Principal's Message

Dear Homestead,

Welcome to Spring!  As we enter March, we have a lot to look forward to such as the beginning of Spring Sports, the changing of the weather, springing forward on the clock, and believe it or not graduation is just around the corner.  We are even starting to look towards the next school year as we begin to welcome our incoming students for the class of 2026, choose courses for next year, and finalize a new bell schedule to comply with the recently passed state law stating high school classes must start no earlier than 8:30.  At the moment, we are gathering feedback and input from a variety of stakeholders with an expected finalized and approved schedule by mid March.  

Even with so much to look forward to, there is a lot on our plates that is hard to ignore.  The headlines in the media are filled with breaking news about Russia and Ukraine, state laws being considered to punish parents of kids who are transitioning, and more examples of Antisemetic acts in Texas.  While some of this news is happening across the world or beyond our state borders, we certainly can feel the impact here on our campus.  Homestead is a very diverse community as we sit in the heart of Silicon Valley, which draws families from all over the world who are attracted to the technology industry, great communities, and fantastic schools.  So while it might be easy to not look at the TV or online news sources, we don’t have to look far to see that we have students, staff, and families who are hurting because of what is happening between Russia and Ukraine.  We also know that we have a large number of kids who are transitioning, questioning, or non-binary who are frightened about the possibility of a law being passed that delegitmizes or criminalizes their ability to be who they are.   Again, whenever anything happens in this world, no matter where the location it occurs we can be assured that someone here at Homestead is affected.  This highlights the importance of continuing our work to help our students understand how their actions and behaviors can either be supportive or destructive in making our community safer.

That is why something like the hostage standoff that happened at a Jewish synagogue in Colleyville, Texas, back in January is not just a regional event but one that greatly impacted the Jewish community in our area and at our school.  It is impactful because it reminds people of previous attacks such as the ones in Pittsburgh in 2018 or in Poway, near San Diego in 2019.  What was also particularly troubling about the most recent attack in Texas is that it has been followed by various communities from Texas to California waking up to find antisemtic flyers on their driveways.  Residents in Palo Alto and Los Altos also reported receiving these same notices, which prompted the Santa Clara Police Chiefs Association to send out a statement condemning the violence and to stand in solidarity with members of the Jewish community.  Even more unfortunately, a swastika was found drawn on the ground of the horseshoe over this February break.  We reported this hate incident to our school resource officer and turned over photos and security video to document the incident.  

I hope that whoever drew that on our campus was not a Homestead student and merely someone passing by while the campus was closed, but it does bring home the point that we have a lot of work to do to build acceptance and community right here.  This is why we are holding advisories and why we are looking to celebrate the diversity of our campus while providing guidance on how to reduce bias and prejudice. The timing could not be more appropriate but the staff at Homestead and Fremont have been working on an advisory for March that highlights the harmful nature of Antisemitism.   It is also true that there have been other churches, mosques or religious institutions attacked during this time so this is not just an issue that the Jewish community alone faces.  We also don’t have the time and ability to highlight every community that has been attacked or persecuted but our hope is that by highlighting any form of injustice our students can begin to apply what they have learned to other situations.  While the players or issues involved may be different, there is often a familiar path from biased attitudes to acts of bias, discrmination, bias motivated violence, and finally genocide (as noted in the Anti-Defamation League’s Pyramid of Hate, copyright 2018).  So by looking at this progression of bias, it is easy to see why our Jewish community is so uneasy with these incidents.  No matter what group, whether it is our LGBTQ+, Black, Latinx, Asian, Muslim, Christian, or you fill in the blank, people are on edge after reading through the multitude of tragic headlines that dominate our news cycle.

To bring this back home to Homestead and to our community, we need to be aware that on the outside things may look fine or “normal” but most likely we are all suffering from some sort of trauma or fear.  And even with the hopeful blooms of spring that are starting to pop up all around, we need to be kind to each other and to be supportive in any way we can.  This does not mean we should ignore warning signs or report issues because we don’t want to tread on someone’s feelings but that we should work together as a team to try to smooth out the rough spots where we can. 

