Da Vinci Design

Greetings Designers and Design Families!

We are wrapping up a fantastic and fun week at DVD! We handed out roses to each student on Valentine’s Day, we showed out with our Spirit Week dress up days, and we culminated it all with an amazing community dialogue assembly celebrating Black History Month. CD, hosted by our awesome Black Student Union and their advisors, had the whole school community sharing in the joy as we had games, dancing, awards, and even a Soul Train style fashion show, all backed by a live DJ. See below for photos!

Next week, we have a short schedule due to the President’s Day holiday. See the Week 24 schedule here:

Key Dates and Upcoming Events:

• Monday, February 20th: NO SCHOOL – President’s Day Holiday
• Wednesday, February 22nd @4:30pm: School Site Council Meeting #4
  • Zoom Link: https://zoom.us/j/96326418680
  • Agenda: 1) EL / Title 1 Updates, 2) School Stakeholder Survey Review pt. 2, 3) CCSPP Community Schools Grant Wish List
• Wednesday, March 1st: Coffee w/ Admin Parent Session
  • Agenda: Fentanyl & Youth Drug Abuse Resources
  • (Two Sessions: 8am & 5pm, via Zoom – all parents welcome!)
• Week 27 (3/13 – 3/16): Student Led Conferences (minimum days)
• Friday, March 17th: NO SCHOOL – Staff Development

Week 23 Highlights: Black History Month CD & Valentine’s Day Rose Welcome

Greetings Designers and Design Families,

The classroom highlight from this week might make you hungry! Today, our 9th graders got to go on a walking field trip to Del Aire park and celebrate the kick off for their Spring  exhibition projects by visiting some food trucks. For this upcoming project, students will model their ideal food truck and even conceptualize what recipes they would put on the menu. They got to spend the day outside at the park, sampling some of the food, hearing directly from food truck owners, and brainstorming what their food truck might be like. See photos below!

Next week is Spirit Week! See below for the spirit week days, and the Week 23 Bell Schedule:

Key Dates and Upcoming Events:

• Week 23 (2/13 – 2/17): !Spirit Week!
  • Mon, 2/13: Pajama Day
  • Tues, 2/14: Valentine’s Day Monochrome
  • Wed, 2/15: Despicable Me
  • Thurs, 2/16: Sports Day
  • Fri, 2/17: Black Out Friday
• Friday, February 17th: Black History Month Community Dialogue
• Monday, February 20th: NO SCHOOL – President’s Day Holiday
• Week 27 (3/13 – 3/16): Student Led Conferences (minimum days)
• Friday, March 17th: NO SCHOOL – Staff Development

Week 22 Highlight: 9th Grade Food Truck Field Trip

Dear Parents/Guardians and Students of the Class of 2023,

We’d like to inform you about an exciting opportunity for the senior class.  Your student will be a part of the next class of Da Vinci graduates to experience Senior Projects.  This student-driven project will give Da Vinci Designers the opportunity to explore a project topic of their choosing, and each student will design a project meant to address a need of the Da Vinci Schools or of our local community. Working in a group, students will collect research, take action through fieldwork and consult with experts or target groups off campus.  Each group will be assigned an advisor to guide them through the project design process, and through a series of POLs. The project will culminate in an exhibition with students explaining their research and solutions that they have created in response to their topic.

To learn more about the Senior Project process, you can access the full letter shared with students here: Senior Project Family Letter

Greetings Designers and Design Families,

Happy February! We are kicking this month off with multiple celebrations.

First, we started this week celebrating Black History Month! Students from our BSU started a month long celebration by decorating the atrium staircase at DVD. They are also working on a collaborative mural that will be displayed on the first floor. And, they are hard at work preparing for our annual Black History Month community dialogue assembly. We look forward to recognizing the achievements of Black Americans this month in our classes and curriculum, too.

Next week, we are celebrating National School Counseling Week! Not only is this an opportunity for us to celebrate our amazing school counseling team, but it is also an opportunity to engage our students in a week of activities focused on promoting mental health, college readiness, and socioemotional learning. Take advantage of the spirit of recognizing the importance of school counseling this week, and consider sending a message of support or gratitude to our great team of counselors!

