Academic Life, VP Letters

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Welcome to the season of Advent. This time of year in the life of a Catholic school is full of expectation in many ways: as we wait for the “coming” and celebration of the nativity and welcome the new liturgical year, we simultaneously are moving towards the end of our first semester and of 2021. There is a natural tension, then, between the “pause” that Advent encourages and the “rush” that the end of the year asks of us. Multiple members of the Diocese, of the SFNO Christian Brothers’ District, and our very own Mr. Holquin have all shared wonderful reflections on the possibilities provided during the Advent season. This past Sunday, Mr. Holquin shared with all faculty and staff the following thoughts: 

“We’re given the next four weeks in Advent to prepare for Emmanuel’s incarnation and especially amidst that crazy pace of school, we are each encouraged to pause in prayer to reflect deeply  on what we do to make Christ’s birth new again. Sunday’s Gospel reading from Luke tells us to ‘Beware that your hearts do not become drowsy from...the anxieties of daily life…[and] be vigilant at all times and pray that you have the strength…’ Pope Francis encourages us to use these weeks and especially prayer to focus on Christ’s coming knowing that we can’t rush it.”

As we embrace the call to “pause and pray” even in the midst of secular demands, I want to thank your sons and your families for being on this spiritual and educational journey with DLSHS. 

As always, the campus has been filled with multiple academic and co-curricular activities that embody sacrifice, service, collaboration, and inspiration:

• On November 2, the Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors adopted a resolution recognizing De La Salle High School for its continued efforts in community outreach during the 2020-21 school year and their national recognition by Multiplying Good last month. The Student in Action Club, in collaboration with the multiple service learning activities and student leadership, continue to contribute tens of thousands of service hours and to raise thousands of dollars to help the community on and outside of Winton Drive. Thank you to our students for living the gospel everyday!

• The week of November 7 marked the National Vocation Awareness Week, and it culminated in a lunch with students and visiting Christian Brothers coordinated by Br. Carter Powers and Mr. Andrew Berkes.

• November 14 witnessed both the Junior Mass of Unity and last day of DLS/CHS fall production, Puffs. 

• On November 17, the school launched the annual Toy Drive, which will run through December 16. The agencies that benefit from this year’s De La Salle Toy Drive include the Bay Area Crisis Nursery, Oakland Catholic Worker, Running with Love, the De La Salle Academy, and the Monument Crisis Center. 

• November is a popular month for our Biology field trips, and we are so happy to resume them more fully this year! On November 6, 48 DLS Honors Biology students, along with their teacher Mrs. Howett, completed restoration work as part of a Conservation Collaboration Agreement with Save Mount Diablo. The trip also included a field ecology class and a “solo in nature” adventure. On November 17, over 100 sophomore DLS students visited the Fitzgerald Marine Reserve to do a qualitative and quantitative field study, focusing on zoology, ecology, natural selection, animal behavior, and climate change. Thanks to their teacher, the indomitable Mrs. Acquistapace, and volunteers Mr. Norris and Mrs. Coblentz.

• Tuesday and Wednesday all of our sophomore students in Religious Studies 2 participated in our Sophomore Immersion Program, which we now host on campus because of COVID restrictions. Students participated in a poverty simulation and packed food for food insecure families across Contra Costa County with the help of partner Generation Alive. 

• On Wednesday, our entire faculty and staff met in the Theater to vote on our growth areas for our 2021-2022 Accreditation! The work continues, and it is exciting to envision new possibilities for our school! More to come, as always. And in the meantime, thanks to Dr. Elizabeth Berkes and Ms. Lillian Dickson and all domain chairs who have worked overtime to make this all happen.

• I would be remiss if I did not share the fun and creativity that continues to happen in our classrooms: on Monday, December 6, the annual Physics Boat Races return!! We cannot wait. Last week, I visited Mr. Thompson’s “Engineering, Architecture, Drafting, and Design” to see student progress on their mechanical toys unit. Take a look!

As we approach the end of semester 1, take a look at the schedule for our final exams, from 12/14-12/16. 

As always, we thank you for the gift of your sons and for your partnership. Have a blessed Advent.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

October 7, 2021

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

We continue to have so much to celebrate in terms of our student accomplishments and leadership.

• In case you missed it, one of the early highlights of this academic school year for me was watching the DLS Marching Band play “Freebird” during the halftime for our Homecoming game, with senior Marco Stassi as the lead guitarist. Halftime also included the honoring of our senior students who made up the DLS Homecoming court: Griffin Lee, Colin Sweeney, Jack Hoover, Jay Hawkins, Nathan Vanderklugt, Malcolm Caminero, and Marco Stassi.

• On 9/28, De La Salle High School’s Students in Action team was announced as Multiplying Good’s National Student Choice Winner. During the 2020-21 school year, De La Salle students completed more than 49,000 hours of community service and raised more than $30,000 to support local community organizations. Click here to review the interactive ThingLink presentation page that outlines the numerous charitable programs put on by De La Salle students this past school year and here to watch De La Salle Students in Action Student Choice video. 

• Please join me in congratulating the students recognized by the National Merit Scholarship Program. On 9/15, the following students were named Semifinalists for the 2022 competition: Michael Kostolansky, Marcel Latasa, and Samuel Pickett. Last week, six Spartans were named Commended Students: Trey Johnson, Cameron Keith, Max Koerner, Cameron Meyer, Zane Mogannam, and Jackson Snodgress. 

• The 2021 Cereal Drive ends on Friday, October 8th, the class competitions have been fierce, and we look forward to loading the thousands of boxes of cereal into parent volunteer cars next Thursday to donate to the Monument Crisis Center! Thank you to such a giving community.

• It is a daily joy to continue to watch our students learn and witness our teachers educate, love, and instruct. Included is a picture from Mrs. Rickett’s “Fundamental of Arts” class in which students have been doing “site drawing” for over a week, using the Hofmann Center as inspiration. Last week, I had the great pleasure of watching the bridge project in Mr. Kelly’s physics class, and the week before that, witnessing our sophomores in Mrs. Coblentz’s class compete in a “Wingman” seminar about the unit on Ender’s Game.

Looking forward, do not forget to be on the lookout for the opening of Company’s PUFFS in November. Also, the Theatre Company will be collecting new pairs of socks to donate to St. Anthony’s Foundation in honor of the house elves. This service learning project is aptly titled “Free the House Elves,” and the donation bin will be in the theatre lobby before and during shows.

As always, we thank you for the gift of your sons and for your partnership.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

June 3, 2021

Yesterday I received a beautiful message from Mr. Mike Daniels, who is the Lasallian District of San Francisco New Orleans Office of Education Director. In it, he called our attention to this recent Lasallian Reflection:

“Our shared miracle stories remind us that ours is a living tradition that continues to call us into a courageous and creative future.”

As we celebrate the end of the 2020-2021 school year, I cannot help but think of the communal miracle of courage, persistence, and creativity our students have shared. Thank you for joining us on this incredible and daunting journey. We are so grateful for the ways that our Lasallian mission and our faith have sustained us in this moment.

The end of this school year ushered in much to make us grateful as a school community. 

• On Friday, May 14, De La Salle High School was announced as the Ambassador School for Students in Action for the San Francisco Bay Area. De La Salle graduating senior JT Baird ‘21, who is a member of the school’s Service Leadership class, joined an Instagram Live broadcast to represent the school as the regional winner of this award was announced. The De La Salle Students In Action Club started 13 years ago with the mission to help De La Salle students and the surrounding community get involved in community service. De La Salle students have completed more than 500,000 volunteer service hours, impacting more than 50,000 people, and have raised more than $150,000 since the program began. Please join me in celebrating both the students and their faculty mentors, Dr. Elizabeth and Mr. Andrew Berkes, for their amazing contributions to our community.
• We celebrated our  Baccalaureate Liturgy on May 21st as well as the full graduation of the class of 2021 on May 23rd, which can both be found in their entirety on our graduation webpage. Our SENIOR AWARDS, which for the first time were all given at graduation, can be found here. 
• On May 26, 2021, De La Salle held its annual Academic Awards night in the Quad to celebrate the classes of 2022, 2023, and 2024 for their hard work and dedication. 
• On Friday, May 28, our first cohort of teachers who finished their individual training with our Educational Technology partner Knowing Technologies offered a wonderful share-out, so we could all learn from the best practices they adopted during the pandemic. In addition, we had a beautiful prayer lunch to honor our retiring Lallians, men and women who together have dedicated their lives, compassion, and wisdom to De La Salle for over a century. Once again, we will miss deeply Mrs. Sherry Bedford, Mr. Matt Castello, Mr. Mark DeMarco, Mr. Bob Ladouceur, and Mr. Bob Zorad.
• Even as we say goodbye, we are delighted to welcome to the 2021-2022 De La Salle community our new faculty hires: Mrs. Kristin Lamble (Social Studies), Mr. Roberto Martinez (Bishop John S. Cummins Student Support Coordinator), Mr. Carter Powers (Religious Studies), and Mr. DJ Vierra (HPER). Additionally, Mr. David Holquin, our incoming President, starts in July, and Mrs. Bonnie Seck will be starting this summer as our new Receptionist.

Important Information for Next Academic Year
We want to make sure you read the April 29th message from the President’s Cabinet announcing jointly with Carondelet that we plan on being back in school full time, five days a week for all students. There will be no virtual class options for next year, as students will be expected to be on campus every day.

To that end, we released next year’s De La Salle/Carondelet joint BELL SCHEDULE on Wednesday on Schoology for our students to see. Here are some of the highlights:

• Return to five days a week of academic instruction.
• Mondays are Periods 0-7 with Tuesday through Friday being alternating 80-minute blocks called A Day: Periods 0-1-2-3-7 & B Day: Periods 0-4-5-6, similar to this year.
• Flex Wednesdays go away, but on some Wednesdays (approx. twice a month), we will have integrated Community Time connected to either 5th or 6th periods.
  • During Community Time, we will have check-ins, discussions, and chances for students to connect with one another on a variety of topics.
  • Some Community Time will be dedicated to Liturgies/prayer services or assemblies and rallies (there are special schedules connected to those days)
• We will also have some Wednesdays designated as Late Start days with school starting at 9:30am (4th period).
• On Fridays, following 6th period will be X-Block. X-Block will be dedicated to academic and co-curricular time where students may meet with teachers/counselors, do makeup testing, meet with a club/organization, work on a project or homework. For some students, the school may mandate academic support during X-Block.
• Short, four-day weeks (holidays, professional development days) will only have A/B-Days, no 0-7 days.
• As we emerge from our collective Covid-19 experience, we continue to be grateful for the miracle of this community. We will continue to work closely with our partners at Carondelet to refine what next year looks like. And more than anything, we are so excited to see everyone back on campus in the fall.

As a final reminder, be on the lookout for the SUMMER CHECKLIST, which will go live at the beginning of July.

We hope that you and your family enjoy a restful, safe, and restorative summer.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

Mary 6, 2021

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Teacher/Staff Appreciation
This year, like last year, the May Spotlight letter is being sent out during Teacher/Staff  Appreciation week. We have decided to honor our teachers and staff next week, which is the last week of classes for our seniors (May 10th-14th). Please join me in celebrating the resilience, adaptability, care, compassion, and competence of all our faculty and staff. We say this often because it is so true: our educators give life to the Lasallian charism, and they make our mission possible. Our students and our amazing Parents’ Association will use multiple creative ways to express their gratitude to our faculty, staff, and administrators, so thank you all!

Updates
Please join me in congratulating sophomore David Wright, who placed third in the 70th Annual California State Science fair for his work on “Radiotrophic Fungi: Benefitting from Exposure to Ionizing Radiation.” If you happen to be in the front office on school business, take a look at the display case which highlights the impressive student work for this year’s science fair. In addition, two juniors--Pierre Jolin and Samuel Pickett--have advanced from the County to State level competition for their projects for National History Day. The requirements for participation in National History Day, like those for the science fair, are quite rigorous; students choose a research topic based upon their interests, write a thesis, and then spend four months engaging in in-depth research and historical argumentation to prove their historical thesis. We wish both Spartans the best of luck in the next round!

On May 3rd, we held our induction for our newest National Honor Society members, and we welcomed last year’s inductees to stand with and be welcomed in person! Mr. Norfolk and student officers Antonio Crivello, Luke Anderson, Angelo Grajeda, and Marcus Stich all gave short and moving reflections. Mr. Norfolk shared: “Our NHS members are self visionaries all while staying selfless during the most difficult times. You continue to give your time and positive energy to the community … Your deep love for others is special. This can’t be taught. Thank you for being incredible ambassadors to DLS.” We also wanted to let you know we will be able to celebrate our Academic Awards Night in person on Wednesday, May 26th (more information forthcoming)

The 24 Hour Plays are back and will occur on May 7-8th!! The creative whirlwind continues! 

Lasallian Educator of the Year
At this year’s Founder’s Day Prayer service, I had the distinct pleasure of announcing the 2021 Lasallian Educator of the year, social studies department chair and teacher Mrs. Anna Talmadge. This award is given to a faculty member who exemplifies the qualities of St. John Baptist de La Salle, specifically meeting the following criteria:

• A dedicated and committed individual who is an exemplary educator;
• An educator who understands his/her own dignity as a child of God so that he/she can pass this on to students;
• A person who cherishes and cares for his/her students like an older brother or sister, and, above all, someone who is committed to a life of faith and expresses that in a commitment to teach his or her students the importance of the spiritual life, inculcating living values.

Mrs. Talmadge has also just won for the second time the VFW Teacher of the Year. Her peers were consistent in their praise of her professionalism, dedication, passion, love for her students and for the content that she teaches, and commendable leadership in multiple aspects of school life. We are honored and blessed to have a Lasallian educator of this caliber working with our students. 

Retirements
This year, we will be saying goodbye to multiple beloved members of our community who are retiring:

Mrs. Sherry Bedford
Mr. Matt Castello
Mr. Mark DeMarco
Mr. Bob Ladouceur
Mr. Bob Zorad

Together, these Lasallians have dedicated a combined 133 years of service to De La Salle High School. I am awed as I write that sentence! We will miss them dearly.

Planning for the 2021-2022 Academic Year
I wanted to reiterate crucial information regarding DLS/CHS planning for next year in case you missed the previous email we sent last week. Based on the current California Department of Public Health guidance, both De La Salle and Carondelet are developing a new bell schedule as we plan on being back in school full time, five days a week for all students. There will be no virtual class options for next year, as students will be expected to be on campus every day. Both schools strongly recommend and encourage all of our students and families to be vaccinated but are not mandating it. We will continue to work with Contra Costa County Health Department in regards to vaccinations. In addition, both schools will continue to follow all State/County guidelines in regards to COVID protocols and procedures on campus and for school sanctioned activities. We are absolutely delighted to welcome all of our students back. 