An important step in building community is to start with kindness and assume best intentions.  Too many times, we start off conversations or interactions with anger and entitlement and this results in some sort of conflict or confrontation that does little to resolve the actual issue.  If we start with kindness or assume best intentions, however, then we can often more directly address a problem or concern.  So rather than picking sides or choosing your battle, let’s agree to go into whatever is facing us as allies.

Here is wishing you and your family a wonderful start of spring, and to let you know that we are here when times get tough.

Respectfully,

Greg Giglio

Dear Homestead,

My monthly message is a little late so I apologize for the delay but I hope that you can be a little forgiving after the week we had to start this month.  As you may be aware, we had a medical emergency with a staff member on Tuesday 2/2 and the shock of dealing with this has taken a toll on many of us.  This story does have a happy ending as our teacher has returned home after spending a few days in the hospital and undergoing medical treatment.  This story is a happy one because the stars aligned in so many ways and because we have been preparing to deal with this type of emergency as well as others our whole career.

On that day during tutorial, one of our teachers became unresponsive, which initially confused some of our students as I am sure you could understand.  One student did think of getting another adult to help so ran to the room across the hall where Eileen Jones was teaching.  She told him to get more help as she went to the classroom, assessed the situation, and called 911.  Our student found a second teacher, Nicole Zambrano, who started to head to the classroom and because she had just seen me supervising the quad, told the student to go get me as I was just around the corner.  After the student alerted me, I made a radio call for more help and ran to the classroom with the student.  After I arrived, so did Louise Garces, our student conduct liaison, and Dan Yusim, our health clerk and athletic trainer.  We cleared the room and tended to the teacher with assistance from the 911 operator.  These were very scary minutes as we waited for emergency services because we needed to take action as our colleague was definitely in distress and worsening.  We ended up having to do a few rounds of CPR before applying two shocks from the Automated External Defibrillator (AED).  We saw a significant improvement in the teacher on the second shock, and thankfully the EMTs showed up to take over.  Meanwhile, the admin team was spread out through the building and campus to help redirect students and guide the EMT’s to the right place.

Fortunately, every two years the administration and various support staff are trained in CPR, first aid, AED and Epi-Pen use.  I can now personally attest to how important and useful this training is, and I am so thankful to those instructors in Adult Ed who have been training us over the years.  Our site does have 8 AED machines spread out throughout the campus to be used in cases of emergency.   In this particular incident, we knew the closest AED was located in the office, so we were able to call on the radio to have it brought to us so that we did not have to waste precious time looking for it.  If you yourself have not been trained or it has been many years since you last attended a training, I would highly encourage you to do so as you never know when you may have to use these skills (but hopefully you never do).  

With a school the size of ours, we do have to be prepared for just about anything which is why we create a school safety plan to cover any sort of situation.  These plans are reviewed by the district office who provide support, materials, and training.  We do have specific drills that we are required to hold over the course of the year such as fire, earthquake, and intruder drills but whenever we have an emergency or crisis, we also hold an “after action review” so that we can improve our responses and be even more prepared the next time.  I sent a reminder email to our teachers with a campus map that included the locations of all of our AED machines and have provided information for those who wish to refresh their training.  If you would like to look into training, please contact our Adult Education program for more information.

It is not lost on me that this happened during February, the month for Valentines Day.  So it is with heartfelt gratitude that I would like to thank everyone who took part in supporting the Homestead Community during this emergency and to those of you who sent your wishes, prayers, and kindness our way.  Thank you and wishing you a whole lotta love this Valentine’s Day.

Greg Giglio

Dear Homestead,

Happy New Year and Welcome to the Second Semester.  I hope that you had a restful and relaxing time despite the rising fear surrounding Omicron.  We have definitely hit the ground running to respond to the increase in positive cases, so I thought it would be worthwhile to review our safety protocols and to let you know about some of the work done over the break to continue to keep campus safe.  While the variant may have changed, our focus and commitment to these safety measures have not.

