The 9th Grade Experience

Special thanks to Pennsylvania Education Technology Expo and Conference (PETE&C) Day 1 Keynote Speaker Jimmy Casas for taking time after his sessions on Monday, February 7, 2022, to chat with the 9th Grade Experience Podcast about his own middle/high school time, how to encourage and teach students and educators how to ask for help, and what he would do if he were back in the role of principal attempting to work first-year high school students in a school’s culture.

According to his PETE&C bio, Casas strives to “Eradicate Average! CULTURIZE Your School. Average schools don't inspire greatness--and greatness is what our schools need if we are going to produce world-changing learners.”

To learn more about Jimmy, visit https://www.jimmycasas.com/ and to purchase his book Culturize, go to https://www.amazon.com/Culturize-Every-Student-Whatever-Takes-ebook/dp/B077QVXCRN/ref=sr_1_1?crid=EZSQG9VLYWQV&keywords=culturize&qid=1644257697&sprefix=culturize%2Caps%2C243&sr=8-1

To help promote the upcoming Emmaus High School Night at the Lehigh Valley Phantoms on February 19, 2022, this episode features two members of the team talking about their unique 9th grade experiences while chasing the dream of playing professional hockey. Linus Sandin and Garrett Metcalf have both followed a long path to reach playing in the American Hockey League and look back on their experiences up to this point with special host, Phantoms radio announcer Bob Rotruck.  

Sandin, originally born in Sweden, talks about how ingrained hockey was to his schooling experience while Metcalf shares how a decision made early in his high school career took him from home to pursue competitive hockey. Both interviews show the importance of focusing on a goal and doing everything possible in order to accomplish the desired outcome.  

Additional thanks to Amy Keller, Senior Creative Director for the Phantoms, for helping to facilitate these interviews as well Rotruck, who stepped in to hold the conversations based on player media availability.   

For more on the Lehigh Valley Phantoms, visit www.phantomshockey.com  

EHS Night at the Phantoms  

We are having an Emmaus Phantoms Night! 

The EHS Class of 2025 will be hosting an Emmaus Family/Friends Phantoms night open to all East Penn Families, Students, and Staff. The EHS Chorus will be performing the National Anthem and we have access to $40 tickets for just $25. If you order tickets before 1/21, you will be entered into a raffle for free future tickets, one of 8 spaces on the Fanboni during the game, and Phantoms swag. The more tickets we sell, the more raffle prizes we will have Use this link and share with anyone who you think would enjoy a fun night out at the Phantoms.  

https://fevo.me/emmaus  

Contact Mrs. Kaunitz for more information.

On this episode we spotlight everyone's favorite Emmaus High School "freshman," Branch, the Therapy Dog. Branch has been present in hallways and classrooms since the beginning of the school year, offering students another layer of support and comfort as they have returned back to the halls of EHS. You will hear from Mr. Mihalik, the coordinator of the East Penn Therapy Dog program, staff and students about the impact that Branch has had on anyone who has come into contact with him.

Please consider participating in the #BettyWhiteChallenge in order to help fund this amazing program in our school district by donating at the link below in the show notes.

Episode Breakdown

:08 - Introduction

4:04 - Staff Reflections on Branch

9:50 - Comparing  Branch to Other Therapy Dogs

15:05 - How Should You Approach Branch

16:06 - Why Do We Need Therapy Dogs in EPSD

25:22 - Help fund Branch and his buddies

Welcome Emmaus High School Class of 2026! Though we haven’t had our first major snow of the school year, thoughts are slowly beginning to turn to fall and the arrival of the next group of freshmen who will roam the halls of EHS. The first in-person introduction to EHS came on January 11, 2022, at the counseling department’s 8th to 9th grade guidance information night. On this episode, hear from current LMMS and Eyer students about what they are looking forward to at EHS and advisors/representatives from groups detailing the support and opportunities offered to first-year students.

To learn more about events discussed on this episode, please see the links below:

Phantoms vs Utica Comets - Class of 2025 Emmaus High School Night February 19, 2022

https://offer.fevo.com/phantoms-game-24-vs-utica-comets-2dz5fjz-248af0b?fevoUri=phantoms-game-24-vs-utica-comets-2dz5fjz-248af0b%2F

2022 EPSD and Communities in Schools Mental Health Symposium - February 21 - March 6

https://sites.google.com/eastpennsd.org/virtuamentalhealthsymposim2021/home?authuser=0

EHS Shave for the Brave - March 11, 2022

https://www.stbaldricks.org/events/Emmaus7

It’s normal for high school varsity athletes to put pressure on themself. Being a freshman on a varsity team only magnifies that intensity. Now, think about the expectations of being a first-year member of the nationally-ranked, defending state champion EHS field hockey team.

