Hello Rising Starrs Families
Have you had a chance to see our Dia de los Muertos altar?! This past Monday (Oct 31), we changed up our usual Halloween Carnival and threw an event to expose our youth on the traditions of Dia de los Muertos. This altar was filled with projects that our youth made to honor their friends and families. There are dolls, tissue paper flowers, and picture frames all hand-made & dedicated to celebrating our loved ones. It's been on stage all week! Check it out if you haven't had a chance to see it.
Along with the altar, we also incorporated some Halloween-themed activities. Adopting one of our activities from this year's Harvest Festival (Oct 22), we let our students do some "Pumpkin Chucking"! Students were challenged to create their own mini-catapults using limited materials (i.e. popsicle sticks, rubber bands, and masking tape). Once catapults were made, they each took turns to see who could launch a candied pumpkin the farthest--apparently 30 feet was the winner!
... and now, we're in the thick of event season for all of the holidays coming up. Here is a list of November/December events for After School & the Potrero Hill Community:
Fri, Nov 4: Literacy Day
To celebrate National Literacy Day (Nov 2), our Friday Club Day this week will be Literacy themed. There will be LOTS of activities to promote reading and comprehension--I hear there will be a Giant Boggle board and a new game called, "Double Lit Ninja" will be played.
Tue, Nov 22: After School Program's Annual THANKSGIVING POTLUCK
Every year has gotten better and better with our Thanksgiving Potluck... and when something works--you keep going! Who remembers these pictures? Be on the lookout for what your child(ren)'s group will be responsible to bring. Just put this on your family calendar now, so that you remember to send your child with something to share for this day!
Have you had a chance to see our Dia de los Muertos altar?! This past Monday (Oct 31), we changed up our usual Halloween Carnival and threw an event to expose our youth on the traditions of Dia de los Muertos. This altar was filled with projects that our youth made to honor their friends and families. There are dolls, tissue paper flowers, and picture frames all hand-made & dedicated to celebrating our loved ones. It's been on stage all week! Check it out if you haven't had a chance to see it.
Along with the altar, we also incorporated some Halloween-themed activities. Adopting one of our activities from this year's Harvest Festival (Oct 22), we let our students do some "Pumpkin Chucking"! Students were challenged to create their own mini-catapults using limited materials (i.e. popsicle sticks, rubber bands, and masking tape). Once catapults were made, they each took turns to see who could launch a candied pumpkin the farthest--apparently 30 feet was the winner!
... and now, we're in the thick of event season for all of the holidays coming up. Here is a list of November/December events for After School & the Potrero Hill Community:
Fri, Nov 4: Literacy Day
To celebrate National Literacy Day (Nov 2), our Friday Club Day this week will be Literacy themed. There will be LOTS of activities to promote reading and comprehension--I hear there will be a Giant Boggle board and a new game called, "Double Lit Ninja" will be played.
Tue, Nov 22: After School Program's Annual THANKSGIVING POTLUCK
Every year has gotten better and better with our Thanksgiving Potluck... and when something works--you keep going! Who remembers these pictures? Be on the lookout for what your child(ren)'s group will be responsible to bring. Just put this on your family calendar now, so that you remember to send your child with something to share for this day!
Tue, Nov 29: Program Fundraiser at Goat Hill Pizza
We had such a successful & delicious fundraiser last year with Goat Hill, that they've agreed to help sponsor our program once per semester! Five days after Thanksgiving, when all of your leftovers are gone--or, you are just sick of them... TAKE YOUR FRIENDS AND FAMILY TO GOAT HILL PIZZA (Potrero Hill and West Portal locations only) AND LET THEM KNOW THE STARR KING ASP SENT YOU! Our program will get a percentage of the sales from dine-in and carry-out orders who specify our program fundraiser.
Thu, Dec 1: Junior Warriors Basketball Playoff/Championship Double-Header
The Rising Starrs ASP Basketball Team is on their way to making it into the playoffs for this year's Junior Warriors League. The TOP 4 teams will be in the playoffs, and according to Coach Rainer, this year's team is very capable of making it in! Please continue to support our Team of 14 competing (& seven 2nd grade students who practice with them). We will squeeze in one more practice day per week, so that our team can be set up with the skills they need to for the playoffs. The picture on the right shows our team participating in a community Court Unveiling sponsored by the Warriors, where our team got to participate in a basketball clinic with Warriors player David West!
