Newsletter
Welcome SGA Warriors!
We are over halfway through our summer break and already planning, in expectation, for another great school year. It is that time of the year that we welcome all of our families to the upcoming school year at Southwest Georgia Academy. For some of you, this is your first warm welcome to our school family and for many it is more of a welcome back. I speak for the entire Warrior Faculty and Staff when I say that we are grateful to have you and yours with us as we embark on the school’s 50th year of dedication to serving families through educating their children.
As usual, we have utilized the first part of the summer to enhance, market, practice, stimulate, modify and discuss a variety of areas that make up our “home away from home.” The continued heart of SGA is the most beneficial and effective piece of the puzzle so we thank you for being a tremendously large part of the family piece and for sustaining the heartbeat of the school. Your children will be joining us before we know it as we move into the 2019-2020 school year at SGA. It is my hope that SGA will serve not only as an exceptional institute of learning but as a safe haven for everyone as we come together as one big family to live, learn, and prepare our children to succeed in today’s society and world.
The following are important dates as well as information students and parents should note:
1. State law and GISA requires all students participating in athletics to have a physical (JV and varsity.)
2. We will continue to hold students to the rules and dress code stated in the school handbook. The handbook and changes will be reviewed and discussed with students August 8th. Please review the updated handbook on our website the first of August.
3. K5 orientation is Monday, August 5th in the music room at 6:30 p.m.
4. The official student’s schedule will be made available to parents as early as August 6th at the close of the PTO meeting. PTO meeting will be at 5:30 in the Joe Bryan Auditorium.
5. New family and faculty supper August 6th in the SGA cafeteria at 6:30 p.m.
6. K3/K4 orientation is Monday August 12th at 6:30.
7. Tailgate supper is Monday August 19th.
8. Chapel began four years ago and will continue this year. The last Wednesday of each month is when we gather for chapel in the Joe Bryan Auditorium at 8:40 AM. We encourage any parent to come and attend chapel with us!
9. On the first day of school, August 8th , we would like to invite all students, parents, faculty and staff to come to the flag pole outside the main building at 8 AM for prayer as we embark on the new school year.
- Miss Gibbs will speak to our students August 8th at 9:40 to talk about SGA’s 50th year.
I said this last year and I would like to reiterate the same message— effective communication is a vital component to a successful school experience. The staff at SGA wants to keep an open line of communication so please feel free to email or call or schedule a meeting or conference. In addition to these forms of communication is the alternate: the school website, Power School, Facebook and the 411 page. Last but not least, I want to extend a thank you to you, your children and the talented and dedicated staff at Southwest Georgia Academy. The support of my efforts and the success of the school could not happen without each and every one of you. Thank you for putting your trust in Southwest Georgia Academy.
May God continue to bless these last moments of summer! See you soon!
Go Warriors,
Matthew T. Dalrymple
Headmaster
PTO PRESIDENTS’ COMMENTS:
We would like to begin the 2019-20 school/PTO year by offering our thanks to Julie Ginn and Carol Sheffield, who did a great job as our PTO presidents last year. They, along with our Treasurer, Leigh Fain, have made this quite an easy role to slip into. We are thankful for their guidance and organization as we begin our journey as PTO leaders. We hold SGA near and dear to our hearts. We are blessed to have the opportunity to help SGA continue to prosper and be successful.
In order to encourage continued excellence from our PTO, a system has been implemented whereby the Presidents from the previous year serve in a mentoring/advisory role to the current year Presidents. Additionally, the Vice-Presidents will be “Presidents in Training” and will assume the role of Presidents the following year. We believe this system will allow for us to build on successes from year to year while ensuring we don’t repeat mistakes. This will also allow us to avoid having all the responsibilities heaped on just one set of parents who have agreed to serve our school in the vital role of PTO Presidents. Vice PTO Presidents for this school year remain to be determined.
We are currently working on a new Volunteer Committee. If you would like to help, please contact Rhonda Rathel at (229)254-2234. We would also like to thank all of those who have volunteered to serve as committee chairpersons and members. We will not be able to accomplish our goals without everyone pitching in and doing their part to better our school. It is with great anticipation that we look forward to working with Headmaster Matt Dalrymple, our outstanding teachers, support staff, and parents.
We are excited about what the 2019-20 school year holds for SGA! Through hard work, exceptional attitudes, unity, and everyone’s commitment, we can continue to make SGA a great school for our children. It is only through the continued work and efforts of dedicated parents, teachers, and supporters that we will build on the proud tradition of SGA. Thank you for allowing us to serve as Presidents this year!