I wanted to reiterate as we approach the end of our 2020-2021 academic school year the following: We are so proud of our students. We are so grateful to our faculty and staff. We are so lucky and blessed to work in partnership with our families.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

April 1, 2021

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Before our faculty, staff, and administrators began Easter break, we were able to convene as a community on Wednesday 3/31 for our annual Faculty/Staff Holy Week retreat. This year Campus Ministry provided an ingenious format that allowed us to convene in small groups to practice the theme for the day: “Creating and Celebrating the Mosaic that Shows Us the Face of God.” The activities, which were led by many of our peers, included a “Nature Activity as Prayer and Reflection;” “Art as Prayer;” “Bread Blessed, Broken, and Shared;” and multiple service activities. Thank you to the Campus Ministry team for creating innovative ways for our hard-working faculty and staff to come together in prayer and community.

Important Announcements
You received this week an update from the De La Salle President’s Cabinet that includes detailed information about any Request to be Considered for Group 4 Status (four days per week on campus). On March 19th and March 20th, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) respectively updated their recommendations for classroom spacing. As a result, we will be able to move more desks and tables into our classrooms, which means we will also be able to welcome more students on campus four days a week. Please read the letter fully and please fill out the Request to be Considered for Group 4 Status only if you want your son to join this group no later than Monday, April 12th. These changes will take effect on Monday, April 19th. 

We also want to call your attention to the fact that Contra Costa County Health (CCCH) updated its website on 3/30 to announce that it has opened vaccine eligibility to 16+.

Before we all scatter for Easter Break, there are a number of things we want to celebrate:

• Every year, our sophomores in AP Biology participate in the prestigious Contra Costa County Science and Engineering Fair, and all 16 Spartans placed in the top three for their category. The De La Salle AP Biology group amassed four first-place distinctions, five second places, three third places, and four special awards from government agencies and corporations. Five De La Salle students (four projects) qualified to participate in the California State Science Fair (also a virtual event) on April 12 and 13, 2021. This is the 21st consecutive year that De La Salle has sent county-appointed sophomores to the most prestigious Science Competition in California. 

  • De La Salle students Daniel Berkes, James Christensen, Issac De Rosas, Rolando Sanchez, and David Wright received first-place honors, and the projects submitted by these five Spartans are four of the 18 from Contra Costa County that qualified for the 2021 California Science and Engineering Fair.  

• March 30th marked the end of our 2021 Charity Challenge, and all donations will support the Nativity Village School in Shinara, Eritrea, the Brothers’ Ministries in India and Sri Lanka, the De La Salle Brotherhood Fund, and Generation Alive. Mr. Hassett included on Schoology this particular shout-out to our students and staff: “Many thanks to Scott Tomaszewicz from Campus Ministry Leadership who set up the GoFundMe account with the help of Mark Chiarucci, Rich Davi, and Karla Wiese from the Advancement Office, and to Matt Fong, Luke Anderson and the Service Leadership Class as well.”

  • You may have heard that we have about 15 of the coveted Comply sweatshirts (size large) still available; these sweatshirts were created in a very special collaboration between our alum Taveis Marshall ’19 and our current students. Please reach out directly to Dr. Elizabeth Berkes if you are interested in purchasing one; $9 of each sweatshirt purchase will support the Charity Challenge.

• Make sure to mark your calendars now for our spring Company production of 1984. The dates will be April 15, 16, 17, 22, 23, 24 at 7:15m, and the Box Office will open in April. The venue will be outside under the tent on the Quad!

During this Lenten season, I have started the daily practice of reading Pope Francis’s Twitter posts, and I have found this meditative practice particularly grounding in Holy Week. We wish you a blessed Easter and a restorative and healthy Easter break. 

Thank you, as always, for your partnership.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

March 4, 2021

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

During the Lenten season, I think very intentionally about the sacrifices and gifts we share both as a community and on the individual level, and that practice has only intensified as we approach the one-year anniversary of moving into Shelter-in-Place. As I think about the school’s blessings, I think repeatedly about how our students, faculty, and staff--their courage, vulnerability, compassion, introspection, and resilience--have helped to sustain us all. 

And it is with excitement that we celebrate the many accomplishments and contributions of our community. Please join me in congratulating senior Ryan Vaughn, who is officially a National Merit Scholar Finalist. We also congratulate De La Salle’s new Mock Trial team that went 4-0 in the preliminary match-ups and advanced to the Quarterfinals on 2/9. Students Lance Distefano and Sean Nimr both won Contra Costa County Judge’s Choice awards and Patrick George, Michael Giorgi, Ben Deviney, Gabe Tang, and Tyler Laymon all won awards as attorneys or witnesses. We are so impressed with this inaugural team!  From March 11-13, our AP Biology students will participate in the annual (and virtual this year) Contra Costa Science & Engineering Fair; they have been working hard since August to get to this moment, and we wish them luck!

We also continue to be moved by our students’ commitment to community service. The beginning of the Lenten season (Ash Wednesday 2/17) also annually kicks off the Spartan Charity Challenge at DLS, which will be a completely online fundraiser this year. 

Students Nico Roth and Zach Elian, with the support of our Service Leadership class, cut their hair in the Quad to be donated to support pediatric cancer research and patients. On Wednesday, February 24, 20 De La Salle students from Mrs. Acquistapace's Biology class volunteered to plant 20 citrus trees at CoCo Farm in Martinez, a non-profit that grows organic fruits and vegetables exclusively for food banks and schools. 

Here are some important updates to consider as we approach the end of Quarter 3:

• Ms. Lillian Dickson, our Registrar Mrs. Linda Byrne, and the faculty in our Student Support Services have successfully migrated the entire class registration process to an online platform and have been working overtime to get all students scheduled for next year. It has been a truly collaborative and herculean process. THANK YOU!
• Quarter 3 ends this Friday, March 5.
• Please take a look at the March school calendar, which was updated in January. Please note that Friday, March 12 is a vacation day for all students and faculty, and Friday, March 19 is a Professional Day for all faculty and staff (so there is no school for students). That means there will be no Flex Days those weeks. Also, please note that in order to have two more instructional days the week leading to Easter break and to maintain the same instruction for all cohorts, Monday and Tuesday, March 29 and 30 are distance learning for all students. Student Easter Break begins Wednesday, March 31, which is also our Faculty/Staff Lenten retreat.
• This week I will complete the four-week class, entitled “Boys and Belonging: Creating Inclusive and Affirming Schools for Boys,” I have been taking through the International Boys’ School Coalition. 

We wish you a blessed Lenten season, and as always, thank you so much for your partnership.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

January 7, 2021

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Happy New Year and welcome back! We missed you! We trust you have enjoyed a wonderful (albeit a bit more quiet) holiday with your families. We are excited to welcome a number of transfer students to our campus as well as our in-person and virtual returning students, many of whom have been waiting to see their friends for three weeks. We also want to again thank our faculty who, after a much-needed break, are ready to start the new semester and new year.  

As we prepare to start our second semester, we wanted to share some important updates and crucial reminders: 

• De La Salle will open in person for semester 2, while Carondelet has made the decision to start semester 2 virtually next week only for various planning reasons. Both schools fully support one another, and the instruction of our students remains our highest priority. The decision that either school may want or need to go virtual for a week was one we made early in the pandemic. We have secure locations and supervisors for students who will not be going to their CHS classes in person. All students who have class at CHS during the first week of S2 need to report to the Hofmann Center during that class period.
• We also wanted to assure you, after consultation with Dr. Chris Farnitano, that he confirmed that we have safe, effective, preventive COVID protocols, and the county and state have substantial and increasing data about the safety and effectiveness of schools that are open.
• An important reminder: please, please remember to respond to the email that Ms. Dickson and Mr. Aliotti sent out on Tuesday (1/05) regarding your son’s group choice for semester 2. All families need to make changes no later than this Friday (1/08). Also, please remember to remind your sons, and our students, to fill out the E3 Student Survey, which is a required part of the registration process and which gives us invaluable information about how to better educate our Spartans.
• On Thursday (1/07) and Friday (1/08), our faculty and staff will continue their training in Empowered Communication, focusing on cultural competency, with our trained mediators, Vanessa Alfaro and Lori Cohen. We will also start preparing for our accreditation process, which will happen in the 2021-2022 school year. All faculty will participate, additionally, in one of two Professional Learning Communities: “Online Teaching Tips and Tricks” or “Anti-racist teaching.” Mr. Mike Aquino and I will lead a semester-long book club on Ta-Nehisi Coates’s National Book Award-winning Between the World and Me.

Happy New Year. We could not be on this journey without you.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

February 5, 2021

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

There is so much to report, even if this school year looks and feels different than any we have experienced as a community. As we approach the beginning of Lent, I am hoping we can all not only contemplate but also experience the renewal that comes with this important season.

Many important Campus Ministry events have rolled out since the beginning of this semester. We just finished our freshman retreat, for which we welcomed back to campus Mr. Ashanti Branch who helped our freshmen participate in the “Taking off the Mask” workshop. A huge thanks goes out to our Junior and Senior student leaders! Seniors participated in Kairos #129 and #130, which have been completely restructured to occur during the pandemic and which is the culminating spiritual experience of a De La Salle education. Thank you to all who made that happen and for our students’ willingness to adapt at every moment. 

Last week and this week mark our Mental Health Awareness weeks that culminate with Laps for Life, our suicide awareness and prevention event in memory of Tyler Bunn. Due to Covid restrictions, Laps for Life 2021 will be 100% ONLINE and will take place this Saturday, February 6th from 10am – 11am. Although it is unfortunate that we cannot gather in person, we definitely want as many people as possible to unite together online this Saturday. All the details, including the Zoom link, can be found on our student-developed website (http://www.bit.ly/DLS-LapsforLife). This year all proceeds will be split between the national organization called Bring Change 2 Mind--which is also a new club on campus--and our statewide organization, Being Well CA.

Here is important information ALL families and students need to consider:

• REGISTRATION! All of our registration information has been sent to students and families, and Student Support Services and Ms. Lillian Dickson have updated all online information, including videos about General Academic Advising, Registration Procedures, and Registration Information by Department. Remember: students have to complete the E3 Student Survey to register.
• Communication Flow: as we approach registration and as we get closer to storing Quarter 3 grades (March 5th), students and families may have questions. Here is a reminder of whom to contact if you do. If you have any questions about a grade, assignments, or academic feedback, please reach out directly to the assigned teacher and counselor. All registration questions should go directly to counselors. Here is the link to Personal/Academic counselor assignments.

We continue to pray and be grateful for our community’s spirit, commitment to one another, health, and safety. As always, thank you for your partnership.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

We are in the second week of in-person instruction. Dr. Berkes, our Director of Faculty Development, and I have collectively visited every teacher’s classroom over the past week and a half, and we have seen our faculty and students alike engage in thoughtful ways with each other as well as with the students who are learning from home. Over the next weeks, we will be jumping in as distance learners, so we can continue to experience our new hybrid instructional platform from multiple perspectives. This will allow us to continue to support our amazing faculty and resilient students alike.

Here are some of the things we witnessed over the past week:

• One of the assignments in Mrs. Ricketts’s Drawing and Painting class asked in-person learners to paint a color wheel and asked the distance learners to do a scavenger hunt in their homes to find “found objects” to create a color wheel. As with almost all VPA classes, students connected with their off-campus peers to discuss their work at the end of the block period.

• In our Science Department, Mr. Jeans’s Physics students conducted their “egg drop” experiment while Mrs. Acquistapace’s students in AP Biology conducted a lab on E-Coli.

• The World Languages and English classes I visited were equally creative. Mrs. Hall’s class was a marvel of the type of acrobatics our teachers are performing to make sure all students have access to the same high-quality instruction over space and time. While student’s zoomed in to the class from home, Mrs. Hall projected them on the classroom’s whiteboard so their in-person classmates could see them; filmed herself going over the Present Subjunctive, so all students received the same exact instruction live and simultaneously; and called on distance learners and in-person learners equally to help her conjugate the verb “tocar.” All of Mr. Graham’s English 2 students participated in a vocabulary game that allowed them to use their peers, whether on or off campus, as “lifelines” to help them define various vocabulary words. Talk about a communal effort. 

• I saw students in Mr. Alumbaugh’s US History class give a group presentation on Zoom to the entire class on the Battle of Antietam; witnessed Mrs. Sciacca and Ms. Lopez, our college counselors, deftly walk our seniors through their application process as a group in the Hofmann; and witnessed Mrs. Macariola’s technology set-up for her math classes that is so elaborate and effective I cannot adequately describe it.

• Yesterday, I virtually visited the SCORE presentation on stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination that SCORE leaders Ryan Chand, Anthony Parker, and Diego Hernandez gave to Mr. Berkes’s freshman Religious Studies 1 classes. Ryan Chand, in his small group session, used the application Pear Deck to effectively present the material and to overtly engage freshman responses, which were compelling, to say the least. The presentation ended with a showing and discussion of A Class Divided. Check it out if you have not seen it! 

One student shared with Dr. Berkes his feedback from the first week: “I know you enjoy hearing feedback from the students about their experiences with hybrid learning and wanted to let you know that teachers have been doing a great job with managing the kids who opted for in-person learning and those who decided to stay at home.” Also, if you have not had a chance to take a look at the Facebook pictures from our return to in-person instruction, please take a look.

I wanted to leave you with a few reminders: The Company play 12 Angry Jurors opens TONIGHT! I do not think that one exclamation point fully captures my enthusiasm about the opportunity to see the fruit of DLS/CHS students’ extremely hard work and dedication to their craft. A special congratulations goes to Ms. Meredith Barnidge and Mr. Thomas Wickbolt for their creative, fearless, and unstoppable shepherding of this production. There are still a few reservations remaining, and you can sign up HERE.

We realize you have received many letters from us recently, I want to remind you that our Hybrid/Distance Learning and COVID-19 page contains a thorough Return-to-School video, our departmental hybrid teaching and learning templates, an archive of all our correspondence with families since last March, and a link to the DLS Town Hall recorded Zooms. And please, please remember to sign the COVID Community Pledge if you have not. Another reminder will be sent on Friday.

November is a month that begins with a celebration of All Souls and that asks us to reside in gratitude. Thank you to our teachers, thank you to our students, and thank you to our families for your partnership.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

October 2, 2020

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

At this point, families on both sides of Winton Drive will have received multiple communications from us over the past week. In case you missed them, here are the important links:

• Contra Costa County was moved to the RED TIER on Tuesday, September 29th. Here is our joint DLS/CHS Letter to Families.
• On September 30th, we sent another Letter to Families with a survey that allows each family to identify your son’s intention for coming back to school in the Hybrid Format or to continue at home with the Distance Learning program. 

We want to assure you as we approach the potential reopening of school that as “Two schools, One community” we have the flexibility ability, community connections, and resources to welcome our students back in person. As you know from our multiple communications over the summer, we have been planning across both schools for our hybrid learning plan for months. We miss face-to-face interactions with our students, and they are the reason that the mission of the Christian Brothers exists.

