District 5 Schools Site A site dedicated to providing the parents, teachers, students, and staff with all of the current information regarding their schools!

GSMS Updates

UPDATE: 8/24/09

   Help us welcome our new Art teacher, Mr. Boyd.  He will be taking Mrs. Graham's place who retired last year.  He's very excited and is looking forward to a great year!  

The new PE building is complete. It is need of some rubber flooring. If you know of anyone who can help us with this, please call me 251-609-2873.  I'll help get the details worked out.

Middle School football and volleyball is in full swing. Looks like a great year!  GO DOLPHINS!

Update: 6/1/09

Congrats to our rising 9th graders!  We'll certainly miss you! Also, congrats to our newly tapped NJHS students. It was a beautiful ceremony!

Update: 2/28/09
Weight room facility
   Students are expected to be able to use our new weight room in the next few weeks! Equipment will be ready for delivery very soon.  The weight room will be available to PE classes, for boys' and girls' middle school sports, and teachers and staff! Thank you!

Landscaping
   If you were anywhere near Gulf Shores Middle School last weekend, you would have seen our own Mr. Fountain on campus planting our new azaleas donated by Kutters!  Thank you Mr. Fountain for the free labor and beautiful campus!

 
Update: 1/19/09
The new weight room/PE facility is complete! 
Thank you, Gates Builders!

Update: 11/26/08
Computer Lab
I am very pleased to announce that our Computer Lab at GSMS is near completion! Our Baldwin County Technology Director, Derek Roh jumped right on this one for us.  County funds covered all aspects of the lab including remodeling of the current classroom, wiring for the computers, and the computers, themselves.  They've done a great job in a short amount of time!  I visited the school this week to take a look and will post pics here. 30 computers in our new lab!! Wow!This is a great example of cooperation between our principals and our county directors with a great result!
Thank you to everyone who helped us make this happen!

Update: 10/19/08
The GSMS Open House was held on Oct. 7.  Parents had the opportunity to meet Mr. Fountain and their children's teachers as well as the members of the PTSO. Mrs. Lee and Mr. Dey from GSES were on hand to do a Promethean presentation for the parents as well.

I think everyone will agree that Mr. Fountain has done a fabulous job as our new GSMS principal! 
The students have been very excited to have him and have already seen some exciting changes at school.

Music is back in the Cafeteria!
Our students are again able to enjoy lunch and the company of their friends in a friendly and inviting atmosphere
complete with tunes!

All Sports Pep Rallies!
Our GSMS Sports season was kicked off this year with a huge Pep Rally recognizing all of our hard working GSMS athletes and Coaches! What a great time we had!  If you missed it, be sure and join us for the next one on October 2!
Parents are welcome, too!

GSMS' first ever HOMECOMING!!!
The week of Sept. 29 through October 3 is was our first ever Homecoming week for GSMS! Our kids celebrated each day with Camo Day, Tacky Day (this was something to see!), and Hippie Day. The week culminated with Spirit Day on Thursday and record attendance for our GSMS football game in the Sportsplex Thursday night. At the game, our first ever Homecoming Queen, Mrs. Tiffany Graves an 8th grade Special Needs student was announced!  We were very proud of Tiffany and our student body who voted for her. The Homecoming Dance was held on Friday night at 6:00 in the GSMS Gym, where we also had record attendance.   Mr. Fountain, The GSMS PTSO, and our Cheerleaders worked very hard on this entire event, and it was a great success!

Mr. Fountain is moving a little dirt!
You may notice several areas of the school where our grounds "under construction". Mr. Fountain is in the process of beautifying our school even more with curbside landscaping, and courtyard areas around the school for the enjoyment of our students and teachers.
GREAT JOB!

Update: 8/28/08

CONGRATULATIONS TO
PHILLIP FOUNTAIN!!!!
Our new GSMS Principal!!!

Mr. Fountain has officially been voted in as of today, August 28 as our new principal!!!
Please help me welcome him to his new position! He'll start Monday!
E-mail me today!  I'll be happy to forward your congrats to him!

Update 8/24/08

  According to our information, most of us expected to have a principal recommended to the board for a vote at the Aug. 21 BCBE meeting, and to have a new principal at Gulf Shores Middle School this week. As per Aug. 21, the committee had conducted their interviews and had made their recommendations to Dr. Hollinger. On the morning of Aug. 21, I received a call from Dr. Hollinger.  Although he was very comfortable with the recommendations he had received from the committee, he felt that in order for the process to be fair and complete, there were a few more interviews he, himself would like to conduct. One candidate had been interviewed by phone only and he wanted to interview him in person; and there were two candidates whom the committee did not recommend, but whom the communities favored.  He felt that since these two candidates had strong community support, it was only fair to grant them interviews as well.
Dr. Hollinger asked my opinion as to whether I thought the recommendation should be postponed for one week in order to conduct the additional interviews. I agreed that it was better to postpone the recommendation in order to make sure we make the RIGHT choice for our school, rather than rush our decision and possibly make a wrong choice. I was sure you all would agree.

A special board meeting will be held on Aug. 28th for a budget hearing. It is my understanding from our discussion
(Dr. Hollinger and myself) that the interview process will be complete for all candidates and a recommendation will be made to the board at that meeting.
Thank you for your patience and understanding.  We want to get it RIGHT!

Update Aug. 23:

Although we are certainly thrilled to have Dr. Rosado as our new GSHS Principal, his appointment has also left us with a sense of loss at GSMS.  Our new GSMS Principal, whomever it may be, will certainly have big shoes to fill. Dr. Rosado has done a tremendous job of turning GSMS around in one short year.  

Although we have already begun our new school year, Dr. Rosado's appointment to the high school on July 25 has forced Gulf Shores Middle School to start the year with no principal in place.  Dr. Tom Sisk was on hand for the first few days of school to assist Mr. Joe Carpenter, our current Assistant Principal (and Interim Principal) until a permanent Principal can be named.

All open positions in the Baldwin County School System must be advertised for two weeks before the interview process can begin.  The position for principal began advertisement on Monday, July 28; and the last day to advertise the position was Monday, Aug. 11 (the first day of school). 

The Baldwin County School System has a committee that will review the applications and decide who will be granted an interview for the position. (There are approximately 15 applicants for the position.)  The committee will interview and review the applicants and narrow the candidates down to about 4.  These 4 or 5 names will be presented to Dr. Hollinger as a recommendation. At that point, Dr. Hollinger may interview the applicants a second time and will make a choice.  He has the flexibility to accept the committee's recommendations or choose a completely different applicant if he sees fit.

A Work Session is scheduled for August 19, and a Regularly Scheduled Meeting is set for August 21.  If all goes as planned, Dr. Hollinger will have a recommendation for the position for this Aug. 21 meeting.  He will recommend his candidate to the Board and they will vote on his recommendation. If his recommendation is accepted by the Board, we will have a new GSMS Principal in place right away!

While I have certainly offered my opinion in the matter to Dr. Hollinger, and have forwarded the input that YOU have sent to me, the final decision will rest with Dr. Hollinger.  While I am confident that he will choose the best possible candidate to carry on Dr. Rosado's work at the middle school, I have also stressed the importance of making the RIGHT decision. Our middle school is an important link between our children's "warm and fuzzy" elementary years and the responsibilities of young adulthood in the high school years. It is a crucial time in our children's lives where role models make a lasting impression and mentors can make the difference between self confidence and the lack thereof.

Best of Luck to all of our Applicants!

I will certainly keep you updated on our progress! 

Current District 5 News
 

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