Several emails have come to ask about when or if we could return to remote or even hybrid learning.  As we have stated before, we take our direction from the county in regard to major moves like in person or remote learning.  This is not a decision that I can make as a site principal nor a decision that our district does without the express input of the county experts.  At this time, the guidance is to continue to do what we have been doing in order for schools to remain open.  So here is what we have and will continue to do:

HVAC Systems:  A major component of our safety measures is to ensure that we have the maximum amount of fresh, filtered air pumped into each classroom, office, and general space on campus.  We spent a good portion of time when school was closed upgrading, maintaining, and replacing parts to our Heating Venting and Air Conditioning (HVAC) system.  We installed the highest level filters (Merv-13) that would fit with our system and can filter out bacteria and other particulate matter.  We regularly replace the filters and prioritize help tickets we receive from the staff to assist with the HVAC system.  Over this past break, we had a contractor on campus to service, repair and replace motors, belts, and filters as needed.

Masks:  We continue to enforce our mask mandate, which states that students and staff must appropriately wear face masks both inside and outside (except when eating or drinking).  We do not allow students to eat in classrooms, but some teachers do allow students to quickly lower their masks to take a drink of water while some may ask students to step into the hallway to do so.  Last semester, we did loosen the restrictions on eating indoors during lunch and brunch because of the cold and wet weather; however, we have tightened this starting on the first day we returned to school.  Now, students may only eat indoors in our cafeteria where we can open up the doors and roll-up door.  Students may not eat in hallways, classrooms, or other general spaces.  We will need to temporarily lift this restriction if and when it rains.  Our staff will continue to ask students to raise or properly wear their masks when we see a student who may not be following the protocol, and have given out consequences to those who continue to violate these rules.  I can say though that this is a small number of students and is usually quickly adjusted.  We also provide masks to students and staff if they forget, lose, or damage their masks.  Teachers can request extra PPE for their classrooms and we have begun supplying staff with KN-95 masks if they choose to wear them.  We also are following mask guidelines for indoor sports in regard to athletes, coaches, and fans.

Hand Washing:  We continue to advocate hand washing and sanitation as this is another important component to keeping each other safe.  Every classroom and every entrance to a building has a hand sanitizer bottle that we constantly refill.  We also prioritize replacing soap in the bathrooms and would encourage students to immediately tell their teacher or another staff member if they come across a dispenser without soap.

Testing:  Our district continues to provide on site testing at each of the sites across the district.  Testing is available at Homestead on Tuesdays in the foyer to the Field House from 7:30am to 4pm.  Students and staff can test at other sites with the results sent to our COVID designee Brian Dong so that he can process positive test results.  Here is the current schedule for testing across our district:

Testing Schedule

Testing from 7:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Mondays: LHS, Original/Former main office

Tuesdays: HHS, Field House Lobby

Wednesdays: MVHS, Auditorium Lobby

Wednesdays: FHS, Fair Oaks room (main office)

Thursdays: CHS, Gym Foyer

Testing from 7:30 a.m. to 12 p.m.

Fridays: FHS, Fair Oaks room (main office)

Our district also handed out the state supplied at-home testing kits the first week back for second semester.  Our indoor athletes are also testing regularly as are our band students. 

Finally, there have been a lot of stories and rumors floating out there about students coming to campus who are positive but not showing symptoms.  Whenever any of these stories have come up, we have followed up with the families and been given evidence that shows that this is untrue.  I do think our students and families are doing a lot of work to keep themselves and each other safe, but we will do our due diligence to follow up on and deal with stories, rumors, or concerns until they are resolved safely and efficiently.  If  you have any questions or concerns, you can always go to our COVID resources page or contact our COVID Designee, Brian Dong at brian_dong@fuhsd.org.  You are always welcome to send me your comments, questions, concerns, suggestions, etc by email or through the weekly parent/student survey where I will answer your questions privately or on my weekly video messages.

Thank you, happy new year and be safe!