I want to also remind you that today is the last day of the CEREAL DRIVE. This year, we mark the 20th anniversary of the amazing service-learning project, one that is deeply rooted in the Lasallian core principles. A special shout out to Mrs. Viki Acquistapace for her two-decade-long dedication to this project, to all of our Biology classes, and to our Service Learning Class! 

We want to celebrate Biology teacher Mrs. Henriette Howett, this year’s recipient of the Marchetti Award. Established in 2015, the Marchetti Family Lasallian Educator Fellowship Award provides support for an extraordinary educator at De La Salle High School. Mrs. Howett has worked tirelessly with administration, faculty, staff, students, and outside organizations to implement a school-wide Green Initiative. Her Honors Biology class includes Environmental education, and she spearheaded the school’s adoption of our Tri-Bin waste system. Thank you, Mrs. Howett, for your commitment and creativity!

Before I sign off, as we enter yet another new phase of planning and preparation for the school, I wanted to share with you a Tweet that Pope Francis shared on September 2 and that our District leaders forwarded shortly thereafter: “The current pandemic has highlighted our interdependence; we are linked to each other, for better or for worse. Therefore, to come out of this crisis better than before, we have to do so together, all of us, in solidarity.” We sent this recently to all faculty, staff, and coaches. A Lasallian Catholic education is dedicated, among many other principles, to the formation of community. Thank you for your commitment to our school. Thank you for sharing your sons with us. Thank you for our partnership. And more than ever, thank you for your dedication to our Lasallian Catholic community.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

September 4, 2020

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Welcome to the 2020-2021 Academic School year! By now, you will have all received the Back-to-School Night videos for each of your sons’ classes. Thank you to our teachers, all academic directors, and our communications team for working so hard to get those out! I will repeat what I said in the opening video: we are extraordinarily impressed with what our teachers and students have already accomplished, and we look forward to what we can continue to accomplish together spiritually, academically, and communally as we work together in this extraordinary moment. 

I wanted to share with you other important and exciting academic announcements. 

• We will launch our 20th annual Cereal Drive on 9/21, and it will continue through 10/2. Every year, this is one of our largest service-learning opportunities, and it will be additionally supported by our Service Leadership class. Over these two weeks, there will be two platforms where the community can give. A student-developed website will host all of our giving opportunities, so look forward to seeing that soon. All proceeds go directly to bulk cereal purchases that will be donated directly to the Monument Crisis Center (Concord, CA).
   
• We are super excited about what our wonderful Laboratory Technician Mrs. Tina Schumann has been compiling for every Sophomore Biology class, namely take-home laboratory kits for every student. We will send out details for how and when they can be picked up, but that date will be by the end of September. These are the academic explorations that will be coming your way:

• The 2019-2020 Yearbooks have arrived! You will be receiving information about how to pick up your yearbook, and it is so great to see everyone’s faces.
   
• I wanted to underscore again our new curriculum for 2020-2021:

  • We introduced a new class in our HPER department called “Fitness” that will allow us to run Physical Education classes in a way that is no-contact and that aims to inculcate life-long practices that optimize health. Thank you to the department chair, Mr. Doug Bauman, for authoring this curriculum.

  • This year we introduced our new Religious Studies 2 curriculum, which focuses entirely on the Bible and which houses our Mentors-in-Violence Prevention curriculum as a link to Jesus as an active bystander. This is part of a multi-year rollout of the new Religious Studies curriculum.

  • We added AP Computer Science A to our Computer Science offerings this year thanks to the hard work of Mr. Tim Bedford.

I also wanted to draw your attention to a few reminders:

• Mass of the Holy Spirit: If you have not already done so, please take some time to watch the beautiful Mass of the Holy Spirit that we celebrated on 8/26. A special thanks to not only Campus Ministry for providing a live stream, but also to the students who participated.
   
• Teacher Communication/Response: We recognize that attending/teaching school from home has blurred the work/life balance. Please note that our teachers are working hard to create innovative and powerful learning experiences for our students. We have reinforced with teachers that their work hours are between 7:45am-3:30 pm during the weekdays. If you contact them outside of those weekday hours or on weekends, please be patient and give them 48 hours to respond as they also have family and obligations beyond their classes to attend to. 
   
• Flex Days: Beginning in September, Flex Days will be programmed days for Campus Ministry, clubs and Student Activities, organized class and community building, academic support/tutoring, and personal/counseling support. Students will be asked to sign up and be present for Wednesday Flex Days beginning September 16th.

As this entire community continues to negotiate the beginning of a school year unlike any other we have experienced as educators and as students, I wanted to share some of the Lasallian resources that have grounded me and other district leaders at this moment. The Lasallian Resource Center is an invaluable trove of information, and I want to direct you specifically to the Daily Quotation section, which helps ground my own prayer.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

June 4, 2020

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

It almost goes without saying that this semester was a challenge. Still, I want to communicate that your sons not only met the challenge of this semester, but also exceeded all of our expectations. We have witnessed our students’ resilience, humor, academic engagement, creativity, and adaptability. We miss them deeply, and we are so impressed by what they have accomplished.

As you know, we have planned an alternate Baccalaureate Liturgy and Graduation for August 1st and 2nd, and we had a delightful and moving Senior Send-Off Parade on Saturday, May 23rd. You can take a look at pictures here.

As President DeMarco’s letter underscores, we are actively planning with Carondelet for multiple instructional scenarios pending what we will be allowed to do in August. Please know that we will start school on the same day as planned, and both schools’ planning and preparation absolutely focus on our students’ return to campus. (If you have a daughter at CHS, you will have read the same in Mr. Cushing’s End-of-Year Enews). Our planning includes not only academic life but also how we can deliver a rich and meaningful co-curricular experience, no matter what Bell Schedule we adopt given local and state mandates.

We have expanded our resources for summer Faculty Innovation Grants, which fund faculty to “think outside the box” in order to help students better achieve academic and social-emotional outcomes. Our faculty learned so much, and did so much, during our Flexible Learning Plan, and we want to encourage them to continue to innovate. We have every faith and have already witnessed that our teachers provide a high quality, Catholic education no matter what the scenario God puts in front of us. Over the summer, our communications team will be updating our community’s responses to our Flexible Learning Plan, so feel free to return and take a look. And take a look immediately at this creative video by our very own Religious Studies teacher Joe Grantham about teaching during the Coronavirus.

In addition, our Librarians have been busy expanding our digital offerings. They just added Accessible Archives, which is a collection of digitized primary source historical documents. The Archives contain multiple primary sources, including: early African American publications; Fredrick Douglass’s Newspaper; American County Histories; WWI and WWII newspapers such as ones from Camp Bragg, Camp Pendelton, and other military posts; papers from the Civil War - North and South; the 19th Amendment Victory Newspaper; Godey's Ladies Book; and Women's Suffrage publications. In addition, the Library now offers Classroom Video on Demand, which is a streaming video database with over 29,000 full-length films and over 226,000 film segments that are easily integrated into Schoology for use by both teachers and students. Both platforms support curriculum and learning in the classroom and remotely.

We are delighted to welcome to the 2020-2021 De La Salle community our new hires: Kristin Leete (ASL), Chris Miller (Religious Studies), Danielle Skipper (History), Lisa Sciacca (Co-Director of College Counseling).

Finally, in case you missed the message from the De La Salle President’s Cabinet on June 02 that included the letter from Brother Visitor Donald Johanson, please take a look at it here. To reiterate: we are deeply saddened by the recent events in the United States, and we pray that we will see better days ahead. Our Lasallian Catholic values will guide, ground, and sustain us, and we hold ourselves to the obligation to be servant leaders and to inculcate the same in our students.

We hope that you and your family enjoy a restful, safe, and restorative summer.

As always, thank you for your partnership.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

It is so fortuitous that our Spotlight was slotted to go out this week, as this is National Teacher Appreciation Week. I have written many, many times that we are blessed to have a faculty whose calmness, competence, creativity, compassion, diligence, flexibility, and collaboration are things of wonder. They make our mission possible, even when the world seems to have gone sideways. In lieu of the in-person celebrations we typically have this week, school leadership sent each faculty member a GrubHub gift certificate and all of our love and appreciation.

Here are other academic highlights I want to share with you:

National Honor Society
Mr. Norfolk, the DLS National Honor Society faculty moderator, let NHS inductees know they were accepted last week. The first meeting with the new class was May 6! The induction ceremony, typically held on the same day as Founder’s Day Liturgy, will now be in August. As with all postponed events, we simply cannot wait to celebrate our students in-person! In the meantime, congratulations to our new NHS members. It is a well-earned and well-deserved honor.

ACADEMIC AWARDS
Our Academic Awards Night, during which we give all academic awards to our underclassmen, was originally scheduled for Tuesday, May 19. The faculty and academic leadership feel very strongly that student accomplishments need to be celebrated in some way, so this year we will be uploading a short video from me and creating a slideshow that will be available on our website on Wednesday, May 20. We will also be mailing home certificates to honor every student who has received an award. Congratulations to these Spartans!

24-HOUR PLAY
On Friday, May 1, Company students spent 24 hours writing, directing, acting, and editing brand new monologues called The 24 Hour Plays. Here is a more detailed overview of the challenge:

Writers had eight hours to write a monologue for specific actors who auditioned in specific costumes and specific "locations" though virtual backgrounds or in their houses. The actors then rehearsed the monologues. Directors gave advice and input to a handful of actors. Actors recorded themselves and handed them off to the video editors to cut together.

Numbers: 10 writers, 10 actors, 4 directors, 3 video editors, and 1 producer. 28 total

They started streaming on our website at 6:00 pm on Saturday, May 2, with a new monologue coming out every 15 minutes. Wow! Thank you to our resilient and creative and amazing students for sharing your talents with us!

SENIOR LETTER
On Wednesday, we also sent a letter to all seniors and senior families regarding multiple dates and alternate celebrations, including the following:

• Sunday, May 10th: Senior Mother’s Day Liturgy 
• Tuesday, May 19th: Senior Book Return and More  
• Saturday, May 23rd: Senior Send-Off, 10:00 am-noon - The administration, faculty, staff, and coaches welcome seniors and their parents back to campus for a “drive-through” celebration and send-off. 
• Saturday, August 1st: Baccalaureate Liturgy at 5:00 pm  
• Sunday, August 2nd: Graduation and Reception 

We know these events, ceremonies, and rituals will look different this year, but we want to send our seniors off in style, with love, and with laughter.  

LASALLIAN EDUCATOR OF THE YEAR
Campus Ministry did a truly beautiful job of putting together a virtual Founder’s Day Liturgy, which we aired on Wednesday, April 29. As I have written before, the Founder’s Day Liturgy is one of my favorites every year, as it asks the entire community to join in prayer and contemplation about the legacy of the founder of the Institute of the Brothers of the Christian Schools, St. John Baptist de La Salle. Every year at the end of the Liturgy (including during this year’s virtual version), I have the distinct honor of announcing the Lasallian Educator of the Year, who for 2020 is Mr. Mike Aquino. This award is given to a faculty member who exemplifies the qualities of St. John Baptist de La Salle, specifically meeting the following criteria:

• A dedicated and committed individual who is an exemplary educator;
• An educator who understands his/her own dignity as a child of God so that he/she can pass this on to students;
• A person who cherishes and cares for his/her students like an older brother or sister, and, above all, someone who is committed to a life of faith and expresses that in a commitment to teach his or her students the importance of the spiritual life, inculcating living values.

This year, a number of colleagues who nominated Mr. Aquino commented on the fact that he is “empathetic, compassionate, patient, nurturing, dedicated, and proactive.” Another peer wrote that Mr. Aquino’s “leadership at this time of uncertainty has been exceptional, extraordinary; he has paved the way for the rest of us to be able to continue instruction at a distance.” Another commented that Mr. Aquino’s “relationship with the students as teacher, mentor, and coach is very inspiring. He’s dedicated to creating a culture of respect and dignity here at DLS through the MVP training for students and faculty. He cares deeply about the heart and soul of this school and is dedicated to making DLS an ‘inclusive community’ where ‘respect for all persons’ is our culture and guided by ‘faith in the presence of God.’” Congratulations Mr. Aquino, and thank you for your leadership and dedication.

RETIREMENTS
At the end of the academic school year, we will say goodbye to two beloved members of our community: Mrs. Joan MacDonald (Religious Studies) and Mrs. Janet Appel (Co-Director, College Counseling). Both of these women have served our mission and our students tirelessly and faithfully since 2001; they also are amazing and loving colleagues. We will miss them dearly! Thank you Mrs. MacDonald and Mrs. Appel for all the gifts you have shared with the DLS community for the last 19 years.

***Please note, Mrs. Appel will be available to all of her students over the summer until her replacement arrives in August. 

In these uncertain times, we are so grateful for the strength, love, and resilience of this community.

As always, thank you for your partnership.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

March 5, 2020

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

February flew by, and March has begun with multiple professional development opportunities for some of our chief administrators and with the normal flurry of curricular and co-curricular activities for our students.

At the beginning of February, Dr. Elizabeth Berkes and I spent five days at Bellarmine College Preparatory in San Jose as we served (and Dr. Berkes chaired) on the school’s Western Catholic Education Association (WCEA) accreditation. It is so gratifying to learn and to share with another Catholic school, especially a fellow all-male school, and it is the best professional development to see how other schools educate men of integrity in the 21st century.

Last week, I flew to Houston to attend the 2020 LASSCA conference, which brings together the lead administrators at all North-American Christian Brothers Schools and which addressed the theme, “Sustaining Excellence in Lasallian Leadership.”

I attended two plays in February inspired by our current curriculum that reminded me in the most poignant way of the power of art and the humanities to reflect our beautiful, messy, and tragic human experiences: Cambodian Rock Band, about a father daughter relationship that grapples with the legacy of the Khmer Rouge, and Gatz, which enacts Fitzgerald’s entire novel The Great Gatsby.

On March 20th, our next professional day, we welcome back the trainers we have been working with since January who will continue to walk us through how to have courageous conversations as educational leaders by practicing empathy, other non-violent communication methods, and cultural competency.

Student life has also been particularly active in February, and it will continue to be so in March. Here are some of the many highlights:

• 2/01 witnessed the 9th annual Laps for Life, which is a suicide awareness and prevention event
• 2/10-2/13 was RISE (“Respect, Inclusion, Solidarity, and Empowerment”) Week, with shared programming with Carondelet High School
• 2/26 was the Ash Wednesday Prayer Service, which is a day that also inaugurates DLS’s annual Charity Challenge
• Wish our students luck in March, as some head off to the Contra Costa County Science & Engineering Fair at Los Medanos Community College (3/12-14) and the FIRST Robotics Competition (3/27-28) at U.C. Davis
• Reconciliation will be offered on 3/19
• And Company’s Guys and Dolls premiers to Alumni on 3/25 and has opening night on 3/26; click here for all information!

Before I sign off, I want to send out a hearty THANK YOU to school counselors Scott Drain, Lindsay Melaas, Cris Rosales, and Lauren Stevens as well as to Ms. Lillian Dickson (Director of Academic Services) for their amazing work at registering all De La Salle students for next Academic year.

