The South Abington Elementary School PTA wants to help parents and teachers encourage student participation in the National PTA Reflections program which promotes inclusion of the arts in education. For the 2016-2017 school year, students will have an opportunity to explore the theme, "What Is Your Story?" and to submit their original works of art in the areas of literature, film production, dance
choreography, photography, visual arts, or music composition. Click here to read the Reflections Toolkit and to register for the free webinar: http://www.pta.org/reflectionstoolkit
2) Make note of the name of Nellie Connolly of Carbondale, PA, and of her email address:
[email protected] She is the regional rep for our area and the number one go-to person for everything from "I have no idea what I'm doing," to "Please let me know if I am understanding this correctly." She is a PTA Reflections veteran and is anxious to help you run this program well. She will also redirect you to the right person if you happen to contact her regarding something she doesn't know.
3) Do contact Nellie about the possibility of connecting South Abington Elementary to Newton-Ransom, Clarks Summit Elementary, Waverly Elementary and the Abington Heights Middle School in order to form what the Reflections program refers to as a "Council." We found out at the end of 2015-16 school year that our kids' projects would be more easily judged and that greater numbers of SAE students would move on to Regional/State/National competition if SAE were part of a Council. You would likely need to do this ASAP--certainly before the school year actually begins.
4) Understand that the general Reflections information on the PTA website sometimes uses what I think is conflicting/confusing language to describe the different stages of the Reflections program. Last year, for instance, "Kickoff Day" (or whatever synonymous name they called it) was actually the day by which all student entries had to be collected, judged, categorized, logged, packed, and delivered to Regionals or stored if they didn't make it to Regionals. I just kept checking with Nellie to be sure I wasn't misunderstanding anything or missing a deadline.
5) I read on the PTA Reflections site that they are changing how and when they do the Reflections Awards ceremonies for the 2016-17 school year. This is where we fell apart last year because Reflections notified the students of their invitation to the ceremony, but not the school or the Reflections chair. We later learned that some never received their invitation and various other mishaps that were too late to fix when we found out about them. Again, keep in close contact with Nellie about this once SAE students' entries move from local to Regional....that would be from early/mid-October and onward.
6) You are welcome to use whatever judges you choose, but if you're curious as to who we used last year, they were:
Rich Banick (Professional Photographer) - 2d and 3d Visual Arts (He did the judging at school on Picture Day last year--Contact at [email protected])
Kim Gromacki (Professional Piano Teacher)- Music Composition (Contact at https://www.facebook.com/kim.gromacki?fref=ts)
Rebecca Loescher (Local Children's Book Author) - Literature (Contact at [email protected])
Joan Manze (Owner, Joan's Dance Studio) - Dance Choreography (Contact at 206 Depot St., Clarks Summit, 206 Depot Street, Clarks Summit, PA 18411-1860. 570-586-4322. *FYI - Joan is elderly and does not use technology of any kind. You'll need to take entries to her on your own device in order for her to see and judge them. She has taught dance in the Abingtons for about 47 years.)
7) We had no entries and therefore no judge for film/video production. One last thing - My two regrets:
1) That I didn't plan the end-of-year Reflections Assembly earlier. (Should be planned by mid-March at the latest).
2) That I didn't so overwhelm my own child (who loves the arts) with Reflections busyness as to cause her to not enter her project in the program last year. So although she was a great help to me in getting it all done, the only year my daughter did not actually submit a Reflections entry was the year I chaired the program. Think about that.
