May 12- May 28

Only a few weeks left in this school year and our Calendar is packed with events. Most of the events are celebrations of student achievement. A highlight of student achievement at Rayburn is the annual Student Awards Night which is on May 19th. Keep in mind that this event will be at Rayburn this year. In addition, our music department will have spring concerts you won't want to miss. Other major events are The National Honor Society induction, The 8th grade dance, Field trips, 8th grade Panoramic Picture, and the Digital Media Fair Awards. Rayburn has three students who have placed at the district level in the Digital Media Fair Awards. See you at the Celebrations!

April 28- May 9

During the week of Monday, April 28 to May 2, our students will be completing high-stakes standardized testing. Please encourage children to get plenty of sleep, eat well, and manage stress. School begins at 8:30 a.m. and ends at 3:40 p.m. Our cafeteria serves breakfast and lunch. If students have free and reduced lunch they also qualify for free and reduced breakfast. Physical activity helps relieve stress and stimulate brain activity. Below is a link to released TAKS tests from previous years.

Released TAKS TESTS

April 17- 24

School News

Our campus is buzzing with activity this week. Our Band will perform at the UIL contest, our Science Department is hosting the popular Science Night, and the 5th-six-weeks grading cycle ends on Friday. There are important state tests on the horizon for the upcoming weeks. See the School events listed to the right. Below is a link to released tests that can be used to help prepare for state tests.

Released TAKS TESTS

April 1- April 14
Rick Riordan visited our campus! Yes the author of The Lightning Thief was in our cafeteria signing books and talking to students, parents, and teachers about his books. He told the story of how he started to write and explain the process he follows as he write his stories. He also shared is career history, he was a middle school teacher! Thanks to our Librarian, Ms. Damon, who arranged the whole evening, those who attended were treated to a neat experience. See the link below that takes you to the Rayburn Library Blog. Ms. Damon captured the event in a Digital Story.

Rayburn Library Blog

March 2008 17-31
Digital Media Fair

Northside hosts a Digital Media Fair Contest each year. Students who have created products such as web pages, digital graphics, flyers, animation, newsletters, presentations, videos and more can enter their best work in the contest. Students have a couple of options to submit entries for the contest. The first option is to submit the project online using their Net Storage account. Students copy their work and paste the entry in the Digita Media Fair- Turn-in folder. The second option is to ask their teacher to submit the project to the CIT. For more information about the Digital Media Fair, click the link below.

Digital Media Fair

March 2008 10-14
Library
Rayburn students are provided many databases by our Librarian and the NISD Library Services. These databases offer educational information and safe searches. The United Streaming database is popular because of the high quality images, video, and teaching resources. See our Library site for all the databases available. Students are given passwords at school.
Also the NISD library system has upgraded our online catalog from Webcat to iBistro. Use this site to search for books and other media. Check out the links to see how many titles are available.

Rayburn Library
NISD databases
iBistro

March 2008 - 3-7
Writing TAKS
Our Students will be taking the writing TAKS test Wednesday March 5th. Our students have done well with the writing test over the past years. The hallways at Rayburn are decorated with student created posters to motivate success on the Writing Test.
Surveillance cameras are now operational, and provide a useful tool in monitoring the safety of our students.
The construction plans for the Library remodel and classroom construction are being finalized.