Greg Giglio

Dear Homestead,

Welcome to December and the end of the first semester!  As the holidays roll in, many of us tend to want to look backwards to reflect on the past 12 months, but at the same time many of us want to keep moving forward and away from where we have been.  I am going to do a little bit of both as we celebrate our accomplishments and look down the road to see what 2022 brings us.

This first semester started with a lot of hope and joy as we were able to return to in person learning after having gone through Emergency Distance Learning, Remote Learning, and Hybrid Learning.  We were thrilled to be taking part in athletics and extracurricular activities but also just seeing friends and colleagues up close and personal again.  This first semester, however, has not been without challenges and stress.  I might even say this semester was more challenging and stressful than previous semesters as we tried to readjust our brains to being around people and getting back to work after such a long time.  Looking at the grade analysis data for the first two grading periods, I am relieved to say that we are back to the normal, pre-pandemic levels of the types of grades student are earning after seeing an increase in the number of students who were earning D’s and F’s last year in remote learning.  This “return to normal” is also an indication of the great work that both our staff and students are putting into school after the concerns of being off campus and away from each other.  

Adding to the stress of our return is the ever present shadow of COVID.  While I am proud of the safety protocols and behaviors of our students and staff, we continue to see positive cases trickle in.  Fortunately we are not seeing breakout cases where whole classrooms or groups are becoming sick and our numbers continue to be small (just .005% of our Homestead staff and student population).  And while many may be growing tired of mask mandates, vaccination attempts, and testing I know that everyone is doing their best to keep each other safe and in class by coming together (or should I say staying apart) for the greater good.  Of course, now we are getting news of the Omicron Variant, so hopefully we are not back on that roller coaster. 

Then in September we had the unfortunate but safely resolved issue of a student in possession of a gun on campus.  This incident took a great toll on our emotions as we seemed to be fighting enemies both real and microscopic.  I would again like to thank the swift reaction of our Santa Clara Sheriff’s Department and Sunnyvale Department of Public Safety members who once again dropped everything to make sure our students and staff were safe.  I am glad to say that we have taken several steps forward in putting this behind us but in also keeping each other safe.  Just this past week, we have seen new gates being installed that allow us to prevent others from entering while allowing the safe and quick exit of our students if needed.  We have also fine tuned our emergency response procedures with fire, earthquake, and intruder drills and are looking at programs and resources such as the Sandy Hook Promise to make our campus safer.

We also started the year in fear of the Devious Licks trend on Tik Tok and while other schools around the area fell victim to these destructive pranks, Homestead was fortunate to not really see these videos pop up at our school.  And we have all breathed a sigh of relief when the suggested monthly trends also never appeared, which I think speaks volumes to the respectful nature of our students who would much prefer to get back to the things they do so well -- namely everything they do!  Our sports teams gave us something to cheer about as they took the field in the familiar green and white uniforms, and restarted their winning ways.  All of our Fall sports teams made it to the playoffs, and a special congratulations to the Mustang football team for making it all the way to the finals for the first time in over a decade!  It has also been a pleasure to see the Marching Band out doing their thing and practicing their percussion right outside my window (I definitely and sincerely missed that!).  We have been able to attend rallies, outdoors but still the same loud and spirited fun as the indoor rallies.  We have had Homecoming and crowned this year’s royalty, enjoying the old traditions and creating some new ones along the way.  I can definitely say that the Homecoming Carnival is here to stay!  I have also been glad to see the various groups back on campus doing their thing as I head home for the night -- cheer team practicing in the cafeteria, Robotics taking over the I-Hub, kids working late nights for journalism or yearbook, and all the other over 70 clubs and extracurricular activities we have been active and involved in their passions.

As we move towards finals, I am eager to see what the second semester brings.  The completion of the A Building remodel is on schedule for May, which will signal the start of the same modernization process for the B Building in June.  Next semester will also see the return of out-of-state and overnight trips that are so important to the health and education of our students.  Before long, our sites get set on the 22-23 school year as we begin the course selection process.  Although we can’t get too far ahead because there are so many other exciting things in store for us -- Winter sports, Spring sports, Battle of the Classes, and eventually graduation.  This year could be the return of the single graduation ceremony which we haven’t had since 2019!