Please join me in congratulating Social Studies teacher and Department Chair Mrs. Anna Talmadge, who is this year’s recipient of the Marchetti Family Lasallian Educator Fellowship Award, which the school awards to an extraordinary DLS educator who is committed to further his/her ongoing professional development and furthers his/her own education in service to the Mission and benefit of DLS students.

Additionally, a huge congratulation goes to senior Cameron Katz, who is officially a National Merit Scholar Finalist. 

Finally, in case you missed our communication regarding the school’s monitoring of the COVID-19 virus, please take a look here. We will be in contact if anything changes.

As always, thank you for your partnership.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

January 9, 2020

Dear Parents, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Welcome to the new decade. We all hope your families experienced a restful, peaceful, and joyful Christmas break.

We are all furiously preparing for our students’ return next week on Monday, January 13th. Faculty and staff returned today to begin one of two professional days. Grades were stored on January 7th, so please make sure to check PowerSchool.

In January, your sons will be receiving academic counseling from teachers and counselors alike. The course catalogue will be available on January 21st, and Course Advisement will occur between January 27th-February 21st, when student request forms are due. In order for students to register, they are required to complete the Annual Student Survey, which students can access on our webpage here with explicit directions or directly here. Our annual survey is a data collection opportunity required as part of our accreditation protocol. We ask that all students (including seniors) complete the survey in a timely manner. It takes most students about 30 to 45 minutes to finish. Although submission of the survey is required for current Freshmen, Sophomores, and Juniors in order to complete their course registration for 2020-21 classes, this survey is also for Seniors, as the school values their input about their experience at De La Salle.

This academic year, freshmen are taking a revised Religious Studies 1 curriculum; students in Religious Studies 2 this spring will be trained in the Mentors in Violence Prevention bystander approach curriculum; and the school offered its first interdisciplinary course, entitled “Literature, Conflict, and the Human Experience,” as well as introduced AP Computer Science Principles and AP Macroeconomics for the first time. There are new course offerings that students can consider for the 2020-2021 academic year that we are excited to share with you, including Mock Trial and AP Computer Science A.  

Before I sign off, I wanted to send a serious SHOUT OUT (like last year) to all of our De La Salle families. Because of you, the school donated literally hundreds and hundreds of toys to various organizations. During the Advent season, we witnessed daily the spirit of Christ and St. John Baptiste de La Salle alive in all of you.

As always, we are so excited to have the opportunity to join your sons’ educational journeys. 

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

December 6, 2019

On Tuesday December 3, our Academic Affairs Council met to approve the last of the newly proposed curriculum for next year. We meet every other week on late start days, and a different department chair or academic director inaugurates the meeting with prayer. This week, Dr. Elizabeth Berkes offered a compelling meditation on “let us remember,” which the Advent season encourages us all to do. She also shared a mantra that I think I will adopt for Advent: “make room.” As we move through the hustle and bustle of finals, holiday concerts, ornament shopping, new sports seasons, Star Wars watching, and on and on, I am going to ask myself daily to remember and to make room for the Holy in the everyday.

As I wrote last year, this month also ushers in some of my favorite De La Salle activities:

• the Physics boat races, that will take place in the pool Periods 1-6 on December 10;
• the DLS/CHS Christmas Concert on December 11, held in the Hofmann Student Center starting at 7:00;
• the Our Lady of Guadalupe Liturgy on December 12;
• the ongoing Toy Drive, which comes to an end December 19.

In addition, all DLS faculty and staff have been invited to Carondelet’s I-Center Open House on the afternoon of the 10th, and we are always excited celebrate our partner school.

As semester one comes to an end, here are a few reminders:

• Final exams will occur from Tuesday, December 17 through Thursday, December 19. Please remember to consult the School Calendar for the exact times. Final exams are firm dates, and any student who is sick will need to notify both the attendance office and Ms. Lillian Dickson (dicksonl@dlshs.org) to schedule make-up exams.
• Grades will be available after they are stored on Monday, January 6.
• Classes resume for the second semester on Monday, January 13.

Finally, let me wish you and your families a restful and joyful Advent season and Christmas.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

November 7, 2019

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

I have to repeat what I have been saying since September to our parent community: I cannot wait to talk to you about our Lasallian Catholic Assessment Process (LCAP), an overview of which I provided in last month’s Spotlight and at Back to School Night. President DeMarco’s letter summarized some of the findings of the visiting team’s final LCAP report, most particularly the strengths of the school as a Lasallian Catholic school and the challenges that we as a community identified we would like to address to continue to offer the best possible academic, spiritual, and holistic education for the students entrusted to our care. The success of this assessment process is because of a climate of care, quality academics, and “focus on growing up well” that the entire community works to create and foster. I wanted to add further context to President DeMarco’s overview by drawing your attention to the central role that our Religious Studies and Campus Ministry departments play. They were celebrated by the visiting team for numerous reasons, and I think the “Final Word” of the visiting committee’s report illuminates the significant contributions of these two ministries to the lives of our students.

“A Final Word

Our Lasallian regional tag line reads, ‘Transforming Lives Since 1680.’ This statement is theologically false if one reads it as we (teachers) transform lives. Saint John Baptist de La Salle tells us that the spirit of the Institute is a spirit of faith. We believe that God transforms through human ministers. God may use us as conduits of grace to young people, and, of course, young people can be the bearers and means of our salvation. If living faith is the source of the transformative education that we call Lasallian, how do we keep faith alive in a community?

I encountered young people at De La Salle High School whose lives had been transformed—young people who had found God, compassion, listening, a heart for service, commitment to growth, and care for one another. I found a faithful community whose openness to God made those transformations possible.”

That sentiment offers a beautiful segue to highlight further the ongoing service of our students and faculty alike. Today began with the second edition of Campus Ministry’s “MMM: Music, Ministry, and Munchies.” We began the day at 8:00 a.m. sharp in front of the cross in the courtyard, and Librarian Brooke Heskett led us in song as prayer. The ministry ended with students, faculty, and administrators linking arms in a circle singing “Lean on Me”—a reminder that we are a community whose members can rely on one another. Campus Ministry then offered donuts to all attendees before classes started.

Today also witnessed our Veterans Prayer Service. The service ended with a unique moment: Mr. Jerome Hudson, Senior Vice Commander of the VFW in Clayton and father of DLS alum and fellow veteran Michael Hudson, presented DLS Social Studies teacher and department chair Mrs. Annemarie Talmadge with the 2019 VFW California Teacher of the Year award. Mrs. Talmadge received the award for her and her students’ work with the Veterans History Project, which is archived in The Library of Congress. Today we also thanked DLS faculty and staff veterans for their service to our country: Mr. Matt Harrison, Mr. Jay Juarez, Mr. Michael Norris, Mr. Jason Shelton, and Mr. Jeff Villafania.

We have additional faculty and student achievements to celebrate today. Mr. Mike Aquino (Director of Campus Life & Culture) presented this afternoon at the Northern California Safe and Healthy Schools Conference on campus climate, leadership, and our ongoing work with Mentors in Violence Prevention.

In addition, tonight marks the official debut of Company’s fall play: She Kills Monsters. About the play, DLS theater director Ms. Meredith Barnidge writes:

“Set in the 1990’s, the stage-combat filled, comedic play She Kills Monsters tells the story of Agnes, a senior in high school, who stumbles into a dungeon and dragons game written by her deceased little sister. Agnes discovers that her little sister created a fantasy world that mirrored her experiences of her real world. She turned them into a game of D & D. Bullies became monsters. Friends became warriors and heroes. The little sister became the mighty Paladin in search of her lost soul longing to be found. By the end of the play, the audience may wonder who the real monsters are. High school students or Fantastical Dragons? Or in some small way… each and every one of us.  If each of us can be a monster, can’t each of us also choose to become the hero?”

She Kills Monsters will play at 7:00 p.m. November 7-9, 14, 16 and at 2:00 p.m. on November 10. Please go here for advanced tickets.

Before I sign off, I wanted to share some end-of-October highlights:

• On Friday October 25, DLS held the annual Jim Olwell Memorial Duck Race at the pool. Mr. Olwell was a beloved math teacher at De La Salle, and we were honored to welcome his wife, Mrs. Wendy Olwell, his daughter-in-law, Mrs. Lianna Olwell, and his grandson and namesake, baby James Olwell, to campus. De La Salle’s Service Leadership class and the Students in Action/Jefferson Awards club run by Mr. Andrew Berkes and Dr. Elizabeth Berkes sponsor the event every year to raise money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society in Mr. Olwell’s name.
   
• On Saturday, October 26, twenty-five Latin students from De La Salle and Carondelet High Schools participated in LUDI at The Menlo School in Atherton. About 600 students from all over Northern California were present at this gathering of the Junior Classical League. Students participated in academic contests and sporting events and attended colloquia given by college professors on such Classical figures as Hannibal and Achilles. Several of our students earned honors in their respectful levels. Freshman Janie Hatfield placed third in Vocabulary; Sophomores Marcel Latasa placed first in grammar, Isaiah Sana earned second and third place awards in Reading Comprehension and Vocabulary, Sam Pickett placed second and third in Vocabulary and Grammar; and Junior Diego Hernandez earned third place honors in Vocabulary. Congratulations to our very own classical scholars!

As we enter this season of Thanksgiving, I want to underscore the work of our College Counselors and to thank the multiple faculty members and school counselors who together wrote literally hundreds of letters of recommendation for our students’ college applications. For more information about our superb college counselors, please go here.

As always, thank you for your partnership. We wish your families a blessed Thanksgiving.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

October 3, 2019

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

The beginning of the 2019-2020 school year has moved quickly (the quarter ends this Friday 10/4). As always, we have so much to celebrate in the Academic life of the school. First, we would like to invite you to join us in congratulating our senior Semifinalist in the 2020 National Merit Scholarship Program: Cameron Katz. In addition, ten seniors were named Commended Students: Riley Cisneros-Mann, August Gingrich, James Jolin, Jack Lamborn, Tyler Manning Shannon, Carson Newman, Sampson Paonessa, Luke Taylor, Brian Vega, and William Wygal. Another eight students who scored in the top 2.5% among Hispanic and Latino PSAT/NMSQT test takers in our region were officially recognized by the National Hispanic Recognition Program: Alexander Avila, Myles Bergman, Riley Cisneros-Mann, Jarod Jatoft, James Jolin, Cameron Katz, Charles Kunz, and Alexander Prado. Brava, gentlemen!

Here are additional academic highlights from September and a look at October:

• Our Lasallian Catholic Assessment Process came to a very successful end, and the entire community worked with our visiting team to identify our strengths as a Lasallian Catholic school and our desired growth areas. I look forward to sharing out some of the final commendations and recommendations once we receive the official report.
   
• The annual Cereal Drive is in full swing. It began on September 23 and will continue through October 11. In case you missed it, here is the video made by student Conor Sweeney that we showed during Back to School Night.
   
• Mr. DeMarco and I made our biannual trip to join our San Francisco Lasallian colleagues at the District Chief Administrators Association gathering that was held this fall in San Diego. This gathering was unique in that it included experiential learning to allow school leaders to explore perspectives on the realities of the U.S. Mexico Border.
   
• Our very own Biology teacher Mrs. Viki Acquistapace just returned as an invited participant from the 2019 Society for Science and the Public High School Research Teachers Conference held in Washington D.C. on September 27-29.
   
• This week De La Salle participates in Down Syndrome Awareness week, and the student coordinators are Shamal Perera and Amir Desai. The week leads up to the 2019 Step Up for Down Syndrome Walk in Pleasant Hill this Sunday. It is impressive to witness the commitment of our student servant leaders.
   
• Please join us on Wednesday, October 9, from 6:30-8:30 at Carondelet’s Garaventa Center for our joint screening with Carondelet High School and Fusion Academy Walnut Creek of the new documentary Like. A panel discussion will follow. For more information or to RSVP, please click here.
   
• October 7-11 will witness our Third Annual Stream Week hosted by the De La Salle Library. Every day at lunch and after school, there will be different activities, and students will be able to build Littlebits Circuits, Spheros, Makey-Makey, Catapults, Bristlebots, and more. Please reach out to the library if you have any questions.
   
• On October 15th, all De La Salle and Carondelet academic departments will meet for a joint professional day.
   
• At the end of October, with teacher and DLS Director of Online Learning Mr. Donald Van Bomel and Carondelet teachers and administrators, I will be heading to the annual iNACOL conference to learn about best practices in online learning.

We are excited to start a successful Quarter 2. In the meantime, thank you as always for your partnership.

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

September 5, 2019

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Welcome back! Summer feels like a distant memory. So much has already transpired at De La Salle High School, from our new teacher orientation at the beginning of August to our faculty professional days to the welcome Bar-B-Que for all new students, the second year of joint orientations for all classes at De La Salle and Carondelet, the Welcome Rally, Welcome Dance, first athletic games, theater try-outs, lost locker combinations, and the list goes on.

September promises to be an equally dynamic month. Next week will be particularly eventful for the Academic and Mission side of the school, as we welcome a visiting team of administrators/leaders from our local and national Lasallian network for a school-wide process entitled LCAP, the Lasallian Catholic Assessment Process. The team will be here from 9/11-9/13. Working from the surveys we gave to administrators, faculty, staff, coaches, students, and parents in late spring 2019 as well as our inventory and assessment of the school’s Religious Studies Program and Spiritual Life, the visiting team help us assess how we are living the Lasallian Core Principles. In other words, LCAP “addresses the question: How does the Lasallian Catholic spirit and mission permeate all aspects of the school and create a distinctive identity now and into the future?”

In particular, LCAP aims to

1. “provide a self-assessment of the school …”
2. “provide for a review of the religion program and the spiritual life of the school …”
3. “recognize and reinforce the strengths of the school as demonstrated through the five core Lasallian Catholic principles…”
4. “envision how the school will be living the five core Lasallian Catholic principles in the future by creating a shared vision and practical plans for growth.”
5. (Guide to Lasallian Catholic Assessment Process 2019-2020)

The assessment process will include multiple meetings with school leadership; an extensive meeting with the Religious Studies and Campus Ministry departments; 11 listening sessions for adults and for students from every grade level and from Student Leadership, Service Leadership, and Spiritual Life Leadership. We will spend the entire professional day on 9/13, the last day of the visit, working through our strengths and growth opportunities in order to create a shared vision that will guide us in the future. The day will culminate with the visiting team meeting with the Board of Trustees. We are excited to learn and grow.

Next week also witnesses Kairos 122 AND Back-to-School Night on Thursday, September 12th starting with the President’s Welcome and Prayer and some brief words from me in the gym at 6:30.

