BHS has a New Website

After almost eight years, BHS has a new look to the website. While it might take some time getting used to the new look, we hope that people find that this change to be a good change. A big thanks goes out to Kerri Lunn for her assistance, especially in the creation of the new Program of Studies - no longer a 100 page PDF document!

Things to Note

Navigating on Mobile Device
Our new site was built with mobile devices in mind. If you find yourself on your mobile device, you will want to note the 'hamburger' menu button (button with three horizontal bars) on the top left. By selecting that, you will find all of the sub pages of the high school website. If you find yourself lost, you can always hit the Bedford Image at the top of the screen to bring you back to the home page.

Clickable Buttons
If you see a button or an image on the website, more likely than not, that button or image will launch a page.

Daily Announcements
Daily Announcements are now part of PowerSchool. That means parents, students and staff are now able to read announcements for the day when they are logged into their PowerSchool account. Don't have a PowerSchool account? No worries! By clicking on the Daily Announcement button on the main website, you are able to view the announcements.

Department Blogs
Important announcements from several departments are now done through blogs. You will notice BHS, Athletics, Counseling, and Special Education departments have a blog that is featured on its main page. The user is able to read through the announcements by scrolling. If you would like to read more about a particular post, you can click on the title of the post. This will then open the blog in a new window. You can also find a history of posts by clicking on the main link of the blog underneath the provided posts.

Staff Contact Info &Teacher Websites
There are now two different locations where you can get contact information. For a master list of all employees, go to the staff directory page under the School Info tab.

For a breakdown of staff by department, go to the department page under the Academics tab.

Program of Studies
The Program of Studies has been designed with the user in mind. No longer must you scroll through 100 pages of a PDF document in order to find the information that you are looking for. Thanks to Kerri Lunn, the Program of Studies is now a website. You can access the Program of Studies either through a Department page, or from the Counseling Webpage.

Ease of course descriptions in Program of Studies Website

Again, we hope that you like the changes!

EVERYDAY IS A GREAT DAY TO BE A BULLDOG

Social Media and Your Digital Tattoo

Last week, I had the pleasure of partnering up with the counseling department in Bedford High School's first annual Social Media Awareness Day. I must say that not only was it fun to help organize the day, but is was also very rewarding.

Last year the counseling department came to me with an idea to work together to help remind students (and staff) about how to handle social media in showcasing the 'goods' and the 'bads'. Throughout the school year, we got together in meetings to brainstorm what we exactly wanted to accomplish. We knew that there was going to be a presentation but we wanted to make the day even more than just that.

When it came to the presentation, we knew that we did not want to just lecture about the negatives of social media. Instead, we wanted our message to come out that it is ok and encouraged for students and staff to use social media with keeping precautions in mind.

To open this Prezi presentation in a new window, CLICK HERE.

We also wanted to make it real and personal for the students. With that, we surveyed our staff at BHS as well as all of our freshmen and sophomore students. That is right, we surveyed almost 600 students and staff!

We asked similar questions to both staff and students so that we would be able to make comparisons amongst each group. The results were very informative and helpful. Not only did we share the results in the presentation, but the counseling department also created posters to showcase in the main hallway.

We also decided that since we wanted to highlight how social media can have a positive impact on others (and we did not want students to get 'bored' of listening to Mrs. Puffer and I) we interviewed some teachers in the building. We asked them how social media has had a positive impact on them. It was really interesting to hear what the teachers had to share - personal and professional examples are both given in this video. To view this video in a new window, CLICK HERE. 

At the end of the presentation, we highlighted the YouTube video, "Look Up" by Gary Turk. If you have not yet seen this video, then you must take a look at it. This video really makes you think about your 'screen time'. We decided to challenge the entire BHS community and 'Look Up' during the lunch block that day. If you would like to view this video in a different window, CLICK HERE.

As students walked into the commons, some of the National Honor Society members as well as the BHS counselors reminded students of the challenge to not look at a device for 25 minutes and to be present.

These students actually took it another step further and placed all of their phones in the middle of the table while they were hanging out socializing and eating during their lunch break.

All in all, it was a great day! It was very refreshing hearing from teachers talking about how it either impacted the students or themselves in some way. The day would not have been possible without the Counseling Department - all the way from concept to reality. And a big kuddos to Ms. Puffer for helping give a great presentation. I know that I am already looking forward to next year.

Another GREAT Day to be a BULLDOG!