I just want to end with how appreciative I am of our students, our staff, our families, and our community for the dedication, care, support, and joy they bring to our campus every day.  This group has been through a lot but continues to make Homestead a great place to learn and work.  I wish you and your family a joyful holiday season and look forward to continuing this joyous celebration in 2022!

Respectfully,

Greg Giglio

Dear Homestead,

Fall is upon us, and Daylight Savings is around the corner (or perhaps has come by the time you read this).  The weather isn’t the only thing changing, so let me give you a summary of some of the things that are happening in and around campus.

There has been a lot of discussion about the concerns surrounding the “Skinny Wednesdays” on our current bell schedule.  For those who have never heard this term before, we call it this because all 7 periods meet for just 45 minutes and not the 90 minutes of our block days.  Before the pandemic, Mondays were our skinny day but with the change to remote learning our district moved the skinny day to Wednesday where students and staff would have a bit of break for an asynchronous day of catching up on work, weekly advisories, meetings, and office hours.  As we returned to in person learning, we kept Wednesday as the skinny day in the event we would have to return to Remote Learning.  Please note that we are not planning on nor do we want to return to remote learning, but with the unpredictability of COVID 19, we wanted to make sure we had a schedule that would work just in case.  When we returned to in person learning, the requirements that we have five days a week of daily live instruction as well as the reinstatement of instructional minutes also returned.  This is why we could not keep Wednesday as asynchronous but instead needed to return to having all periods meet on a skinny day.

The two main concerns that we are hearing from students and families are the workload on Tuesday night and the amount of assessments on Wednesday during the skinny day.  There is also concern that because all 7 periods meet on one day, this creates a hectic pace.   To be honest, that same concern existed before the pandemic on the skinny Mondays but many felt that having the weekend before that skinny day helped to blunt the stress.  We, the district, have begun having conversations on how to help manage or alleviate these concerns at multiple levels from the Superintendent’s cabinet, to the weekly Principal’s meetings, to site level teams.  One question we have been asked is if we can move the skinny Wednesday back to Monday this year.  This is not as easy as it seems as it would throw off a lot of careful planning for the district, the school, the staff, for students and families.  It would be easier to change days at the beginning of next school year, so that idea is not totally off the table yet.  Instead, we are choosing to focus on strategies that might reduce the workload, spread out the assessments, and even encourage or promote some self-care and mental wellness along the way.  Some teachers and teams have made small adjustments while others are grappling with issues that might also rise up with the implementation of these ideas such as pacing, scheduling, and preparedness for AP tests in May.  As with any issue, there can be many layers that must be carefully considered before just changing things as we don’t want to make the situation worse; however, I do feel that our staff is taking a good long look at the issues and trying to implement supports and ideas that will help alleviate the stress.  Stay tuned for more details on that one.

Another area that we are reviewing and looking for ways to improve is our current Tutorial system.  Before you panic, we are not looking at getting rid of tutorials but we are looking for ways to help students maximize their time and get more support from staff in order to be successful.  When we went through our WASC accreditation process three years ago, the idea to improve tutorials was noted by our staff as important and became part of our action plan.  The pandemic did prevent us from starting this work but we have begun taking initial steps this year.  We have discussed the current policy in our monthly Department Lead meetings, and I have just sent a survey to staff to get their input.  I am also working on a survey that will go out to students and parents by the end of first semester to get your feedback as well.  One important topic that has come up is how we might incorporate self-care or mental wellness into tutorial.  While tutorial is primarily an academic period where students can catch up on missing work, make up tests or quizzes, work directly with teachers or other students, or get started on homework; we are also seeing that students do need some well structured breaks where they can recharge their batteries and increase their wellness.  We are looking at possible ways to help teach students these important skills and strategies but that students are wisely using their 35 minutes of tutorial that they get three times a week.