Enjoy the final few days of summer and GO WARRIORS,
Nicole and Matthew Klesko
2018-2019 PTO officers:
- Presidents: Nicole and Matthew Klesko (229)205-7213
- Immediate Past Presidents: Julie Ginn and Carol Sheffield
- Vice-Presidents: TBD - If you are interested in filling this position, please contact Nicole Klesko.
- Treasurer/Secretary: Leigh Fain
Fund Raisers:
PTO now has five primary fundraisers: Football/ Basketball Concessions, Fall Festival, Buck Daze, Reverse Raffle, and The Big Blue. If you are interested in serving, please contact the volunteer committee or designated chairperson.
- Football Concessions: Chairperson- Dianne Johnson (229)793-2694 or (229) 400-1365
- Basketball Concessions: Chairperson- Dianne Johnson
- Fall Festival
- Buck Daze: Chairpersons- John Godwin (229)726-3147, Jay Hathorn (229)894-9262, Eric Kimbrel (229)308-7352, Steve Singletary (229)308-2040
- Reverse Raffle
- The Big Blue: Chairperson-Nicole Klesko (229) 205-7213
A strong PTO is vital to the mission of Southwest Georgia Academy. PTO provides over $128,000.00 to support the activities of our school, including: technology, books, supplies, maintenance, janitorial supplies, teacher pre/post planning meals, teacher appreciation, new family supper, literary, academic breakfast, library supplies, Accelerated Reader materials, and PE equipment. The list goes on! It is essential that we all work together to raise these important funds in order to enhance and elevate our children’s experience at SGA.
In addition to activities at school there are other programs that we encourage you to participate in, these include:
- Box Tops for Education: www.boxtops4education.com clip your box tops and send them to school, or to Mischa Smith (229)308-0759
- COKE Rewards: www.mycokerewards.com/schools login or register if you are not already a member. Enter your codes to collect points. Search for Southwest Georgia Academy and enter the points you want to donate! Please do not send these to school. You can create an account and donate them to SGA.
- Shoparoo App: You will need to download the Shoparoo Fundraising app on your phone or device, register for an account, and choose Southwest Georgia Academy as your school. Receipts are loaded into the app simply by taking a picture. Each receipt earns points/money for our school. This is money you’ve already spent, so it’s an easy way to raise extra funds for SGA.
These programs benefit our school tremendously by helping us to order school supplies and office supplies for the year; however, they require everyone’s participation.
Clean Up Day:
We have decided not to have an official campus clean-up day. We have identified several areas that need to be addressed though, like pressure washing jobs, spraying round up, and re-painting the parking lot lines. If you would be willing to help with any of these jobs, please contact us at 229-205-7213 so that we can get these needs met. Any of these jobs can be done at your convenience.
Concession Sign-up/Parent Volunteerism:
In order for SGA to be successful, we must have the active participation of all our parents. Parents certainly should be actively involved in the lives of their children, but we must also have all parents contributing to the success of our school. Part of this responsibility is the requirement of all parents to work at a football or basketball concession/cleanup or at the annual Buck Daze fundraiser in December. Dianne Johnson, (229)793-2694, has graciously agreed to coordinate concessions and sign-ups for us. When you registered your student for the upcoming academic year, you were given the option of “opting out” of this requirement by paying $200/parent. If you did not “opt out” the expectation is that you will work at least one event. The first opportunity to sign up will be at the initial PTO meeting on August 6th at 5:30 PM. Thereafter, the sign-up book will be maintained by Leigh Fain and available to all parents in the front office. All parents will be expected to sign up by Friday, August 30th. If you have not signed up by this date, then you will be assigned an event to work and you will be notified. Choosing not to work, or being a no-show, will result in a $500.00 fine per parent ($1000.00 per family). Administration has informed us that any outstanding debt to PTO (as a result of not having met your work requirement) will be reason to disallow your student from sitting for their final exams. Should you not be able to work your assigned time, it is YOUR responsibility to find your replacement and then sign up for another time slot.
In an effort to encourage a culture of volunteerism, we are implementing some “rewards” for parents who choose to give of their time and efforts above and beyond the minimum required. The incentives are as follows:
(1) Working on a clean-up project for the school = Free admission to the first two (2) home football games.*
(2) Signing up to work ten (10) events = All sports admission pass (good for free admission to all sporting events on campus for the entire school year)*
* Per person per event worked
We also will be recognizing the “Warrior Volunteer” Individual/Family of the year at the PTO sponsored year-end teacher’s banquet.