Autum Kernechel and Lauren Kushma cracked through and earned a spot on the varsity squad in what turned out to be a historic year for the program. The team celebrated a second-consecutive and 14th overall state championship along with coach Sue Butz-Stavin’s 46th year of coaching capped by her national-record 1,000th victory. On this episode, listen to Autum and Lauren talk about what it took to make the team, compete at a such high level, and transition to high school all in the same season.

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Emmaus High School Night at the Phantom

February 19, 2021

We are having an Emmaus Phantoms Night! The EHS Class of 2025 will be hosting an Emmaus Family/Friends Phantoms night open to all East Penn Families, Students, and Staff. The EHS Chorus will be performing the National Anthem and we have access to $40 tickets for just $25. If you order tickets before 1/21, you will be entered into a raffle for free future tickets, one of 8 spaces on the Fanboni during the game, and Phantoms swag. The more tickets we sell, the more raffle prizes we will have Use this link and share with anyone who you think would enjoy a fun night out at the Phantoms.

https://fevo.me/emmaus

Contact Mrs. Kaunitz for more information.

During the course of the fall semester, Kayla Canning, a senior, pre-service teacher from Cedar Crest College, shadowed me in the classroom, which was one of my first experiences with.a pre-service teacher. On today's episode Kayla will give her impressions and thoughts of what it's like as somebody that's learning to become a teacher, especially with 9th grade students. She also honestly looks back on her own ninth grade experience and assesses some of her decisions during that year and how those influenced her choice to be a teacher.

We have a couple shout outs! 

The East Penn Education Foundation. At the end of November, the 9th Grade Experience was awarded a grant to purchase some new video equipment for the podcast, so hopefully you will be seeing our video quality increase in the new year. The east Penn Education Foundation also gave the initial grant for the equipment to start the podcast so they've been there since the since the beginning. We thank the East Penn Education Foundation for their generous support of the podcast, and for supporting different projects throughout the school district as well.  

Thanks to all of you!

We are almost to the goal of reaching 5000 total views on YouTube. We appreciate how YouTube has caught on with students and staff and people in the community, making  it easier to experience the podcast. So if you haven't subscribed yet we're still trying to build that subscriber number up, go to 9th Grade Experience on YouTube, hit the subscribe button, watch the videos, and get us over 5000 views.  We're coming close to 10,000 total views and listens to the podcast since it started so it's really exciting to reach such a big number. So we appreciate all the people that have listened, over the course of the podcast as well.  

At the end of this episode, you'll see a commercial that we produced for ETV asking students to participate in our next challenge our next getting getting out there to give their new year's resolutions so we're

With over 2,800 students, Emmaus High School is a community of learners from many different cultural backgrounds. The focus of the Global Citizens Club is to assist students in learning about and becoming actively engaged in promoting a globally-minded consciousness and worldview. On this episode we hear from club members Britney Cordero, Cecilia Christ, Shiv Patel, and Ariana Ruiz describe the ways that the group strives to help expand student's understanding on the importance of celebrating the many cultures at EHS. They do this through different themed events, learning opportunities, and fundraisers to make connections to people all over the world. 

The club meets on the 1st and 3rd Thursday of each month in Room 230. For more information, please contact club advisor Mrs. Kita.  

When entering 9th grade, some students choose to ease into this transitional time to get their feet under them by limiting their activities and focusing on school.

Will Buck is not one of those students.

He is currently participating on two school sports teams during the fall season: varsity football as the kickoff specialist and JV soccer as a goalie. He is taking a demanding course load, full of upper-level honors classes. He is also one of the first students to reach out on his own to be interviewed on this podcast.

In this episode, Will shares how he was able to balance his busy fall season, the importance of time management, and why he is interested in podcasting.

Look for more from Will in the future as we look to incorporate him into future episodes of this podcast and prepare him to potentially host his own show.

This recording is from a roundtable discussion during a session at the 2021 Pennsylvania Council of Teachers of English and Language Arts Conference held October 22, 2021 in Harrisburg, Pa. This was a wide-ranging conversation about the impact that 9th grade English class can have on students during their remaining years of high school and beyond. Themes of connectivity, failure, and recovery came through many of the answers from four English teachers from across the state. The major questions addressed during the conversation included

Many thanks to the following educators who participated in the roundtable discussion

To learn more about the work of this organization and future conferences, please visit http://www.pctela.org/.