A Message from the President

Welcome to Ohlone, one and all, new and returning,

I hope you’re rested and refreshed from the summer. I hope you’re ready to dive in to Ohlone life for your first, or another, year with your heads up, your eyes and hearts open, your minds alert and peaceful. In this letter I hope to give you just a little information and inspiration, and then set you loose to go about the business of completing forms, writing checks and trying to help you and your kids get enough rest during a wildly busy time of year!

Great descriptions of Ohlone PTA abound, as do those of the other major committees at our school: the Core Values Committee (CVC), Site Council, Farm Council and Partners in Education (PiE). Allow me to direct you to the flyer in your Back to School (BTS) packet that describes these branches of leadership, to the Ohlone website and to the staff and your fellow parents, including anyone seen frequently on campus! As our school grows in size, and changes in many ways, I think each of us needs to hold on tightly to visions of inclusive, nurturing and functional community, and I hope the PTA will be a grand and dynamic vehicle for making many of those visions reality.

I really like the “exit skills” for our children: that Ohlone alumni would be people who:

• Seek opportunities to continue learning
• Can develop strong positive social interactions
• Can make decisions and take responsibility for the resulting outcomes
• Are able to discover and draw on all available resources
• Are well-rounded individuals

Do these strike you, as they do me, as great goals for EVERY person who has the privilege of being involved at Ohlone, children and adults alike? So much of what the PTA does all year long, from the one-time events like the Back to School Picnic and Ice Skating Party, to the ongoing services, like those provided by the Hospitality or Traffic Safety teams, is inspired by these over-arching goals and values. Please jump in and join us!

There is a ridiculously long online volunteer form, because this community is fabulously active! I encourage you to see yourself as one part of the big, beautiful picture that is Ohlone. Where would you like to make your brushstrokes? How can we model, for each other and our kids, the best of the human capacity by forging new partnerships and alliances in the face of inevitable change and adversity? If you order an Ohlone tee shirt (see the enclosed order form) your sleeves will already be “pushed up”, you’ll be ready for action and cooperation. The opportunities to take part and be involved at Ohlone are as myriad and diverse as its population. I ask you to “discover and draw on all available resources”, both familiar and new ones, as you consider what sort of involvement will best suit you and your family this year.

In addition to reminding you to attend to all the information contained in this Back to School packet, I want to heartily invite you to our first PTA General Membership meeting of the year, Friday, September 9, at 8:20 a.m., and to the four other such meetings that will occur throughout the balance of the year. We would like to have as much input as possible as we make decisions that impact our school community; your voices are welcome!

I also want to highlight this year’s move into the new building as a perfect, “all hands on deck” community building (no pun intended) event. All of the staff will need all kinds of extra support to make the move as seamless for the students as possible, so please be looking for ways to help with that process.

I hope you will find the PTA resourceful and approachable, a good place to bring both your questions and your answers about all things Ohlone. I look forward to meeting and working alongside as many of you as possible, and I welcome you to another year of grand adventure.

Jennifer Sampson
PTA President, and on behalf of the PTA Executive Board