Cleveland Students! We are excited to welcome back any existing and new clubs into the 2024-2025 school year! Filling out this form thoroughly means that you, as a club leader, are going to abide by the responsibilities and commitment that every club is expected of. All clubs will only be approved through the Cleveland Club Application Process.

Cleveland Club Application

Congratulations Cleveland Wind Ensemble!

Dear Cleveland Families,

It is officially fall and many activities are in full swing. Thank you all for coming to Back to School Night. It was wonderful to see you there. If you could not make it, or you missed a teacher, you can always reach out to teachers via email. Many of them use Canvas to post assignments, syllabi and grading policies.

Our first progress reports will be going out soon which is the first check in point of the semester. Some teachers may report letter grades while others may use P/NP (Pass/No Pass) to indicate progress. You can always check ParentVue to check on your student’s progress in a class. At this point in the semester, you can see if your student is on track to meet course standards and to see what is working or not working for your student. The cycle of progress reports will include a Quarter 1 grade half way through the semester, another progress report after that before the Semester 1 grade which will be entered on your student’s transcript. The semester grade is the only grade that is recorded on the transcript and used to calculate grade point averages. Do not hesitate to reach out to teachers or your student’s counselor to talk about strategies for your student to find academic success.

After three weeks of implementation of our new cell phone policy, students know the expectations. Cell phones, bluetooth devices such as earbuds and smartwatches are locked in the Yondr pouch during the school day. We will take phones and lock them in the office when we see them out of the pouches. Some students will say, “But I wasn’t using it.” The policy is that if the devices are on campus during the school day, they must be locked in the pouches. At this point, we will require parents or guardians to come get phones that we have taken during the school day. I continue to hear concerns about the phones being locked up at lunch and the need for emergency communication if the student is off campus. The phones can be used to make phone calls by using the voice activation feature on the smartphone. This feature works even if the phone is locked. Finally, I want to correct an assertion I made about contacting your student using Google chat. You can email your student using a non-PPS email address, but the Google chat feature on their Chromebooks only works with PPS addresses. Thank you for your feedback as we implement this policy that has already had positive impacts on student engagement in school.

The Dr. Matthew Prophet Education Center, the rather staid home to Portland Public Schools administrative staff, had a very different look on Monday evening when it hosted the world premiere of “The Return of Emergetron.”

The red carpet event was in celebration of a new film starring students – and for students – about the many emergency scenarios they might encounter in a typical school year.

Portland Public Schools’ Comprehensive School Psychology program was recently named the recipient of a prestigious $5.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education for its proven track record of improving student well-being and academic performance. 

The renewable, school-based mental health grant will be used to provide comprehensive school psychology services to 18 Title I schools across the district for the 2024-25 school year. This is up from 11 schools served in the previous year. Through the duration of the grant, 25 schools designated as Title I at the time of the grant award will receive comprehensive school psychology services.

When Beckham Weatherby picks up his tuba, the rest of the world falls away. 

“I don’t get that nervous and I don’t get stage fright at all,” he said. “I guess I got lucky with how my body reacts to performing in front of crowds.”

Which is something the McDaniel High School junior has done quite a bit of lately. Not only is he a member of the prestigious Portland Youth Philharmonic (PYP) and the PYP conservatory orchestra, but he recently earned first prize in the tuba solo performance category at the Oregon State Solo Music Championships.

The first things you notice when you walk into Ellie Jensen’s classroom at Boise-Eliot/Humboldt Elementary School are peace and warmth. Then you hear the laughter of children. Then you just might see two posters hanging on the walls that tell you a great deal about the kind of teacher she has been for the past 50 years. The posters simply say, “Leave a little sparkle wherever you go” and “Be a friend.”

Jensen, known as “Miss Ellie” to the hundreds of students she has taught in her half a century as a Portland Public Schools educator, can’t help but light up a room. And she is a friend to all children.