You will hear more from me in my next newsletter about the end of September (after Mr. DeMarco and I join our Lasallian colleagues for a Chief Administrators Conference in San Diego) and the anticipated events in October. Until then and as always, thank you for your partnership.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

June 12, 2019

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Now that the academic year is officially over, the sounds I hear outside of my office windows, which face the quad, have changed dramatically. I still hear on a daily basis the exciting, if not loud, construction progress of the Ladouceur Athletic Performance Center. Instead of the sounds of the thundering running of a 1050 young men to the Hofmann Center every break and lunch to be the first in line, I hear the summer athletic camps in progress (I am pretty sure I hear Mr. Pelosi coaching the basketball camp as I write this). The changing of the sounds are a daily reminder of the ebb and flow of school life. It is hard to believe that the 2018-2019 academic year has come to an end, and a few weeks ago, we graduated the class of 2019 and promoted to the next level our freshmen, sophomores, and juniors. (If you missed the 2019 graduation ceremony, please click here.)

As I discussed in my graduation speech, 2019 is an important year for De La Salle. It marks the tricentennial of the death of St. John Baptist de la Salle, the patron saint of teachers and the founder of the Lasallian charism. In addition, this year marks the retirement of three cornerstones of De La Salle High School, whose combined service to the school is over 82 years and whose combined years as educators is in excess of 120: Mrs. Mary Ann Mattos, Mr. Jack Dyer, and Mr. Steve Oelschlager. With the closing of the Christian Brothers community on campus, we also say goodbye to Brother Lawrence Haley, FSC (Religious Studies, school photographer, webmaster), who will be deeply missed. This year two additional teachers are moving on to new adventures, Mrs. Rebecca DeWeese (Chair, Visual and Performing Arts Department) and Mr. Ray Meadows (Social Studies). We wish them all the best in their new journeys, and we thank them for their dedication to our students and faculty alike.

We are delighted to welcome to our 2019-2020 De La Salle family our new hires: Ms. Caitlin Coblentz (English), Mr. Kevin Fordon (Social Studies), Mr. Michael Norris (Math), Mr. Rene Sanchez (Religious Studies), and Mr. Giles Thompson (VAPA). We are excited also that Mr. Eric Ghisletta, former Captain for Martinez Police Department, has agreed to teach a Criminal Justice class as an instructor of practice.

There are additional changes we would like to share with you. Ms. Lillian Dickson will be taking over for Mrs. Mattos as Director of Academic Services. Also, the President’s Cabinet deliberated at length after Mr. Dyer announced his retirement by strategically assessing the overall needs of the school. We decided not to replace the Vice President level position in campus life. Instead, a new position will be created for 2019-2020, which will be Director of Campus Life and Culture that will report to my office. We are grateful and excited that Mr. Mike Aquino, who has many years of administrative experience in this aspect of school life and who has worked for years on school climate initiatives here, has agreed to assume the position. Among the duties that the Director will supervise and/or coordinate are all Campus Climate Initiatives, Campus Life Programming (including Student Activities, Clubs, Class Moderators, etc.), Student Orientation, Parent Association and Education, and Educational Technology.

Please be attentive to the upcoming summer electronic mailing (forthcoming mid-July); it will include everything from required summer reading to a check list of responsibilities to prepare for the upcoming school year. 

Thank you for a wonderful year, and enjoy your summer! We look forward to seeing you again in the fall. 
 

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Last Tuesday (4/30), we held not only our Founder’s Day Liturgy during the school day, but also our National Honor Society inductions that evening. The Founder’s Day Liturgy is one of my favorite every year, as it asks the entire community to join in prayer and contemplation about the legacy of the founder of the Institute of the Brothers of the Christian Schools, St. John Baptist de La Salle. This year was particularly important as it is the 300^th year anniversary of the founder’s death, and there have been global “events and celebrations … honoring our common Lasallian mission of faith, service, and community through the theme highlighting that we are one: One Heart, One Commitment, One Life.” At DLS, we honor the Lasallian Educator of the year at that Liturgy, and I think it was particularly fitting that we inducted our new class of NHS members on the feast day of the Patron Saint of teachers. Both NHS and Lasallian schools are committed not only to quality education, but also to the belief that education is a means to create servant leaders capable and willing to share their gifts with a larger world community.

It was an honor to announce at the Founder’s Day Liturgy Mr. Richard Graham as the 2019 Lasallian Educator of the Year. This award is given to a faculty member who exemplifies the qualities of St. John Baptist de La Salle, specifically meeting the following criteria:

• A dedicated and committed individual who is an exemplary educator
• An educator who understands his/her own dignity as a child of God so that he/she can pass this on to students
• A person who cherishes and cares for his/her students like an older brother or sister, and, above all, someone who is committed to a life of faith and expresses that in a commitment to teach his or her students the importance of the spiritual life, inculcating living values.

Mr. Graham is both an alumnus and a long-time teacher, and multiple peers wrote about his humility and his commitment to his students. About Mr. Graham’s gifts, the English Department Chair Ms. Alex Stevenson wrote: “His ability to connect the literature in his classes to the experience of the human condition is exemplary. He has an innate ability to establish relevancy and encourage depth of understanding. He is deeply committed to honoring the dignity in all humans, especially his students … He is also a man who looks out for the ‘marginalized.’ He is profoundly compassionate and is sensitive to the suffering of others.” Congratulations to Mr. Graham, and a hearty thank you.

We held our recognition assembly on Wednesday, May 1, and it is always a delight to see so many student accomplishments celebrated by the community. Sophomore Luke Anderson, who competed in the California State Science and Engineering Fair, received a Special Recognition Award from the UCLA Brain Research Institute, which recognizes outstanding projects in all areas of Neuroscience from “Molecules to Mind”. Also, the Athlete(s) of the Year, as voted upon by the DLS varsity head coaches, were Henry To’oto’o and Kyle Parco.

I want to remind you, before I sign off, that you still have time to see the Winton Arts Festival, which began with the spring play Pygmalion on April 4 and concludes with the Concert and Jazz Band Concert on May 10. Please check it out!

As always, thank you for your partnership.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh

Vice President for Academic Life

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Last Wednesday was one of my favorite days at the school. I began the day in one of Mr. Terry Eidson’s freshman Religion classes. The class began with a beautiful prayer that wove together a Lenten reflection, Isaiah 49, redemption, and the theology of baseball and that included teacher and students alike. The class moved on to review Malcolm Gladwell’s interpretation of the David and Goliath biblical story. Then one student group presented on their modernization of David and Goliath by showing a video of the all-deaf football team from the California School of the Deaf and linking the team’s journey to the biblical passage. One student wisely commented that the team has “figured out how to communicate in a different way than people expect them to.” My next stop was Mrs. Rebecca DeWeese’s Drawing and Painting class, as both she and Mrs. Jennifer Ricketts welcomed onto campus “Safari Encounters,” a Petaluma based non-profit that brings exotic animal rescues into the classroom to promote interdisciplinary and environmental education. The teachers always schedule the animals’ return around our own children’s spring break, so we were delighted to welcome many of our teachers’ children to this interactive classroom experience (my son included). My trip to the Hofmann for lunch included the De La Salle/Carondelet annual talent show, that ended with a beautiful duet by our very own Mr. Corey Kelly (Physics/AP Physics teacher) and Mrs. Brooke Heskett (Librarian). My last stop? Mrs. Anna Talmadge’s class. As you may remember from last month’s Spotlight, Mrs. Talmadge is not only our Social Studies department chair but also the VFW California Teacher of the Year. The students from her “History of the 60’s” class are participating in the Veteran’s History Project, and last week I had the great honor of sitting in as three De La Salle students interviewed a female naval veteran of the Vietnam War.

Yet again, we have a lot to celebrate this month in terms of faculty and student achievement. First, two De La Salle teachers have recently been accepted to nationally prestigious summer institutes. Mr. Rob Rogers (English teacher) will attend the NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Workshop, “From Immigrants to Citizens: Asian Pacific Americans in the Northwest,” and Ms. Meredith Barnidge (Theater teacher and Director of Theater Arts) will be participating in the Yale Writers’ Workshop. It is good day when I receive an email from a faculty member that begins, “I got in!”

Many of our Latin students participated in the spring California Classical League State Competition (over 900 students attended from California and Nevada). There were academic competitions in the areas of reading comprehension, vocabulary, grammar, classical art, and mythology. In total, DLS/CHS students garnered nine awards, and special mention should be made that Henry Baer scored in second place for the statewide advanced reading comprehension contest. Overall, our team came in third place for points earned in academic competitions. A special thanks goes out to Mr. Michael Marcheschi for his inspiring work with our Latin students.

That same weekend (March 28-30), De La Salle and Carondelet students participated in the International Thespian Society State Competition in Upland, California. The competition is attended by 70 high school ITS Troupes in Northern and Southern California and over 2,000 student artists competed. Please help us in congratulating the following students for their accomplishments:

Grace Hatfield – Selected as the Light Board Operator during Main Stage All Fest.
Jessica Pulver – 3rd in State for Dance
Alana Dallmann – Cast in All Festival Closing Number
Robert Nelson – Superior in Solo
Robert Nelson – Cast in main stage Playworks (against 200 other male students)
Jeff Gilbert – Superior in Monologue
Justin Campo – Superior in Monologue
John Laurence & Robert Nelson – Superior in Duet Acting
Dante Williams – Superior Stage Management in Dogfight

Finally, join me in celebrating the 20 AP Biology students who received awards at the Contra Costa Science and Engineering Fair. Two students qualified for the state competition:

Luke T. Anderson (1^st Prize in the Behavioral Category) and Thomas Cumbelich (1^st Prize in the Physical Category). In addition, students were honored with named awards: Angelo Grajeda (US Naval Science Award), Colton May (Chevron Special Award), Ben Deviney (Stockholm Junior Water Prize Regional Award), and Alexander Wackowski (Meteorological Society Award and Contra Costa Water District Award). All of this would not be possible without the vision and guidance of our Science department, Dr. Elizabeth Berkes (Director of Faculty Development), and Mrs. Viki Acquistapace (AP Biology teacher).

As always, it is with gratitude that we thank you for the gift of educating your children and for your partnership. Have a blessed Easter.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

I have an exciting story to share that began this time last year and that includes our nine students in Drawing and Painting 2, three of our Visual and Performing Arts teachers (Thomas Wickboldt, Jennifer Ricketts, and Rebecca DeWeese), and two school counselors (Scott Drain and Lindsay Melaas).

Here is how the story began: in the spring of last year, we sent Jennifer Ricketts and Thomas Wickboldt to a professional development opportunity at the Christian Brothers’ retreat on the Russian River that allowed them to connect and discuss best practices with multiple VAPA teachers from our partner schools in the San Francisco New Orleans district. They returned with an amazing idea modeled after a teacher-student collaborative project at San Miguel High School in Tucson, Ariz. The project asks our advanced arts students to pitch, design, and implement a semi-permanent art installation that expresses one of the five Lasallian Core Principles. The teachers came to me with a proposal at the end of May, and I said yes before they finished the pitch. They applied and were awarded a faculty innovation grant, with Rebecca DeWeese, to create the curriculum for the 2018-2019 school year.

Fast forward to the fall of this school year. De La Salle runs two Drawing and Painting 2 courses this year, with nine students combined over both sections. The students this year who were tasked with the project are:

Tyler Cesio
Noah Cheng
Chloe Creecy
Benjamin Deviney
Jonathan Diaz
Jack Hazard
Aidan Payne-Kraus
Jackson Shess
Jacob Vines

They were asked, while working simultaneously on the other course curriculum, to focus their design on the Lasallian Principle of the year, inclusive community. Each class section created a design, received feedback from the art teachers, revised the design, and crafted a draft to be judged by me, the three arts teachers, and the two school counselors. Two weeks ago we selected the design, and now the students will create collaboratively a mural painted in sections that will reside in our Student Support Services hallway for every member of our community to see. The installation, which will be there for years to come, will include the artist statement, a legend that describes the visual imagery and how it connects to the theme of inclusive community, and a legend that names which artist created which panel.

Words cannot express how thrilled and emotionally moved we are about this year-long project that relies on multiple people, students and faculty alike, to render visible one of the hallmarks of Lasallian education, namely that we are and will always aim to be an inclusive community. The project not only brings together people, but also multi-disciplines, real world experience, the spiritual, the pragmatic, and the artistic. It is particularly special that the students are working on the actual installation during the season of Lent, which underscores the importance of an artistic artifact that asks us to consider the possibilities of charity, compassion, and redemption. Aiden shared with me that “this is exciting because … this is a real thing people are going to see” and Tyler commented that the art is “more to affect others and to have them see the art the way we do.” I will let you know as soon as it is finished and installed so you can come visit the magic. 

We are in the thick of what some of our teachers call March Madness: Quarter 3 ends today and both the Contra Costa Science Fair and our participation in the First Robotics competition will happen within the next two weeks. Our annual Charity Challenge began on Ash Wednesday.

Finally, I would like to congratulate our Director of Student Support Services, Scott Drain, who will now sit on the advisory council for the Mental Health Education Press. His work with this organization will not only allow him to offer his significant gifts as a pastoral counselor, but also enable him to collaborate on resources that we will be able to share with our entire community.

Additionally, a huge congratulation to student William Cumbelich, who is officially a National Merit Scholar Finalist.

As always, thank you to our community for your partnership.

Sincerely,
Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Imagine my delight when I received this email from one of our teachers,
Mrs. Victoria Acquistapace, on January 31st saying: 

Xander Friedman '21 has successfully transformed mouse stem cell to Neural tissue (image below). He will try today to artificially “clump” these cells as seen in Alzheimer’s then un-clump them with two biological agents.

Yesterday, I received an email from Mr. Andrew Berkes, Religious Studies Department Chair, summarizing an activity his students performed that is part of our Mentors in Violence Prevention curriculum; when I ran into both him and one of his female students, they were excited to discuss how impactful the activity was. I relish the emails and the personal exchanges with faculty, staff, and students alike that ask us to celebrate student innovation and the creation of meaningful student communities.

As I have said time and time again, the great work of our faculty and staff make the creation of our Lasallian community possible. Last weekend ended our Mental Health Awareness week with another moving Laps for Life gathering in the Hofmann. This week would not be possible without the vision and hard work of Mr. Andrew and Dr. Elizabeth Berkes’s Service Leadership class and the multiple teacher volunteers, including Ms. Meredith Barnidge and Mr. Scott Drain.

On Monday, Feb. 4, on our professional day, we all attended the 2nd Bay Area Lasallian Symposium at Saint Mary’s College that brought together the working communities of all Northern California Lasallian Schools to share best practices: the topics addressed everything from Blended Learning, to Enrollment Management, to a Senior Administrator roundtable. I want to thank the two members of our community, Mrs. Linda Byrne and Ms. Lillian Dickson, who spent two years as volunteers on the planning committee.

I would like to commend two additional teachers. Mrs. Anna Talmadge, the chair of the De La Salle Social Studies Department, has been awarded Veterans of Foreign War Teacher of the Year at both the district and state level for her innovative curriculum that focuses on citizenship education topics. She now represents California in the national competition for the Smart/Maher VFW National Citizenship Education Teacher Award. On January 25, we were notified that Mrs. Victoria Acquistapace was awarded a STEM Grant from the Toshiba America Foundation to purchase a plate reader. Toshiba America Foundation’s grants fund projects designed by individual classroom teachers. This “direct-to-teacher” approach brings immediate results. Teachers are able to change the way they teach Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects because the grant supports equipment for hands-on experiments and inquiry-based approaches to the curriculum.

