​Every year the Government of Alberta sends out a survey for our grade 7 parents and students. The student version of the survey is done at school, online. The parent version is mailed to the home and can be completed and mailed in or it can be completed online as well. I thought it might be appropriate to talk about the areas over the course of the year that the you are asked to comment on. This week I will talk about Safe and Caring schools.
At DMC we take the safety of your children very seriously, not just their physical safety but their social and emotional wellbeing. Middle school is a challenging place, a time in life when children are becoming adolescents, they are figuring out who they are, who their friends are and when parents often stop becoming the most influential people in their lives. That role is replaced by their peer group. At DMC we try to address these areas through our health curriculum, having open and honest discussion in class about growing up, choices and decision making. This is done through our Physical Education time and our Chimera Time. Students are given opportunities to voice their concerns, their ideas and to learn from one another and the teacher about life skills. We focus on how to deal with anxiety and how to make and keep friends. In a normal year we try to bring in special guests to talk about big life decisions and events such as drugs and alcohol. We want your children to be ready for the world.
Other services we offer are one on one opportunities for students that need a bit more TLC with our student services team. This team can listen to students and help them find solutions to problems. Parents are also welcome to connect with our student services team if they feel their child needs a bit more support. 
We work hard with all students to create an inclusive environment, one free from bullying. We always deal with these situations, sometimes we cannot speak about what has happened to the "other" child in a situation because we work within privacy legalities, but we always deal with emerging situations and the students involved. 
A school is a community, we will sometimes all get along, and sometimes we will have conflict. It is our job to help students learn in both scenarios, ​
We believe​ DMC is a safe and caring school, our teachers are among the best in the city and all of them care about your children.
In the next blog ​we will talk a bit how we work with the Alberta Program of Studies to plan.