A subject that also connects to tutorials is our monthly Advisories.  These were started during remote learning as a weekly tool to help students and staff get to know each other outside the confines of the academic subject or class as well as to deliver campus wide lessons on topics that were important to our students and staff.  As mentioned above, moving from remote to in person learning meant that we could not continue weekly advisory lessons but instead would need to move to monthly lessons.  So far this year, we have had two advisories with the first one being an introduction and review of advisories that included ice breakers as part of that personalization goal mentioned above while the second advisory was about Awareness of Sexual Harassment.  We are currently planning more advisories on topics such as mental health, antiracism, community celebrations, and other topics as they come up or are needed.  Our students were surveyed twice at the end of last year; the first survey was a Homestead only survey and the second was an invitation to participate in a district wide survey.  Both surveys showed that students felt the advisories were effective, important, and worth continuing.  We also received ideas on future topics and for ways to improve Advisory.

The final change that I would like to highlight is a tough one as it concerns the retirement of Marjie Fischer, our senior clerical in the Resource Department.  Marjie’s last day will be November 5th and she will be greatly missed by students and staff alike as she has been a fixture in the department for over 20 years.  Her knowledge and expertise in special education has benefited many generations of students and have helped our staff be better at their jobs.  We will miss her razor sharp wit as well as her delicious desserts and candies that she brought to campus.  On behalf of Homestead High School, I would like to wish Marjie a relaxing and rewarding retirement as she has definitely earned it.  

Happy November everyone,

Greg Giglio 

Dear Homestead,

Welcome to October!  

These past two months have been very full and productive, but also stressful for all the obvious reasons plus a few unthinkable ones.  First off, I would like to thank everyone for their questions, concerns, and ideas as we process the recent incident involving a gun on campus.  We are beyond fortunate that our partners from law enforcement (namely, the Sunnyvale Department of Public Safety and Santa Clara Sheriff Department) were able to react quickly and help us address the concern to keep our campus safe.  I am also thankful for our staff, both those members of our administration who calmly and quickly addressed the issue as well as those staff members who have supported our students and staff in the days after.

We have already shared the details that we are able to share and have held debrief meetings with our team, staff, and law enforcement partners to review our actions and communication.  While this incident was resolved peacefully and quickly, we are always looking for ways to keep our campus safe and to restore the confidence that you have in our campus when you send your children to our site.  We understand the importance of your trust and take this responsibility very seriously.  One visible piece of action has been to move up our training and drill in the event of an active shooter on campus or potential intruders or threats on or near campus called Run/Hide/Defend, which is the title for what used to be known as Code Red or Lockdown procedures.  We do partner with the Santa Clara Sheriff’s Department and Sunnyvale Department of Public Safety in these trainings and drills, so we try to schedule them as quickly as we can.  We were able to move up by a few weeks both the staff training and the whole campus drill, so we will be reviewing this activity soon with our students.  

We do not publicize the steps in the drill as advised by law enforcement but we will cover fully the details and steps necessary to keep each other safe.  An easy summary, however, of what we do in this drill can be found in the title:  Run/Hide/Defend.  The run portion of the safety plan is if you have the opportunity to safely and quickly leave campus, then that should be the first option.  As law enforcement has studied previous active shooter scenarios, it was found that running rather than hiding could be the difference in keeping large numbers of students and staff safe.  If running is not possible, then the next option would be to hide or lockdown.  Again, I will not disclose what this entails but our students and staff will be reviewing and practicing this on the day of the drill.  As a last resort if an intruder has entered the room or space, law enforcement professionals have determined that staff and students should do whatever they can to defend themselves.  We will not be practicing this, but we will discuss what this means and what can be used as defensive measures.