Grandparents Club
SGA Grands had a great 2018-2019 school year and are looking forward to an even better 2019-2020 school year. We meet in our Little Red School once a month to plan what we can do for our grandchildren to make their time at school more enjoyable. We would love for all grandparents to attend our meeting but understand that some are unable to do so. Grandparents can still support our work at the school by paying their yearly dues. Our yearly dues are $30.00 per family, and we also gladly accept any donations. All monies collected from dues and donations go back into the school.
At the beginning of the school year, your child’s teacher will send a sheet asking for the grandparents’ information. If possible, supply an email address with this information. We would like to start emailing rather than calling when we are working on a project. It is very important for parents to return this sheet to the school. With this information, we can send out membership letters.
Hurricane Michael hit SGA hard and did serious damage to our school. Several Grands helped with the campus cleanup and replaced fans under the shelter on the playground. We also donated to the Jr. Beta Club for the Alabama tornado victims. One major project of ours was the beautiful new “Cafeteria” sign. Some other projects include maintaining the butterfly garden, donating to the school website charges, providing lunch at McDonalds for Accelerated Reader winners, hosting a Christmas brunch for faculty and staff, and playing Santa by giving all students and faculty a Christmas goody. Our kids always love the lemonade stand we have each May. It is a fun time for both the kids and the Grands. Money was donated to help with the air conditioning of the gym, to the Ted Bush Baseball Field sign, and to the Literary and Art fund. As you can see, we spend your dues and donations for the betterment of SGA.
Grand members, Karen Tabb, Mary Jean Cooper, Jo Davis, and Jo Mock, will serve on the 50 Year Celebration of SGA committee. We hope to see as many grandparents, as possible, at the flag pole on the first day of school to help celebrate this milestone.
We may be “Old Warriors,” but we love to support our school and our grandchildren. Please encourage the grandparents in our family to join us.
GO WARRIORS!
Jo Mock, President 2019-2020
Mary Jean Cooper Co-President 2019-2020
Fall Festival News
To SGA parents and teachers,
We have a proposed date of October 24th for this year’s Fall Festival. The usual process of getting things set up is for each homeroom to have a parent that oversees the class’ booth. That parent/chairperson is responsible for organizing the parents in the class (which includes setting up a booth, preparing a parent work schedule for that booth, and taking the booth down at the end of the evening). Like last year, instead of the Fall Festival committee assigning booths, we’d like for each class to create their own booth (with the exception of K3, K4, K5, 11th and 12th grades, which will be assigned a booth).All homerooms must have a chairperson whether it be someone that has volunteered or one that is teacher appointed. To increase SGA’s profit from this fundraiser, we will be renting a minimal number of inflatables this year. We ask that teachers work with their chairperson to decide on a booth and for them to submit their booth idea to the office by September 5th to allow the committee time to review booth ideas to ensure there are no repetitions.
Subscribe to the Warriors Word
Have the student newspaper delivered to your house for $10/year. Send a check or cash to:
SGA Warrior’s Word
14105 GA HWY 200
Damascus, GA 39841
Students, staff, and advertisers receive a free copy each month.
Lunchroom Information
I would like to say thank you to everyone that supported the lunchroom last year. We will continue to strive to provide the best possible meals for the lowest possible price. Lunch and breakfast prices will remain the same for the 2019-2020 school year. Lunch is $3.50 (includes milk or juice) & breakfast is $1.25 (does not include milk or juice). We are always looking for ways to improve. If you have any ideas, please do not hesitate to call 725-1888.
Thanks,
Teresa Tedder
Lunchroom Supervisor
Substitutes Needed
If you would like to be added to our substitute list for the 2019-2020 school year, please call Miss Leigh in the school office at 725-4792.
Asbestos Information
REQUIRED ANNUAL NOTIFICATION OF PARENTS, TEACHERS, AND EMPLOYEES REGARDING THE AVAILABILITY OF MANAGEMENTS PLANS. The management plan for asbestos containing building materials (ACBM) required by the Federal Asbestos Hazard Emergency Response Act (AHERA) has been performed for this facility. The management plan is on file at the school office and is available for public inspection upon reasonable notice. If desired, a copy of the plan may be obtained upon payment of a reasonable reproduction cost. Copies of this dated notification shall be distributed to the organizations of parents, teachers, and employees: or in the absence of such organizations, the notification shall be distributed to the individual parents, teachers, and employees. A copy shall also be placed in the schools management plan. Distribution shall be by MAIL.
