stay competitive amongst the best schools in Los Angeles and California! And, your honest constructive feedback helps us grow.
Thank you families and have a great rest of your week!
—DVD Admin Team
Greetings Designers and Design Families!
Next week, it is SLC week at Da Vinci Design – and we are excited to have you on campus with us! SLCs are an important time when parents and teachers come together for a meeting led by the student. It is a time to highlight a student’s strengths and hard work, to encourage students to set new goals, and to ask guiding questions so students can take ownership of their learning. Every student and parent is expected to participate in leading an SLC this semester. SLCs will happen in-person. See below for SLC schedules and details.
Next week we are also celebrating Latinx/Hispanic Heritage Month at Da Vinci Design with events hosted by our Latinx Student Union. We will have a spirit week where students can express and embrace pride in Latinx culture all week long. And, we will end the week with a Community Dialogue assembly (aka: “CD”) CD celebrating Latinx culture.
It is time for our biannual family and student surveys! Today, you should have received an email from a survey app called Kelvin. This is not spam! Please follow the prompt to complete an online survey from Kelvin to share your feedback on Da Vinci Design. We appreciate your time and your feedback!
Upcoming Dates and Events:
October 2023 College Visits:
Greetings Designers and Design Families!
Next week, it’s Spirit Week! In honor of our first dance of the school year, the Phantom Formal, we are having special dress days all next week to build the hype. Tickets for the dance are $25, and are available on MySchoolBucks. Click here for the link to purchase tickets to the DV Fall dance: Phantom Formal! Sign in using your PowerSchool login information.
We are looking forward to a short but packed week! We are preparing for the PSAT Test Day on Thursday, 10/12. Friday there is no school due to staff professional development.
We are also getting ready for Student Led Conferences (aka: SLCs) the following week (10/16-10/19)! Every student is expected to participate in an SLC presentation with a family member and a teacher. SLCs will happen on campus unless a Zoom meeting is requested. See below for SLC schedules and details.
Important Reminder from the DV Health Team: Key Facts about Influenza
Flu season is here! Our school health team, Dr. Green and Nurse T, want to remind you how to keep your child and others healthy. See the letter to families linked here and above. The flu is a contagious respiratory illness caused by influenza viruses that infect the nose, throat, and lungs. If your child is diagnosed with Influenza, please let your school health team know as we track clusters and outbreaks. All COVID cases must be reported to the school health team. To reach our Director of Health Services, email Dr. Emily Green at egreen@davincischools.org with questions or health updates regarding your child.
Lastly, thank you to all of our parents who joined us for our Coffee with Admin session on Wednesday, October 4th! You can find the slides of what we covered here:
Our next Coffee with Admin session will be on November 1st, Wednesday.
Here is the special schedule for Week 9 (10/9-10/13):
Click links below to access SLC materials!
Upcoming Dates and Events:
All DVD parents/guardians are welcome! Please join to hear about important school updates and to have the opportunity for Q&A with our DVD admin team.
Wednesday, 10/4: Coffee w/ Admin (Two Sessions: 8am & 5pm)
For this session, we will focus on positive school culture initiatives, and also on academic supports. We will help parents/guardians understand the different between PowerSchool and Canvas, and how to access these tools.
Hope to see you there!
Greetings Designers and Design Families,
Happy Friday! This week was another exciting week at DVD – and for our Seniors, it ended with fun and food: our 2nd Annual Multicultural Food Fair. This event is the culmination of a project done in the Ethnic Studies class at the end of their unit on identity. Students analyzed the importance of food as an expression of identity, and celebrated with a potluck where students shared appetizers, entrees and desserts important to their cultural background or ethnicity. See picture below!
Progress reports are being mailed home today, September 29th. The purpose of this is to give families the opportunity to have a snapshot of student progress, and to be able to have a conversation at home with students about how to stay successful in school. This information will also be used by teachers and counselors in their plans to support all students. Please follow up with your child’s teachers directly with any questions about assignments or grades.
If you do not receive a progress report in the mail by Friday, 10/6, please reach out by calling Da Vinci Design at 310-725-5800, or send an email Office Manager Maria Beltran at mbeltran@davincischools.org to request a digital progress report for your child.
See the Bell Schedule of Week 8 here:
Student Led Conferences Coming Soon!
This is a reminder that Student Led Conferences (SLCs) for Da Vinci Design students are happening on-campus and in-person Monday, Oct. 16th through Thursday, Oct. 19th. This is a time when all parents/guardians should expect to visit campus for a meeting with their child and one grade level teacher. We are excited to share that we are updating practices to keep meetings timely, to increase teacher involvement, and to launch a new biannual survey that is faster and easier to complete. Please check the blog next week for more SLC information and schedules.
Upcoming Events and Key Dates:
Campus Highlight: 12th Grade Multicultural Food Fair 2023 – Friday, September 29th
Greetings Designers and Design Families!
This week, we had our annual DVD Club Fair! On Thursday afternoon, we had over 20 DVD student-run clubs host booths at our club fair to get Design students excited about joining. This year our list of clubs included new clubs like Entrepreneur Club, Community and Crafts Club, Astronomy Club, and more!
Congratulations to our Design Ticket winners this week: Julian Saez, Elias Suazo, Hailey Perez and Anthony Orejel. This year, we started a new way of recognizing students by handing out Design Tickets! Anyone can get a design ticket by “getting caught” for being a great student: actions like leading by example, showing kindness, using appropriate language, or being helpful. At the end of each week, a few Design Ticket winners will be randomly selected to have their names read over the intercom and win a prize! We appreciate all of our students who show up every day as mindful, respectful, and responsible.
We also wanted to recognize a student for superior academic achievement: 12th grader Rufus Lapp. Rufus was named a Commended Student by the 2024 National Merit Scholarship Program. Commended Students like Rufus placed among the top 50,000 students who took the 2022 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test.
See the Bell Schedule of Week 7 here:
Upcoming Events and Key Dates:
Campus Highlight: DVD Club Fair 2023: September 21st