As I discussed in the parent webinar we had following the incident, we do have many strategies and practices in place for the safety of our students and staff.  The first, and most important in my opinion, is the visible and active supervision of our campus by our six administrators and student conduct liaison.  We are out and about in specific locations during morning traffic, brunch, lunch, and after school to monitor our students and look for potential issues or problems.  We also employ a check in and badge system for visitors.  This is why we ask that you make an appointment before coming to campus as well as check in to the front office so that we can log who is on site.  We use the badges to identify who should and should not be on campus.  We will approach you and ask you to identify yourself if you are on campus without a badge.  We also have a security camera system with posted signs around campus that you are entering areas that are under video survelliance.  An important tool for our safety procedures is the Student Safety Report (SSR) form.  In the SSR, students and parents can send us information so that we can follow up on and reduce or eliminate safety concerns.  Finally, our most important resource is you because if you see or hear something, you can report it to us and we will follow up on the information until we are assured that the situation is safely resolved.

Along this line, I would like to bring to your attention a very concerning trend on Tik Tok that has been brought to our attention and certainly seems to be a topic of discussion among our students.  At the start of school, we began hearing about a trend on the social media platform called “Devious Licks” which called for students to cause damage or steal items from school bathrooms, film the destruction or theft, then post it on the app.  Fortunately, Homestead did not have any real issues with this but a couple of the schools in our district did have some serious problems with damage and had to restrict bathroom usage to prevent future damage.  The students in most cases were caught and have faced consequences but this has taken up a lot of time and resources that could be better used elsewhere on campuses.  To our greater concern, there now exists lists of challenges or trends for each month:

September: Vandalize school bathrooms

October: Smack a staff member

November: Kiss your friend’s girlfriend at school

December: Deck the halls and show your balls

January: Jab a breast

February: Mess up school signs

March: Make a mess in the courtyard or cafeteria

April: “Grab some eggz” (another stealing challenge)

May: Ditch day

June: Flip off in the front office

July: Spray a neighbor’s fence

As you can see, these are pretty concerning and could result in serious discipline for students that could bring about school or legal consequences.  Depending on the severity of the student’s actions, these activities could even lead towards arrest or expulsion.  Some of these acts encourage vandalism or theft, and a couple could be labeled as sexual harassment or assault.  I would encourage you to talk with your own students about the importance of maintaining decorum and following school rules rather than striving for viral stardom.  The price of that fame is really not worth the effort.  

On a less severe but equally important note, our cafeteria will only accept the scanning of ID cards to purchase lunch and will discontinue the ability for students to manually entering their student ID numbers starting October 11th. Because of the high volume of students getting lunch through the cafeteria with the free lunch program in place this year, we need to find ways to speed up the time students are spending in line.  The process of stopping the line to punch in numbers is taking too long and too many students are simply choosing not to bring their ID’s.  Not to mention, the cleanliness of that many students using the keypad is concerning.  Makeup pictures where students can also get their ID’s is happening on October 6th so all students should have had ample opportunity to get an actual ID card.  One trick that has been helpful is for students to take pictures on their phone of their ID card as the scanner can properly register the student in that manner.  The picture must include the scan bar on the back of the ID to properly register in our system.  Your cooperation is greatly appreciated to help speed up and keep students and staff safe.

To end on a positive note, we are looking forward to in person Homecoming the week of October 11th.  The ASB Leadership students have been working really hard to design a week full of fun and school spirit, so please encourage your students to join in the fun.  Friday is the big day with a rally during the morning, parade after school followed by the first ever Homecoming Festival (which replaces our traditional dance), and finally the Homecoming football game vs. Mountain View.  Hope to see you all there and Go Mustangs!

Greg Giglio

Dear Homestead,

Welcome to the 2021-2022 school year, hopefully you are as excited as you are rested. I am happy to report that we will be fully in-person this school year with some safety protocols and guidelines remaining in place at this time. For instance, we are still required to wear masks while inside classrooms or offices, but the county health department has rescinded the mask mandate while students are outdoors, eliminated social distancing rules, and done away with the daily symptom tracker for both students and staff. As we have stated before, the district has been working with outside vendors as well as our own facilities teams to upgrade and improve our heating venting and air conditioning (HVAC) units so that they can safely provide fresh air that is properly circulated in and out of the room through Merv-13 filters, which are the highest grade filters that can screen out bacteria.