For two weeks in February, De La Salle and Carondelet will focus on the issue of human dignity and respect. This week, Carondelet begins its seventh year of participation in One Billion Rising, a global movement drawing attention to the issue of violence and sexual assault suffered by women around the world. This week of awareness-raising, education, and empowerment is complemented by De La Salle students learning how they can be allies in the fight to end gender-based violence. For the last three years, De La Salle has used this week to educate and raise awareness on the role of men’s leadership in combatting and ending harassment and violence, as we “Rise Together, Respect Each Other”.

The week of February 11-14, De La Salle will host its Respect Week with the theme “Respect Yourself - Respect Others.” Building off the awareness raised during Mental Health Awareness Week, our campus will explore how cultivating a healthy sense of self can extend to how we interact with and treat others. The week will end with two assemblies on Thursday the 14th:

• for the 9th and 10th graders, we welcome back Mr. Ashanti Branch of the Ever Forward Club.
  Mr. Branch will host a pilot workshop with our students to explore the concept of personal boundaries and how the boundaries we create inform the way we show up in the world as men of integrity;
• for the 11th and 12th graders, representatives from the Contra Costa District Attorney’s Office will host a presentation on our roles and responsibilities in combating sexual assault (CHS is hosted the same presentation on Feb. 7);
• Respect Week programming also leads into the school’s Day of Silence (Feb. 22), which is a way to highlight the voice-lessness of those who are oppressed into silence by harassment and violence.

In the flurry of the schools’ vibrant activities, I am trying to finish a daunting reading list (The Hebrew Bible: A Translation With Commentary by Robert Alter and How We Learn by Benedict Carey). I am always compelled by the work of Roy Petitfils, who was the keynote speaker at our Lasallian Symposium, and I will continue to contemplate his work on teenage mental health. We encourage you to take a look.

As always, it is with gratitude that we thank you for the gift of educating your children and for your partnership.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

We just completed the first day of school, and it is amazing to see how much the campus changes when school is in session. I always have to remind myself that when the students return, I have to move quickly out of the quad at the beginning of break as the young men literally race to the Hofmann Center to eat. Yesterday, the students in my Study Skills class noted that the things they loved the most about Christmas break were time with family and friends and sleeping. It always puts a smile on my face when the campus lights up on the return of all of our students.

January in the life of De La Salle High School not only inaugurates the second semester, but also ushers in the academic counseling all students will receive as they prepare to register for the 2019-2020 school year. As a quick reminder, semester one grades were stored on January 3rd, so please make sure to consult PowerSchool.

The most current edition of the course catalogue will be available on January 15th, and Academic Advisement officially begins for pre-registration on January 28th. In order for students to register, they are required to complete the Annual Student Survey, which will go live in a few days, is a necessary piece of our accreditation, and asks students to reflect on every aspect of school life. Their reflections, as always, help drive any changes we make across the campus.

At the final meetings last semester, the Academic Affairs Council (which is the advisory body of the school comprised of Academic Chairs and Directors that approves all curriculum and gives advice regarding all aspects of academic life), approved many exciting new pieces of curriculum. The school next year will be offering its first interdisciplinary course, entitled “Literature, Conflict, and the Human Experience.” The course will focus on “international conflicts that often go unexplored in secondary education” by evaluating the history surrounding and literature produced through the Irish Independent Conflict, the Belgian Congo, and the rise of the Khmer Rouge. This course will be open to Seniors (and Juniors upon approval), will fulfill one of the English requirements, and will be co-taught by an English and History teacher. We are so excited to be able to expand our students’ ability to think as global citizens. The Council also approved our new AP Computer Science Principals, AND a revision of the Religious Studies Curriculum. The former, which is the cornerstone of any Lasallian education, will have a three-year roll out, so stay tuned for more to come!

We are in our second year of our Faculty Innovation Grants, which funds faculty to think, design, and vision in new ways, and much of the new curriculum is a direct result of that initiative and the dedication of our faculty.

Before I sign off, I would like to celebrate two more things.

Congratulations are in order for John Christopher Wackowski, who will be the student keynote speaker for the KPIX/KCBS Jefferson Awards Ceremony night on January 16 at the Herbst Theater for his work on Diabetic Hope, a non-profit he founded.

Also, the entire school community wants to send a serious SHOUT OUT to all of our De La Salle families. Because of you, the school donated literally hundreds and hundreds of toys to various organizations, including the Bay Area Crisis Nursery, Holiday Helpers Warehouse in Martinez, Oakland Catholic Worker, Monument Crisis Center, and Running With Love (during Ven a Ver Salinas Immersion). During the Advent season, we witnessed daily the spirit of Christ and St. John Baptiste de La Salle alive in all of you.

Welcome back.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

December 6, 2018

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

How is it possible that December is upon us? The month’s arrival ushers in some of my favorite activities at the school:

• the ongoing Toy Drive, which will be held until December 19^th
• the Physics boat races that will be held in the pool on December 11^th
• the Our Lady of Guadalupe Liturgy on December 12^th
• the DLS/CHS Christmas Concert on December 13^th, held in the Hofmann Student Center starting at 7 pm

Congratulations are in order for Company, whose production of Dogfight (ongoing until December 8^th) showcased not only our student talent, but also our students’ ability to maturely, insightfully, and sensitively treat such complicated and messy theatrical material. One of the reasons I always swing by the students’ theater auditions is because it is so gratifying to see how much our students grow over the course of each production. I will be there sometime next week when spring play auditions begin for Pygmalion.

Congratulations are also in order for the group of De La Salle and Carondelet students who competed and won multiple awards in Ludi Novembres (11/10) at St. Ignatius College Preparatory in San Francisco.

As semester one comes to an end, here are a few reminders:

• Final exams are firm dates, and any student who is sick will need to notify both the attendance office and Mrs. Mattos to schedule make-up exams (mattosma@dlshs.org).
• Grades will be available after they are stored on January 3^rd.
• Classes resume for the second semester on Wednesday, January 9^th.

Finally, let me wish you and your families a restful and joyful Advent season and Christmas.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

November 1, 2018

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Since I have started working at De La Salle, November has taken on a new pace that mirrors that of the school. It begins with the All Saints Day Mass, seems to always include NCS playoffs, and will end not only with Thanksgiving but also with Company’s fall theatrical production. As I have written before, as a life-long theater lover, the production of the school's plays always inspire me, most specifically because of the way they showcase student courage, growth, and talent. Our fall play is no exception.

De La Salle and Carondelet Company’s fall production is Dogfight (which will run from November 28-December 8). Dogfight is a musical that chronicles the last evening of six Marines before they depart to Vietnam. They host a “dogfight,” which is a contest to see who can bring the “ugliest” girl. The story then unfolds as our protagonist comes to realize he has feelings for Rose, the girl he chose to subject to this humiliation. Rose is the example of compassion and empathy that is the heart of the production. Although it is an upbeat and fun musical, there is an undertone of layered seriousness that could be mistaken if not seen with mature eyes, as Dogfight deals with sexual harassment, objectification, mob-mentality effects, the role of the bystander, standing up to friends, and the importance of radical self-awareness. The spring production, Pygmalion, was also intentionally chosen to extend the conversation about respectful behavior. Director of Theater Arts, Meredith Barnidge, points out: “We create the people we spend our time with by how we treat them.”

The selection of both plays is timely, confronts topics relevant to teenagers who are asked to negotiate a thorny and complicated world, and allows both schools to continue to investigate and to model the importance of bystanders in disrupting damaging norms and behaviors. Most importantly, the plays ask our students to be front and center in using the artistic process to engage the real world challenges they face every day.

Both De La Salle and Carondelet will participate in ongoing conversations with students about the topics the play illuminates. Crucially, Ms. Barnidge will have made over 20 invited classroom visits on both campuses to introduce the play to students outside of Company and to help them understand its layered content. In addition, a video announcement will be made at both schools, lunch time forums will be held for students, and two “talk-backs” will be offered after the December 2 matinee and December 7 showing. 

The end of October bore witness to the fruition of many school-wide initiatives:

• The cereal drive ended in excess of our goals, and we donated 3,095 boxes.
• Last Friday’s Jim Olwell Memorial Duck Race raised almost $500 for Blood Cancer Research.
• This month, our English 2 courses began a new Service-Learning project in conjunction with The Catcher in the Rye, which teacher Greg Brown-Davis summarizes here:
  “Using the medium of children’s picture books, it is our hope to expose young kids to life lessons of substance without having to learn by getting smacked between the eyes. Students will spend over two months creating and illustrating the books which will then be voted on by their peers; the winners will get the opportunity to an elementary school and read their work to kids.”

• To inaugurate the project, Mr. Rick Graham and Mr. Brown-Davis invited children’s book author and DLS mother Mrs. Lisa Bakos to share her work and to give students an overview of how to craft their own children’s picture books. It was such a delightful presentation to witness!
• Last week, the Physics courses participated in one of my favorite academic activities, the DLS Egg Drop (CLICK HERE to see video), while our inaugural HNRS Biology course began a Photosynthesis Lab.

As we look forward, I would also like to make you aware of an exciting parent education event Co-hosted by the College Counseling Departments and the Parent Associations at De La Salle and Carondelet:

Special Guest Speaker: New York Times bestselling author, Harlan Cohen
Date: Wednesday, November 7
Time: 7 p.m.
Location: DLS Theater

Cohen will be here to present Happy, Healthy, Almost Stress-Free College Planning: A New Approach to Search & Selection, which applies a new lens to an old process that shifts the power from the college to the student. Parents and students in 10^th-12^th grade are encouraged to attend. 

On November 14, De La Salle will host the second meeting of the Consortium of Boys’ Schools, which we convened beginning in June 2018, to continue sharing best practices and topics impacting other school communities. Return to the De La Salle website for updates following this meeting. 

As we are approaching the end of semester two, we would like to remind every student that we have multiple academic and emotional supports to help them succeed.

We wish you and your families a healthy and joy-filled month of gratitude.

Thank you.

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

October 4, 2018

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

We are quickly approaching the end of the first quarter; as always, it has been a rich and invigorating beginning to our school year, and we have so much to share. First, we would like to invite you to join us in congratulating our senior Semifinalist in the 2019 National Merit Scholarship Program: William Cumbelich. In addition, 12 seniors were named Commended Students:  Henry Baer, Rithik Castelino, Peter Christie, Charles Conrad, Aiden Guzman, Riley Hilt, Timothy Kostolansky, Connor Livingston, Joshua Manickam, Cole Silva, Michael Wentworth, Jr., and Dylan White. Bravo, gentlemen!

In Academic Life, we continue to focus on interdisciplinary collaborations, both within the campus and beyond. Here are some of the collaborative highlights:

• Our students and faculty are participating in multiple service activities, and many of them are part of our Service Learning Curriculum. The annual Cereal Drive is in full swing, and it began on September 24 and will continue through October 12. Here is the video, “It’s Crunch Time,” we showed during Back to School Night. Wednesday (October 3), Carondelet and De La Salle hosted a Blood Drive; we had 60 appointments, and with those, the community far exceeded the goal of 36 units of blood. Our De La Salle community will be supporting the Down Syndrome Connection of the Bay Area with donations from a Jamba Juice sale during the Power Puff game on Thursday.
   
• On Tuesday, October 9, on our Professional Day, Carondelet and De La Salle will host our first Innovation Conference across both campuses, in which faculty from every department will present sessions on innovative classroom practices, curriculum, and co-curriculum. We will offer 19 sessions over three hours, and each faculty member will attend three sessions. The sessions include topics as varied as “Restorative Practices for Classrooms, Teams, Clubs, and Beyond” and “Student Interdisciplinary Research Symposium” at Carondelet and “Mentors in Violence Prevention, Theater, and Respectful Education Initiatives on Winton Drive” and “Six Degrees of Star Wars: The Use of Cultural Iconography to Deepen Thematic Purpose and Foster Relevancy” at De La Salle. We are so excited to learn from one another! Stay tuned for more to come on social media after the conference.
  
   
• October 22-26 will witness our Second Annual Stream Week hosted by the De La Salle Library. Head Librarian Elaine Seed shared, “we hope the boys will see the fun side of science, and we hope to challenge their creativity.” Every day at lunch and after school, there will be different activities, and students will be able to build Littlebits Circuits, Catapults, Bristlebots, and more. Please reach out to the library if you have any questions.

As we move through our homecoming week on both campuses, I would like to take this time to thank and celebrate our De La Salle and Carondelet families, who contribute so much to the creation of community on both campuses.

Thank you.

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

September 4, 2018

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Welcome back! Last week, De La Salle High School and De La Salle Academy were honored to have Bishop Barber celebrate the Mass of the Holy Spirit with us. The level of respect and reverence our students showed Bishop Barber was something that we are all still talking about. It was a wonderful way for the students to embrace and demonstrate this year’s Lasallian theme, Inclusive Community.

As you may remember, we have partnered with Stanford’s Challenge Success (http://www.challengesuccess.org/) program since 2013, which gives us access to a dizzying array of strategies to promote adolescent health and a strong school climate of care. In spring 2018, we administered the Stanford Survey of Adolescent School Experiences for the second time, and we were the first school in the nation to administer the Challenge Success Parent Survey. As an entire school community, we will be working with the results for the next few years as they help us identify areas of strength and those of growth. Some of our most important findings underscore that students report that we have a nurturing, warm community. 757 students responded to the survey’s first question: "If you were going to use three words or phrases to describe De La Salle, what would they be?" The four “most common categories of words” that students used to describe their experiences at the school are

Family or community
Religious
Caring or Welcoming
Academic

In addition, the same number of students responded that on average they are doing 42 minutes of homework less per night and yet our student achievement is as strong, or stronger, than ever. We have more work to do on how we can help our students gain the skills to lead healthy, balanced lives and still engage in multiple activities, and we look forward to that ongoing challenge.

This year marked the second consecutive year we have combined Carondelet and De La Salle students together for part of our orientation program. For the 9th and 10th graders, we were pleased to welcome back Ms. Kim Karr. Ms. Karr is a former teacher and co-founder of #ICanHelp, a program designed to educate and empower students to use social media positively and combat negative behaviors they witness online. For the 11th and 12th graders, we welcomed back to campus renowned gender violence educator Dr. Jackson Katz and Mrs. LaShonda Coleman from MVP Strategies. Dr. Katz and MVP are key architects of the bystander approach to preventing gender-based harassment and violence. The bystander approach stresses the power of the bystander as a leader, notably that everyone has the power to influence his/her peer group by choosing at important moments to take an ethical stand.

De La Salle has partnered with MVP Strategies for professional development and student training designed to strengthen the culture of respect and inclusion within our school community. Respect and Inclusion will continue to be a focus for us, centered in our Lasallian charism.

