POINTS OF PRIDE

Forest Park MS

1st Point of Pride: The Helen Ruffin Reading Bowl

 Students were challenged with reading one or more of the 10 designated by the state of Georgia for the Georgia Children’s Book Award. The students compete against other CCPS middle school teams to answer questions about the 10 books. This year FPMS placed 2nd out of all CCPS middle school teams and then competed against other metro Atlanta teams at the region level.  This was the first time ever that our team had achieved at such a high level.

Explanation of the impact it is having within the school: This program and this accomplishment has helped to highlight and promote improved literacy so as to improve students’ reading performance on the GMAS.

2nd Point of Pride: Georgia Studies History Bowl

Description of the initiative or special recognition:  A team of 8th grade students competed against other CCPS middle school teams in the first annual Georgia Studies History Bowl.  Our team scored 1st place.

Explanation of the impact it is having within the school:  This performance helped to bolster school pride.  Additionally, these students showed an improved academic performance on the end-of-year GMAS. 

3rd Point of Pride: Hear Our Voices Written Competition

Description of the initiative or special recognition: This is a district written competition among all middle schools.  We had 8th graders to place in the top 3 of the essay, narrative, and poetry categories.

Explanation of the impact it is having within the school:This program and this accomplishment has helped to highlight and promote improved literacy so as to improve students’ writing performance on the GMAS.

4th Point of Pride: Mentoring Partnerships

Description of the initiative or special recognition: We have partnered with several different mentoring organizations, such as the Jasmine House; Girls, Inc.; 100 Black Men of Atlanta; Dominique Stokes and the TRIO program to meet the social-emotional learning needs of our students.

Explanation of the impact it is having within the school:  These partnerships helped us to better address the unique needs of certain groups of students.  This helped to improve their self-esteem, grades, and school attendance.  Overall, these mentoring programs also help to improve our school climate.

5th Point of Pride: District Spanish Spelling Bee

Description of the initiative or special recognition: Our students participated in the district Spanish Spelling Bee.  One student was named the runner-up.

Explanation of the impact it is having within the school:  Our student success in this event helped to promote the importance of studying world languages; grow our Spanish education program; increase our school cultural responsiveness and diversity; and improve our students’ readiness for high school where successfully completing two years of a world language is required.