Wed, Dec 14: End of Semester Showcase
Be on the lookout for your family invite! Our End of Semester Celebration showcasing our students in mandarin, violin, cello, music, and 5th grade dance will be performing what they've worked so hard on this whole semester. Please mark that you'll be at the Starr King Cafeteria for this send off into winter break at 4:30pm on Dec 14.
As you can see, LOTS of opportunities to interact with and support our program are coming up. We hope to see ALL of you there!
In case you haven't had a chance to check out our Rising Starrs YMCA Communication Board, click on the Enrichment Roster page to see which enrichments your child has been participating in during After School. We can't stress enough to please make note of the Enrichments Days/Times, because we pay for each child UPFRONT to participate in enrichments. This means that when your child misses enrichments (by getting picked up early or forgets instruments or swimsuits), hard-to-get funds aren't being used to their maximum benefit.
There has also been some changes to SFUSD's insurance liability requirements, which has impacted a couple of our enrichment providers (i.e. Dance and Chess). For the 2016-17 School year, the general liability insurance coverage now requires $2,000,000 per occurrence and $4,000,000 in aggregate for Bodily Injury and Property Damage (in short, basically doubling insurance requirements). We are working with our enrichment providers to expedite the process as quickly as possible. I also want to assure you that I am working very proactively to find alternate enrichment providers who cannot meet the insurance requirements.
Thankfully, we have so many fun activities already infused within our program, that we've had a smooth year even without one day of chess and one day of dance being provided. The talent of the after school staff is DEEP, and many of them have stepped up to the plate in planning much more engaging activities to our youth.
Make it a habit to check out our community board regularly for more ASP announcements.
We had such a successful & delicious fundraiser last year with Goat Hill, that they've agreed to help sponsor our program once per semester! Five days after Thanksgiving, when all of your leftovers are gone--or, you are just sick of them... TAKE YOUR FRIENDS AND FAMILY TO GOAT HILL PIZZA (Potrero Hill and West Portal locations only) AND LET THEM KNOW THE STARR KING ASP SENT YOU! Our program will get a percentage of the sales from dine-in and carry-out orders who specify our program fundraiser.
Thu, Dec 1: Junior Warriors Basketball Playoff/Championship Double-Header
The Rising Starrs ASP Basketball Team is on their way to making it into the playoffs for this year's Junior Warriors League. The TOP 4 teams will be in the playoffs, and according to Coach Rainer, this year's team is very capable of making it in! Please continue to support our Team of 14 competing (& seven 2nd grade students who practice with them). We will squeeze in one more practice day per week, so that our team can be set up with the skills they need to for the playoffs. The picture on the right shows our team participating in a community Court Unveiling sponsored by the Warriors, where our team got to participate in a basketball clinic with Warriors player David West!
Wed, Dec 14: End of Semester Showcase
Be on the lookout for your family invite! Our End of Semester Celebration showcasing our students in mandarin, violin, cello, music, and 5th grade dance will be performing what they've worked so hard on this whole semester. Please mark that you'll be at the Starr King Cafeteria for this send off into winter break at 4:30pm on Dec 14.
As you can see, LOTS of opportunities to interact with and support our program are coming up. We hope to see ALL of you there!
In case you haven't had a chance to check out our Rising Starrs YMCA Communication Board, click on the Enrichment Roster page to see which enrichments your child has been participating in during After School. We can't stress enough to please make note of the Enrichments Days/Times, because we pay for each child UPFRONT to participate in enrichments. This means that when your child misses enrichments (by getting picked up early or forgets instruments or swimsuits), hard-to-get funds aren't being used to their maximum benefit.
There has also been some changes to SFUSD's insurance liability requirements, which has impacted a couple of our enrichment providers (i.e. Dance and Chess). For the 2016-17 School year, the general liability insurance coverage now requires $2,000,000 per occurrence and $4,000,000 in aggregate for Bodily Injury and Property Damage (in short, basically doubling insurance requirements). We are working with our enrichment providers to expedite the process as quickly as possible. I also want to assure you that I am working very proactively to find alternate enrichment providers who cannot meet the insurance requirements.
Thankfully, we have so many fun activities already infused within our program, that we've had a smooth year even without one day of chess and one day of dance being provided. The talent of the after school staff is DEEP, and many of them have stepped up to the plate in planning much more engaging activities to our youth.
Make it a habit to check out our community board regularly for more ASP announcements.