The joint orientations programs are a direct outgrowth from student forums and discussions we hosted last year. We listened to our students who asked for more opportunities to be educated and hear the same messages together. Film screenings, speakers such as Dr. Katz (who spoke to parents at an education evening last year), and ongoing topical discussions will continue to be provided for our parents. We look forward to partnering with you as we shape your sons to continue to live out what it means to be a “Man of Integrity.”

I want to end this letter by celebrating the diligence and commitment of our students and teachers. Last spring, 216 of our students (188 juniors and seniors, 28 sophomores) took an AP class and respective AP exam. Our student pass rate (those who received a 3 or higher) was a remarkable 89.4%. That is the highest in the school’s history.

As a reminder, we will be delighted to see you at Back to School Night on Thursday, September 6 at 6:30, starting in the gym.

Again, welcome back to all families. We are so thankful to be working with your sons.

Thank you.

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

June 6, 2018 

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

The 2017-18 has come to an end, with the graduation of our 2018 class and the promotion to the next level of our freshmen, sophomores, and juniors. (To see the 2018 graduation ceremony, please click here.)

Last week, we said goodbye officially to some beloved faculty and staff members. Mr. Robin Bradford (40-year DLS Social Studies teacher) and Mr. Michael Otterstedt (30-year DLS school counselor and Director of Student Support Services) both retired at the end of this year. We will miss their wisdom and humor, and it is hard to imagine this place without these men who have worked here in combined years longer than the school has existed!

We also say goodbye to Mr. Tim Chu (Library), Mr. Chris Crespi (Science), Mr. Jordan Kirkner (Math), Brother Patrick Martin, FSC (Religious Studies), Mrs. Shannon Sullivan-Danser (Communications Assistant), and Mr. Chris Trinidad (Religious Studies). We wish them well as they pursue other life journeys, many of them in other locations.

We welcome to our 2018-2019 De La Salle family these new hires: Mr. Brian Wiersma (Library), Mr. David Nelson (Science), Ms. Danielle Garrison and Mr. Travis Pacos (both Math), Mr. Jason Shelton (Religious Studies), Mr. Rich Davi (Communications Associate), and Ms. Lauren Stevens (School Counselor). 

Please be attentive to the upcoming summer electronic mailing (forthcoming mid-July); it will include everything from required summer reading to a check list of responsibilities to prepare for the upcoming school year. 

Thank you for a wonderful year, and enjoy your summer! We look forward to seeing you again in the fall. 

 
Sincerely, 

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

As we approach the end of the 2018-2019 academic school year, I have been ruminating about Walt Whitman’s “Song of the Open Road.” It is a poem in which Whitman, the speaker poet, envisions his journey as an ongoing interplay between the open road, his body, and his soul. It seems such an appropriate poem to ponder as our students move through another transition, whether it be to college or to another grade. Whitman writes ultimately that “Wisdom is of the soul.” As we quickly approach our 2018 graduation, I have thought a lot about the concept of wisdom. We as educators approach every day at De La Salle as one in which we both instruct and learn from our students, from the “Wisdom of [their] souls.” I am struck often not only by our students’ academic, athletic, and artistic accomplishments, but also and often more so by their faith and kindness and compassion and humor and sense of fun. Every day feels like an open road where we have the wonderful opportunity to learn from each other.

To that end, it is no surprise how much we would like to celebrate our students and faculty at the end of the year. Last week, we celebrated St John Baptist de La Salle Founder’s Day with a liturgy, field day, and the announcement of the 2018 Lasallian Educator of the Year, Mrs. Mary Ann Mattos (DLS Director of Academic Services). Mrs. Mattos has been a Catholic educator and administrator for over 35 years, and one peer captured her contributions to our community beautifully when writing Mrs. Mattos’s nomination: “This educator’s commitment to students and parents and determination to help students succeed is unparalleled and visible on a daily basis as this educator interacts with students, parents and faculty on the students’ behalf. This educator’s embodiment of the Lasallian core principles is also exemplary.”

Four students competed in the State Science Fair in Los Angeles, also last week—Chris Fakhimi, James Jolin, William Milosovich, and Dami Olatunji—and Chris, James, and Dami all placed Honorable Mention. Our AP Biology teacher, Mrs. Acquistapace, summarized their participation: “To make it up on the stage at the State Science Fair …well there are actual Nobel Prize winners walking and part of the mix of it all … is special.” The weekend before, DLS and CHS students participated in the Junior Classical League State Convention, and they placed 2^nd overall in the category of small High School team.

This evening, we will hold our NHS inductions. This Thursday, we will hold our Spring Recognition Assembly. For the past two days, a group of faculty, staff, and administrators participated in full-day workshops with trainers from Jackson Katz’s Mentors in Violence Prevention Strategies as we continue to strategize how to move the training program into the classroom and beyond.

As we speak, the art work for the Winton Arts Festival is still up in the Old Cafeteria, and the Company’s production of Little Shop of Horrors continues through May 5^th. I would also like to share with you a news clip about a CHS and DLS brother and sister team, Sophia and Luke Anderson, and the non-profit organization they founded together four years ago called Para Ti Global. They are both regional Jefferson Awards recipients.

Finally, as you may have heard, we mourn the recent passing of the great philanthropist Mr. Ken Hofmann. His contributions to the De La Salle community are numerous and include the STREAM Center, the Hofmann Center, and the DLS Academy. We extend our condolences to his family, and we pray for his continued journey with God. St. John Baptist de La Salle. Pray for us. Live, Jesus, in our Hearts. Forever.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

April 6, 2018

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Although the Lenten season has ended, I continue to reflect upon the various ways our community comes together in the spirit of Christian service, an ongoing pillar of all Lasallian communities. On March 28^th, faculty and staff began Easter break by volunteering across the Bay Area on various service projects, including Habitat for Humanity, various food pantries, ARF, and Save Mount Diablo. The 2018 Charity Challenge ended in March with students, faculty, and staff raising more than $10,000, and we welcomed home another successful Ven a Ver immersion Campus Ministry trip from San Diego. One of my favorite moments of the Lenten season included the Student Lead Reflections every Friday in our Studies Skills class, which I co-teach with Mrs. Mattos, Ms. Stevenson, and Mr. Bristol. The most recent reflection included one student’s evaluation of his Lenten promise to perform four acts of intentional kindness every day.

March proved to be yet another amazingly fruitful month in the academic life of the school. De La Salle students from our AP Biology program presented cutting-edge research at the Contra Costa Science and Engineering Fair. Dami Olatunji’s project entitled “Biting Back - Mosquito Control” was the school’s top winning project and will send him to the state science fair, and an impressive list of other students also placed in various categories including Behavioral Science, Biology, Engineering, Environmental Science, and Math & Computer Science. Those students include Grant Dermon and Cameron Katz; Charlie Kunz; Gus Gingrich; Cesario Randazzo; Zachary Golden-Trujillo; Sam Paonessa; Christian Abbas and Benjamin Moeller; Alex Avila and Ben Maier; Myles Bergman; Jack Lamborn and Tyler Manning-Shannon; William Milosevich; Ben Parker; Riley Cisneros-Mann; Chris Fakhimi and James Jolin; Brian Vega; Kevin Harioka; Christopher Rizkalli; and Jackson Castle. Please check out this piece on the science fair, in which our very own Ms. Viki Acquistapace talks with FM 103.7’s Martha Quinn!

The Robotics Club (bot #2141) made it to the semi-final alliance (out of 65 high schools) with schools from Napa and Vacaville at UC Davis for the FIRST Robotics Competition. Congratulations to all of the students who participated in these competitions!

The Visual and Performing Arts Department also had an active month. Two teachers, Mr. Thomas Wickbolt and Mrs. Jenn Ricketts, attending the discipline-specific workshop at St. Joseph’s Camp in the Russian River with other faculty from Lasallian schools in our San Francisco-New Orleans District. Additionally, students in Ms. DeWeese’s classes received the beautiful and moving portraits in situ that they created for Syrian children as part of their participation in The Memory Project (https://memoryproject.org/; https://memoryproject.box.com/RebeccaDeWeese).

The Learning Center continues to thrive as an academic hub, and we are so grateful for the collaborative efforts of Mr. Jon Norfolk, Mr. Sean Bristol, and Mr. Greg MacArthur, not to mention the dedicated volunteer Deb Jansen and the army of other adult and student volunteers. Here are some of the averages since we returned on January 11:

Makeup Tests/Quizzes

Total tests: 1400
Average tests per week: 115

Homework Study

Total: 350
Average per week: 30

Tutoring Sessions

Total: 700
Average tutoring sessions per week: 65

April and May will witness the Theater Company’s performance of The Little Shop of Horrors.

In addition, on April 30^th and May 1^st a group of administrators, faculty, staff, coaches will participate on campus in another intensive 2-day training in bystander approach with Jackson Katz’s Mentors in Violence Prevention Strategies. The training will continue the school’s multi-year partnership with Dr. Katz’s organization, and it will be the next stage of training for the school.

As always, we thank you for sharing the tremendous gift of your sons with our entire community.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

March 1, 2018

Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

President Mark DeMarco and I just returned from our attendance at the Lasallian Association of Secondary School Chief Administrators Conference in Orlando, Florida, during which Presidents and Principals from North America gather annually for multiple days of sharing and professional development. The conference not only introduces us to national educational specialists, but also enables us to contemplate and question the best practices of partner schools and allows us to connect in and through community. As you would expect, we spent a great deal of time in discussion about the most recent school shooting in Parkland, Florida; the growing student-led movement; school safety; the prayer and scriptural resources that help us navigate such a horrible event; and how we can best support our students before, during, and after moments of national trauma. Please watch our website for updates regarding these issues.

February’s frenzy of activities at the school also embody how inclusive community and quality education are inextricably intertwined in the Lasallian tradition. I am struck repeatedly by how many of our students exhibit daily these values, and as always, I am inspirited by their leadership. The first weekend in February we participated in Laps for Life, an event that was co-chaired by students Nick Brdar and Jack Napper and sponsored by the Jefferson Awards Students in Action Club. Hundreds of members of the community gathered for this moving and crucially important event, and student Dawson Diaz documented it.

February also included our participation in two important weeks: RISE Week with Carondelet (2/5-2/9) as well as our own Respect Week (2/12-2/16). During our Respect Week, we welcomed two national educational leaders about whom I have written extensively: Mr. Ashanti Branch and Dr. Jackson Katz. Please take a look at the photo gallery of Mr. Branch’s freshmen assembly. I include here a link to an article that beautifully summarizes our ongoing work to educate young men as our future servant leaders. In response to the Parkland school shooting, we gathered on the Day of Silence (2/23) to participate in a student-led prayer, in which two students gave up their “vow of silence” to give voice to those who cannot. Please reach out to me directly if you would like a copy of the prayer service—it was beautiful. We will be sending an email in the upcoming weeks to provide more information about Respect Week and the work that has happened since then, so please keep an eye out for that.

Two groups also just returned from academic adventures outside of the school. Two of our language teachers attended the World and Modern Language Educators’ Workshop held at St. Joseph’s Camp from 2/22-2/24. These workshops bring together educators from across the Lasallian District of San Francisco-New Orleans to share effective pedagogical practices in their discipline and to create an ongoing disciplinary community beyond the boundaries of any single school. Two of our VAPA department members will be attending their discipline workshop in March. De La Salle students also participated in Close-Up, during which they spent a week in Washington, D.C. with students from around the country engaging in debate, exploring monuments, and learning about the function of government. They studied each major monument: when and why it was made, what it is supposed to represent, and why it was put in a specific location. Students discussed current policy in small groups with other students from around the country. They ran a full mock congress. They discussed major topics currently in debate on the floor. De La Salle students and two faculty members spent over an hour with Congressman Mark DeSaulnier, and they toured multiple nationally important locations: the Library of Congress, the Supreme Court, the Holocaust Museum, the Newseum, the African American Smithsonian, and the Georgetown campus.

In the month of March, we will continue to see our students participate in multiple educational activities. Here I share some of the highlights:

• It is an active month for our band program, as our Jazz band will participate in the CSU Stanislaus Jazz Festival (3/2), and our Concert band will participate in the Sonoma State University Band & Orchestra Invitational (3/7)

• The Senior Mother and Son Mass and Brunch will occur this Sunday (3/4).

• From 3/8-3/11, the DLS Men of Faith Chorale along with the CHS Women’s Chorale and the joint DLS/CHS Concert Choir are traveling to Anaheim, CA to compete in the Heritage Music Festival. This is the second year of the DLS Men of Faith Chorale’s existence as an academic elective, and we have made significant strides in incorporating theoretical music concepts and applying these to our performance practice. A highlight of the trip will be the opportunity to sing on the Disney SoundStage, which is where voiceover and choral parts are recorded onto the soundtrack of a Disney animated film.

• Our AP Biology students will compete in the Contra Costa Science and Engineering Fair (an Intel Affiliated Fair) from 3/15-3/17.

• Our Robotics team will head once again to UC Davis for the FIRST Robotics Competition (3/22-24), for which they have been preparing all year.

We are so proud of the work our young men do. Thank you, again, for sharing your sons with us.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

• February 12-13 (Lunch): In partnership with the Contra Costa Alliance to End Abuse, students will be encouraged to take the “No More” pledge against interpersonal violence.
• February 13-14 (Lunch): As part of the Ever Forward Club’s 100K Mask Challenge, students will be invited to examine the masks we wear that conceal our true selves.
• February 14: Ash Wednesday Prayer Service
• February 15 (Special Assembly): Mr. Ashanti Branch will conduct a keynote and workshop with students examining the masks of masculinity and challenging our young men to look at the role masks play in their own lives. Mr. Branch was here last year, and we are excited to have him return and continue this important conversation with our young men.
• February 15 (7:00-9:00 p.m.): De La Salle and Carondelet High Schools are pleased to welcome Dr. Jackson Katz for a special presentation, entitled “Bystander Training as Leadership Training,” on the role our students can take as empowered bystanders and leaders in ending cycles of harassment and violence. All families and students are welcome. Please see this page for additional information about both speakers, and please RSVP for the event!
• February 16 (Professional Development Day- No Classes for Students): Dr. Katz will conduct a professional development training for faculty, staff, and coaches at both CHS and DLS; this training will be the first in a series at De La Salle that will lead to bystander training for students.
• February 23: Our Respect Week Programming will extend into the following week to include our 10th annual sponsoring of Day of Silence, which is a day for all people to recognize and support all of those who are silenced through harassment, bullying, put-downs, and mistreatment. This year’s theme is “Use Your Voice.”

January 5, 2018

Dear Parents, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

Welcome back! We all hope that you and your families had a restful, peaceful, and joyful Christmas break.

We are all furiously preparing for the return of all students next week. Faculty and staff will return next Monday to begin one of two professional days, which will include (among other professional development activities) the second half of a workshop on best practices in working with students who have differentiated learning needs, especially those students with ADHD.