See the Week 22 Bell Schedule below, as well as a progress report update, important Senior updates, and upcoming events:

Academic Progress Report: Grades Updated Today via PowerSchool

Parent/Guardians: Friday, 2/3 is the first “Progress Report” grade update for semester 2. What that means is that during staff development today, teachers for all core classes have updated the “Final Grade” for students in both Canvas and PowerSchool. We encourage all parents/guardians to log in to PowerSchool to see your student’s current academic progress. If there are questions about your student’s progress, please encourage your student to connect with their teachers before/after classes, or you may always reach out directly to teachers with an email.

To log in to PowerSchool: See the link under the Resources section on the blog. And, if you have trouble accessing PowerSchool or Canvas, please reach out to the Front Office at DVD.

Senior Activities Updates:

Attention 12th Grade Students and Families: As we near the end of your final semester with us at Da Vinci Design, we look forward to celebrating you with so many great events! Dates for Graduation ceremony, Prom, and Disneyland Grad Nite can be found at the link below!

In the past week, the Senior teaching team has handed out both a Senior Activities overview, as well as a Senior Contract which reiterates important academic and behavior reminders for Seniors.

Seniors should have shared both the contract and the info sheet with you – see here for a digital copy of the activities sheet.

• DVD Senior Activities Info Sheet 2023

Do you have questions about any of these events? Please reach out to the contact person listed for each Senior activity or event on the Senior Activities info page.

Key Dates and Upcoming Events:

• Week 23 (2/13 – 2/17): !Spirit Week! *Details coming soon*
• Friday, February 17th: Black History Month Community Dialogue
• Monday, February 20th: NO SCHOOL – President’s Day Holiday
• Week 27 (3/13 – 3/16): Student Led Conferences (minimum days)
• Friday, March 17th: NO SCHOOL – Staff Development

Greetings Designers and Design Families,

This week, we got back to our new normal for this semester as students started attending their new seminars for the Spring semester. Students this semester will engage in a whole range of fun, fitness and academic seminars: from puppet making and ceramics in the Fab Lab, to weightlifting in the CrossFit box, and even using fondant and icing to craft food sculptures in a student-led seminar called “Fakery”!

Speaking of great opportunities for students, we wanted to shout out the great internship and scholarship opportunities announced regularly by our Director of Real World Learning. Keep you eyes open for regular posts to the DVD blog here for our Real World Learning updates and announcements. On this week’s blog post, there is mention of so much great stuff, including a internship-scholarship opportunities through Warner Bros., summer programs at FIDM, and opportunities for students interested it STEM.

See below for the Week 21 bell schedule:

Key Dates and Upcoming Events:

• Wednesday, February 1st: Coffee w/ Admin Parent Session
      (Two Sessions: 8am & 5pm, via Zoom – all parents welcome!)
• Friday, February 3rd: NO SCHOOL – Staff Development Day
• Monday, February 20th: NO SCHOOL – President’s Day Holiday

Greetings Designers and Design Families!

We are back! It was great to be back with students this week, and teachers wasted no time in getting right to work doing amazing project based learning with our students: Grade 9 started laying the ground work for a food-focused Exhibition project, graphic design students started to stretch their legs in Photoshop, and English 11 students did mini-presentations on songs that shaped them in the year 2022.

Last week, the Da Vinci Design staff had a special opportunity to spend the day on-site with industry partner RIOS! RIOS is a local architecture and design firm that hosted the DVD staff for a day of learning about real world design practices, connecting with design professionals, and working with their grade level teams to plan authentic projects for the semester. DVD staff then had the opportunity the next day to pitch project ideas to feedback panels with industry partners, too. Our teachers and faculty are hard at work preparing amazing, real-world projects for our students! See below for a few photos from our field trip to RIOS.

Next week, we have a special schedule thanks to the holiday on Monday, 1/16, in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. We hope that students and families are able to rest and reflect on this day in honor of MLK’s important message and legacy of civil rights and social justice.

Key Dates and Upcoming Events:

• Monday, January 16th: NO SCHOOL – Martin Luther King Jr Holiday
• Wednesday, January 18th @4:30pm: School Site Council Meeting #3
  • Zoom Link: https://zoom.us/j/95810863962
  • Agenda: 1) School Updates, 2) School Stakeholder Survey Review
• Wednesday, February 1st: Coffee w/ Admin Parent Session
      (Two Sessions: 8am & 5pm, via Zoom – all parents welcome!)
• Friday, February 3rd: NO SCHOOL – Staff Development Day

DVD Highlight: Staff Field Trip to RIOS