School Supply List (Please label your child’s things with a permanent marker)
1st Grade- 2 packs of #2 pencils, pack of basic colors long twistable crayons, 1 pk. of colored pencils(basic colors), 4 glue sticks, scissors, 1 plastic folder with 2 inside pockets, book bag, ruler with cm and inches(no slap bracelet rulers), 1 large box of Kleenex, 1 folder with brads, 1- 1” view binder, 10 plastic sheet protector sleeves, art bag with long ties (approx. 13l x 15w), 1 Clorox wipe container, 1 unscented hand sanitizer bottle, book bag
2nd Grade- 1 box of 24 twistables or crayons, 3 glue sticks, scissors, 2 folders with 2 inside pockets, book bag, 3 single subject spiral composition, 2 packs #2 pencils (no mechanical pencils), 2 packs of wide ruled paper, 2 large boxes of tissues, a large bottle of Germ-X original hand sanitizer, large box of unscented baby wipes, 1 large container of Lysol wipes, 2-4 expo markers and 1 sock or eraser, girls -1 box of Band-Aids, boys -1 box of quart Ziploc bags, art bag with long ties
3rd Grade- book bag large enough to hold a 1 inch binder and textbooks (no rolling), 1-1”clear-view binders, 1 pack of wide colored dry erase markers, 2 boxes #2 or mechanical lead pencils(can be retractable), 2 pairs of Fiskars scissors, 2 packs 24 ct Crayola twistables, 2 packs of colored pencils, 1 pack of 5 dividers (for 1 inch binder), 2 packs of wide ruled notebook paper, 2 packs of 3x5 index cards, 2 plastic pocket folders (any color), 1 red plastic pocket folder, 4-5 glue sticks, 2 large boxes of Kleenex, 2 plastic pencil boxes (approx. 8”x5”), 1 container disinfectant wipes, 10 clear sheet protectors, 1 12” hard or plastic ruler, 1 pkg. asst. colored copy paper, 1 composition book (with center-sewn stitching), boys - 1 lysol disinfectant spray, 1 box quart Ziploc bags, girls - 1 large box band aids, 1 box gallon Ziploc bags
***this list includes supplies needed for art
4th Grade- 1-1” clear view binder, 1 pack of dividers, 2 pocket folders with no brads, 2 pocket folders with brads, 4 spiral notebooks with pockets, #2 pencils, 1 pack of blue pens, 1 pack of highlighters, 1 pack of expo markers and eraser or sock, 2 black sharpies, 1 pencil pouch, 1 pack of (crayons, markers, or colored pencils), 2 large glue sticks, 1 pack of 3x5 index cards, 1 ruler with cm and inches, 1 pack of wide ruled paper, 1 large container of Clorox type wipes, 1 large boxes of tissues, 1 box of any size Ziploc storage bags, 1 hand held pencil sharpener, 1 large bottle of Elmer’s glue, 1 package of colored copy paper, 1 25pk sheet protectors, 1 pair Fiskars type scissors
5th Grade- pencils, 2 pens, 1 pack of wide ruled paper, color crayons, markers, scissors, liquid Elmer’s glue, 2 plastic folders with pockets, 2 inch binder, 2 packs of index cards, 4 dry erase markers, 1 old sock, 2 boxes of wipes, 3 boxes of Kleenex, 5 subject notebook, 1 pack of colored copy paper, 2 yellow highlighters, 5 dividers, 1 box of quart size Ziploc bags, 2 book covers, girls – 1 bottle of hand sanitizer, boys – 1 container of Lysol spray
***Please remember that 4th and 5th graders have to follow dress code. Please consult the SGA Handbook before shopping for school clothes***
Art Supplies Needed for Grades K5-4th: Small art box to store in the art room, colored pencils (3rd and 4th grade only), 24 count crayons (not washable), Fiskars scissors, pencils, glue sticks
ALL ALGEBRA I AND GEOMETRY STUDENTS- TI-30XS Calculator (on Amazon for $14.97)
ALL ALGEBRA II STUDENTS- TI 84 Plus Calculator
*Teachers will give students a supply list for classes not listed in the in the newsletter on the first day of school. Students will be allowed time to purchase necessary items.