In January, your sons will be receiving academic counseling from teachers and counselors alike, as pre-registration for the 2018-2019 academic year begins February 1^st. The course catalogue will be online by the third week of January, and you will notice the addition of a new class: Computer Science. If you have any questions, please reach out to your son’s counselor and/or to Mrs. Mary Ann Mattos, the DLS Director of Academic Services.

Over the past few years, De La Salle has been engaged in a process of examining the prevailing culture of masculinity and its direct impacts on our campus culture. On Wednesday, January 24^th at 6:00 p.m., we will host on encore showing and discussion of the documentary The Mask You Live In. The documentary examines how popular culture, peer culture, parents, sports, and schools influence how young men interpret and inhabit their nascent masculinities. We originally presented a showing and discussion of the film last school year. We will also be offering a student viewing during the school day, the details of which will be shared during our daily announcements.

Two experts featured in the film will also be speaking at De La Salle and working with administrators, faculty, staff, parents, and students in February 2018: Ashanti Branch and Dr. Jackson Katz. Watch for a more detailed email introduction to both activists and to the school’s partnership with them in the coming days!

As always, we are so excited to have the opportunity to join your sons’ educational journeys, and we look forward to seeing you back on campus on January 10.
 

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

I did not read Benjamin Franklin’s Autobiography until I was a doctoral student in English, and I remember with crystal clarity the day I read it for the following reason: Franklin began the Library Company of Philadelphia in 1731, and he believed that a cornerstone of a healthy democracy is public access to libraries. Until that moment, I had never considered the role of libraries in the creation of the United States. As a lifelong bibliophile, I was absolutely charmed by the idea that the public circulation of books was so wedded to the founding of American democracy. It was with equal delight that I discovered, upon my first year at De La Salle, just how central our own Library is to the functioning of the school. Our three librarians, Ms. Elaine Seed, Mr. Timothy Chu, and Mrs. Brooke Heskett, have many commonalities: They all have an MLS degree (Masters of Library and Information Science), love reading, and create a library as an information hub that makes so much of our academic lives possible. They work daily to bring to life a vision that Benjamin Franklin shared—that access to reliable information, in multiple forms, is a necessity for the creation of ethical citizens. To that end, they offer not only their expertise, but also creative technological solutions and programming.

For instance, they noticed that DLS did not have a “hub” that allowed students to interact with one another technologically as they created group presentations. After research and through their own design, the librarians asked our technology team to build a handful of what they call “Collaboration Hubs,” presentation technology that enables students to work mutually in groups on a single, large screen. The “Collaboration Hubs” allow teachers, students, staff, and administrators alike to merge old fashion group work and collaborative thinking with new technology, and they enable students to polish their written, verbal, and media communication skills. Additional programming includes their creation of STREAM Week in the fall (recapped in the November 2017 Spotlight) and Comic Book Week in the spring. One of the resources that parents may be particularly interested in is the AR (Accelerated Reading) Book Guide, which is one of 40 “Spartan Guides” they have created to help students in their research. http://spartanguides.dlshs.org/

As we move to the end of the semester, I want to celebrate a number of students and faculty. First and foremost, congratulations to our DLS and CHS Theater Company for another thoughtful and moving theatrical staging, which was our fall play The Outsiders. I always attend the matinee when many of our root school students see the play, and it is honestly one of my favorite activities of the year. In the first weekend of November, our Model United Nations club competed in the Diablo Valley College Conference. Branden Ross received a Distinguished Delegate award for working with other delegates to craft recommendations for how Europe could combat the illicit trade of “conflict diamonds” mined in Africa. On November 18^th, a group of DLS and CHS students competed and won multiple awards in Ludi Novembres at St. Francis High School in Sacramento; the event is hosted by the California Junior Classical League (CJCL). During the third week of November, a group of DLS faculty and administrators attended and presented at Huether, which is an annual conference that brings together Lasallian educators who focus on innovative educational issues. Dr. Elizabeth Berkes spoke on the opening panel on the Lasallian educator vocation and additionally ran a workshop on Environmental Sustainability. Mr. Scott Drain presented on our SCORE program (Student Coalition on Respectful Education), and Mr. Mike Aquino addressed the topic, “Redefining Brotherhood: Giving Voice to Healthy Masculinity.”

As we move through Advent, I think almost daily about the DLS Toy Drive. It is a concrete reminder of our ethical obligation to one another, and it is a reminder how much our young men and families give. Walking by the many thoughtful contributions humbles us all daily. Thank you.

Finally, let me wish you and your families a restful and joyful Christmas.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

Dear Parents, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

As October comes to an end and November announces it presence with All Saints’ Day, I am yet again awestruck by the ebb and flow of the school year at DLS. Much of what will be accomplished in November by our students, faculty, and staff began in October. Take, for instance, our ongoing service learning projects, including those connected to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society in honor of our beloved teacher, Mr. Jim Olwell. On October 21^st, students, faculty, staff, and more participated and raised funds for the “Light the Night” walk; on Friday, October 27^th, we hosted the Jim Olwell memorial duck race, which also raised funds for the society. On this Friday, November 3^rd, our Be the Match Service Learning project will once again hold a registration drive at our home football game, which will continue to allow us to participate in the largest bone marrow registry in the world.

On the night of October 25^th, our Visual and Performing Arts department hosted their first “One Night Only” event, which allowed prospective students to participate in a behind-the-scenes interactive workshop as they rotated between Visual Art, Music, and Theatre. I cannot say enough about the energy, vision, and commitment to Lasallian education that our innovative teachers in that department share, and all were on full display that evening. Our forthcoming play, The Outsiders, will also showcase the significant talent that the VAPA department fosters in our students. Please join us on November 9, 10, 11, 16, and 18 at 7:00 p.m. for the play or on November 12 at 2:00 for the matinee.

Other partnerships that teachers have created for our students these two months add depth both to their curriculum and to their students’ learning. Our Learning Center continues to thrive with the partnerships our coordinators have created. In October alone, we had approximately 350 tutoring appointments. If you need to schedule an appointment or want to learn more about the programs we have there, please visit the Learning Center page here. In Mrs. Joan MacDonald’s junior level religion class, which focuses heavily on the sacraments, she asked her students to participate in “The Kindness Project” in the wake of the Las Vegas shootings. She asked students to paint two rocks as a means to bring God to others’ in to the world, and her instructions specifically requested: “What would your message to the world be? How could you put that simply enough on the rock to bring the message to the world?” To turn the assignment in, they had to take a picture of themselves with the rocks, and the students have until Thanksgiving weekend to physically place them in the world and to photographically document their placements. I invite all of you to follow their efforts after Thanksgiving by joining the Instagram page that Mrs. MacDonald created and the students named: @wintonrocks. For her Biology classes on Mondays November 6th and 13^th, Mrs. Acquistapace invited Dr. Vernard Lewis to speak. Dr. Lewis is a UC Berkeley professor who specializes in Urban Pests. Take a look at Dr. Lewis’s illustrious career here.

Finally, let me end by reminding you that in October, our counselors sent an email to you with resources on how to talk about respect with your sons. We heard back from many of you about how this letter helped facilitate conversations and lead to some deep conversations about consent, respect, and more. I thought it prudent to re-share that message in its entirety with you.

As ever, we are grateful to partner with you and your sons on this journey. We are working diligently on adding more program and educational opportunities for our students and parents, and we will share that information with you as it becomes available. We encourage you to speak with your sons and to reach out to the counselors or to me with any questions or concerns you might have.

October 25, 2017 Email to Parents from School Counselors

Live Jesus in Our Hearts.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

Dear Parents, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

As we approach the end of our first quarter of the 2017-2018 academic year, there are already many students to celebrate. First and foremost, we invite you to join us in congratulating our eight seniors who were named Commended Students in the 2018 National Merit Scholarship Program: Steven Cline, Easton Elting, Grant Gabrielson, Joseph Keane, Kyle McGrath, Bryson Patterson, Laurence Tacderas, and Daniel von Savoye. In addition, we also want to congratulate National Hispanic Recognition Program Scholars Jonathan Avila, Juan Gomez de la Vega, and Nicholas Pilgrim-Minaya.

On September 19^th, De La Salle student Shamal Perera '20 was honored at the San Francisco Giants game for his work raising money for Down Syndrome Connection. He was joined at home plate by Giants pitcher Hunter Strickland, DLS Jefferson Award co-moderator Mr. Andrew Berkes, and Jefferson Awards representative Kim Bonney. De La Salle will be celebrating Down Syndrome Awareness week from October 2^nd-8^th ,with Shamal as one of our student leaders.

From September 22^nd-24^th, our intrepid Theater Director, Ms. Meredith Barnidge, and other De La Salle faculty escorted a group of De La Salle and Carondelet students on a field trip to Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Oregon. The students and faculty stayed at the Southern Oregon University dorms, and they attended productions that included Merry Wives of Windsor and Shakespeare in Love.

In conjunction with our Lasallian Days of Peace, which will last from September 21^st -October 21^st, students in some of our freshmen English classes are participating in the “Then and Now Service Learning Project.” In complementing with their reading of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, students make a pledge in response to the prompt: “How can I be a voice for change, compassion, and social justice?” The responses range from mature to insightful, and I share with you some that I captured from Ms. Stevenson’s class: one student wrote “I …commit to try and stop racism on social media. I will prevent others from making racist/sexist jokes” and another wrote, “I … commit to standing up for someone I see that is getting bullied.”

We continue to support many students in our new Learning Center, and it is particularly important for us celebrate the over 100 students who have committed their time as peer tutors. Here are some particularly compelling numbers: we now have 45 National Honors Society tutors, 63 De La Salle Service Learning tutors, 10 Spanish Honors Society tutors, and 6 adult volunteer tutors, all of whom allow us to tutor in every subject area. As of last week, we are averaging 35 scheduled and drop-in tutoring appointments per week.

Before I sign off, let me invite all families and students to two special events that will be part of what we are now calling The Winton Drive Parent Education Series.

1. On October 5 at 6:30 p.m., join us in the De La Salle Theatre for a special screening of Angst, a documentary that raises awareness of and breaks the stigma around anxiety. For more information, visit this link here.
2. On October 18 at 6:30 p.m., Carondelet High School is hosting Striking Balance for You and Your Student. Included on a panel of experts will be Mr. Michael Aquino, our Director for Educational Technology. Joining him will be Nutritionist and current DLS parent Celeste Johnson, Life Coach and current DLS parent Torie Henderson, and Dr. Lizette Dolan, Carondelet's VP for Mission and Community Development. Here is a link to that evening.

As always, we thank you for allowing us to be part of your sons’ educational journeys.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

It is staffed by a group of coordinators who bring many years of experience helping students achieve academic, athletic, and life goals. Mr. Jon Norfolk, our new Learning Center Coordinator, has a Master of Arts in Education: Organizational and Leadership; Mr. Sean Bristol ‘97, Learning Needs and Spartan Success Coordinator, has a credential in Special Education and more than 15-years experience in public and private schools; and Mr. Greg MacArthur ‘03, Student Support Coordinator and Bishop Cummins Coordinator, has a Master of Arts in Catholic School Leadership. We invite all families to visit the new space during Back to School Night!

As some of you may already know, a group of 38 students, faculty, and two administrators made the long journey to Maupin, Oregon to witness the "path of totality" of the August 21 solar eclipse. Mr. Spencer Shively, our Science Department Chair, spent months planning the trip, and I was excited to be one of the adults accompanying the students on the trip. NASA set up camp just a few miles away from where we witnessed a natural and spiritual event that I can only describe as astonishing. As a lifelong educator, I have always believed in the profound value of a strong liberal arts education, an education that asks us to intentionally link the discoveries of multiple disciplines, from English to Science to Art to Religion. Witnessing the total eclipse reminded me, and I dare say all involved, that the reason that the liberal arts tradition exists in the first place is to give us the knowledge and language necessary to attempt to make sense of these types of experiences of wonder. Our science experience segued into a spiritual experience and ended in an art project. One student, Dawson Diaz, took pictures that impressed us so much that our Director of Faculty Development, Dr. Elizabeth Berkes, reached out to multiple media outlets to invite them to interview him and the other students on the trip. Check out the segment on KPIX linked here.

I also want to introduce our new Math teacher, Mrs. Roselle Macariola. She comes to us from St. Patrick – St. Vincent, where she was the co-chair of the Math Department with Mr. Matt Boyle and the sole chair after he left to join us here at DLS last year. She is starting her eighteenth year of teaching and has a Master’s Degree in Education from SF State as well as two teaching credentials.

Please join me in welcoming both her and Jon Norfolk to our faculty.

Before I sign off, I want to celebrate the hard work of the instructors and students alike that accomplished at the end of last school year a 100% AP pass rate on their respective AP Exams. Congratulations to Mrs. Marnell’s AP Calculus AB class, Mr. Marcheschi’s AP Latin class, and Mr. Diaz’s AP Spanish class.

Again, welcome back to all families. We are so thankful and delighted to be working with your sons.

Thank you,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh
Vice President for Academic Life

April 5, 2017

Dear Parents, Students, and Friends of De La Salle,

When I lived in New York City, my husband and I were avid theater fans, which is why in the 2008 theater season we saw four different versions of Macbeth, including one in Polish. The current school’s production of the very same Shakespearean play is, simply put, amazing. The set design, acting, lighting, and direction are all superb, and it is as memorable as the many professional productions of Macbeth that I have seen. Brava, Company!

March witnessed many academic accomplishments for our students. On March 16 and 17, a number of our AP Biology students exhibited their research and inventions at the Contra Costa Science and Engineering Fair. The standards to place 4th/3rd/2nd/1st are very high, and the Sophomores compete in a larger group with Juniors and Seniors from throughout the County. The work is judged for creativity, design, logic, thoroughness, problem solving, interviewing, and clarity of writing. It is with great pride that we congratulate our AP Biology Brotherhood and announce that all DLS AP Biology students placed at the competition! Eric Andre and Tanner Mercer won 1st Place and advance to the prestigious State Science Fair.

Also in March, three teams of Latin students competed in Certamen, a team-based trivia contest revolving around questions based not only on Latin, but also Roman mythology, history, and culture. The students have spent the past few months studying in their spare time in preparation for this contest. Their hard work paid off: every team managed to score enough points to qualify for the state semifinals, which will be held at the California Junior Classical League state convention this April. The Latin I team consisted of Sophia Hermelin, Jack Killeen, Antonio Renghini and Luke Taylor. The Latin III team consisted of William Cumbelich and the AP Latin team was comprised of Luke Giuntoli, Alexander Sintic, and Rohan Castelino. Congratulations to all of you, and good luck in the semi-finals!

The Robotics Club was at UC Davis on March 23-25 for the FIRST Robotics Competition. After nine qualifying matches, they were ranked 9^th out of 56 teams, which allowed them to be a team captain in the playoffs for the first time. They made it to the semifinals and were eliminated after a couple of very close matches.

Finally, when you walk on campus this spring, remember to check out our inaugural member of the Spartan Garden that our Science staff has been nurturing all year.

Sincerely,

Dr. Heather Alumbaugh