This year’s bell schedule is very similar to last year’s with the exception of Wednesday, which is now our “skinny” day where all 7 periods meet for 45 minutes. Other than that, not much has changed:

There is a special schedule for the first week of school that differs slightly from above.  This special schedule for the first week moves the “skinny day” to Monday so that students and staff can attend all classes on that first day, and also includes three closed tutorials on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday to go over important school announcements and information to help acclimate your students for their return to the campus.  I am posting it here for your reference but it can also be found on our website under “bell schedules”.

We will be continuing with Advisories this year but they will not be held every week due to the return of five day a week instruction.  There will be 10 advisories in the 21-22 school year, and we will be posting the days and topics in the coming days.

The modernization project for the A Building is well underway and on schedule to be completed by the end of May 2022. The Staff Parking Lot is still off limits for student drop off and pick up because of the heavy equipment and construction trucks needing to use that lot to access the site. Please continue to drop off or pick up students in the Horseshoe, the Student Lot, or an alternate off campus location to help ease the traffic congestion. Alternate forms of transportation are greatly encouraged as we have plenty of bike racks as well as a skateboard rack. If you are biking, skating or scooting to school please follow all safety rules and be sure to wear a helmet. You should also bring your own lock and only lock bikes to actual bike racks. Bicyclists should also only use the Mary Street bike path or the Access Road (next to the I-Hub) when entering and leaving school. Do not go through the Student or Staff lot, and avoid going in front of the Horseshoe.  Other construction projects that should be wrapping up by the start of school are the installation of elective vehicle charging stations in the Student Lot and along the Access Road as well as the safety improvements along the Homestead corridor.

We will be undergoing our midterm review for the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC) in March. Every school goes through the WASC process, which we did in 2019 where we received a six year accreditation with a midterm check-in. This check-in allows us to review our progress as well as to determine what work still needs to be done before our full term review in 2025. 

I am also glad to say that due to a federal grant, we will be able to continue feeding all students for free from our cafeteria. Campus will once again be open for students to get food at local restaurants or shops during lunch, but our cafeteria will be a good option for all students. Students will need to enter in their student ID number so that we can give an accounting of who is accessing lunch and they will be limited to one meal per break (one at brunch and one at lunch).

This year, we are welcoming the class of 2025 with nearly 560 students.  We will be hosting an in-person Homestead Orientation Program (HOP) on August 5th in the morning and the Parent Orientation Program (POP) later that same evening that will be both in person and remote for convenience.  Round Up will be held on August 9th and 10th, and our staff returns on August 11th, 12th, and 13th to prepare for the first day of school on August 16th.  You can find all this and more back to school information here:  

https://hhs.fuhsd.org/about-us/general-information/summer-mailer

While it is always hard to say goodbye to our graduating class of 2021 and to the various staff members who have moved on to new chapters in their lives, I am happy to welcome our new students and staff members. Below is a list of new staff members to our Homestead family:

• Annabelle Alderette -- Registrar
• Hector Almendarez -- English Teacher
• Rosie Nguyen -- English Teacher
• Matangi Rajamani -- Math Teacher
• Michelle Yuhara -- Math Teacher
• Jessica Bai -- Chinese Teacher
• Alissa Paterson -- Resource Social Studies Teacher
• Jon Vranesh -- Resource Math Teacher
• Mina Satya -- Resource Para-educator
• Theo Pappas -- Academic Community Transition (ACT) program Teacher
• Alfred Diaz -- ACT Para-educator
• Yvette Vielmas Zambrano -- ACT Para-educator
• Steven Caringella -- World Language/Spanish Teacher
• Sharaye Bellamy -- College and Career Center Advisor

I will also be continuing the weekly video messages as that turned out to be a very useful tool for both me and you during the pandemic so we are happy to continue this practice as we move forward.  Here is a link to the new survey and you can begin sending me questions, ideas, or recognitions for staff or students.

While it is never fun to see summer end, I can speak for our staff when I say that we are extremely excited to be back in person with all of you again on August 16th.

Respectfully,

Greg Giglio