Woodland School District 50

Catch the WMS Cross Country Team at Viking Middle School today at 4 p.m. Cheer on our Wildcats as they take on Beach Park and Viking! #LifeintheW
Other Athletic Competitions on 9/10/25:
⚽️ Boys Green Soccer at Viking - 4 p.m.
⚽️ Boys White Soccer at Home vs. Waukegan - 4 p.m.
⚽️ Girls Soccer at Home vs. Viking - 4:15 p.m.
🥎 No Softball Games Today
View Schedules: https://www.dist50.net/o/middle/page/athletics

The celebration of new Woodland teachers/staff continues. Please join us in giving a warm #LifeintheW welcome to Candace Andrada! Today we visited Ms. Andrada's class at Woodland Intermediate and the students were all smiles as they worked in pairs and small groups. Ms. Andrada is new to Woodland, but she comes to us with 10+ years of teaching experience, and things are off to a great start in her classroom.
We’ll continue highlighting our new staff members over the next few weeks, so keep those welcome wishes coming! 💚

Go Wildcats! WMS Softball Game Photos

Arigatō! Elementary students had special visitors from Japan today. A group of Japanese graduate students are studying to be teachers and they are visiting the United States through a program at the College of Lake County. The future teachers taught Woodland students the art of origami and answered questions about schools in Japan. Many students were excited to hear that soccer and Fortnite are also popular in Japan! #LifeintheW

The Parent Mentor Program is growing, and having tons of fun while doing so... Please join us for a quick information session to find out how you can be part of the Parent Mentor Program this year!
Sept. 9 - Primary, 8 - 8:30 (Champions Gym)
Sept. 9 - Intermediate, 9 - 9:30 a.m. (Rm W230)
Sept. 10 - Elementary, 8 - 8:30 a.m. (Rm 123)
https://www.dist50.net/page/parent-mentor-program

The celebration of new Woodland teachers/staff continues! Please join us in giving a warm welcome to Courtney Odden to the #LifeintheW! An alum of Woodland, Courtney is excited once again be a Wildcat and give back to the community she loves.

We’ll continue highlighting our new staff members over the next few weeks, so keep those welcome wishes coming! 💚

Classroom visit photos!
Ms. Bensch and her Kindergarten students going over ROAR expectations (R: Respectful - follow directions) and modeling numbers on a 5-frame! The students then broke into smaller groups to visit math stations around the classroom. It's a great day to be a Wildcat!

Great news out of WMS: Congratulations to Noah A. for winning Sectionals yesterday at Ingersoll Golf Course in Rockford. Noah shot a 73 and will be competing at the State meet next Friday in Joliet. Go Wildcats! #LifeintheW ⛳️

Thank you to the Woodland PTA for bringing the Scholastic Book Fair to Intermediate! Our Wildcats had a wonderful time finding new and exciting books and stories to read!

As a reminder, you can visit the book fair during Intermediate Curriculum Night. It’s a wonderful way to spark a love of reading while connecting with teachers and learning more about the year ahead.

Wednesday, Sept. 3 — 4th Grade Curriculum Night, 6 - 7:30 p.m.
Thursday, Sept. 4 - 5th Grade Curriculum Night, 6 - 7:30 p.m.

As we get further into the start of the school year, we’re excited to introduce and celebrate some of our new Woodland teachers! Please join us in giving a warm welcome to Linsey Ryan, who is starting her first year as a full-time Woodland teacher after serving as a long-term substitute last year.

We’ll continue highlighting our new staff members over the next few weeks—so keep those welcome wishes coming! 💚 #LifeintheW

WMS students worked together on these amazing "Why Study History" Collaborative Posters. The first few weeks of school are all about building connections. The students learned about each other, and discussed the importance of studying history while completing this activity. Great job Wildcats!
Thank you to Ms. Barkhurst and Ms. Barbknecht for sharing this artwork.

Ms. Oballe’s 1st grade class was practicing their letter and spelling. They went on a hunt around their classroom to find words that began with the letter “i”.

The Woodland Board of Education met last night, and the Family Coordinator's led the Board in the Pledge of Allegiance. Find a summary of highlights from the meeting in the Woodland ROAR Report for Friday, Aug. 29: https://secure.smore.com/n/106fz
In this edition you can also learn about:
Wildcat Calendar & PTA Events
Saturday Study Hall & Homework Help
Bilingual Parent Advisory Committee (BPAC) Meeting, Sept. 11
Special Education Parent Resource Group, Sept. 17
AND MORE!
To learn more about Woodland's Family Coordinators, please visit the district website: https://www.dist50.net/page/woodland-family-coordinators

Here are a few photos from the WMS 6th Grade Curriculum Night. Join us on Thursday night (8/28) for 7th & 8th Grade Curriculum Night!
Coming Next Week: Woodland Intermediate Curriculum Nights. Check the District Events Calendar for upcoming events: https://www.dist50.net/events

REMINDERS!
💚 The Friday Early Dismissal Schedule Starts Friday, Aug. 29.
💚 Woodland D50 is closed on Monday, Sept. 1 in honor of the Labor Day holiday.
Friday Early Dismissal Schedule:
Primary - 12:40 p.m.
Elementary - 1:00 p.m.
Middle School - 1:45 p.m.
Intermediate - 2:30 p.m.
School Year Calendar
English - https://5il.co/33x56
Spanish - https://5il.co/3mg8p

Here are Woodland we are so excited to have our Wildcats back in the schools! Mrs. Ryan’s 1st graders are having a great start to the school year. Today they learned about lions and wrote down some of their favorite lion facts. #LifeintheW 🐯💚

Safety in the W! Woodland Elementary had their first scheduled fire drill today to practice safe school evacuations with the students and staff. Great job Wildcats! #LifeintheW

Wiley wants you to have a happy & relaxing weekend after such a great start to the school year! We will be ready to cheer you on again next week. #LifeintheW

To kickoff the 2025-2026 School Year, all Woodland staff members gathered at WMS for an opening ceremony on the first Teacher Institute Day. The keynote speaker was a former Woodland student, Curtis Szajkovics, a Systems Engineer and Flight Controller at Firefly Aerospace. His keynote address was all about cool lunar missions and the impact teachers have on students! As part of his presentation he even had a slide about one of his former teachers who is still a teacher at WMS. Curtis thanked Mr. Whiteaker for igniting his interest in science and technology and for always putting up with his ridiculous questions. It was a great moment for Mr. Whiteaker to learn about the impact he had and to reunite with his former student. This is what #LifeintheW is all about!
This story was also shared in the Woodland ROAR Report this morning. In case you missed it - https://secure.smore.com/n/1ntsy
The Daily Herald also did an article earlier this year about Curtis and the “Blue Ghost” lunar lander mission he was part of! https://www.dailyherald.com/20250113/news/gurnee-native-reached-for-the-moon-now-hell-be-steering-spacecraft-to-lunar-landing/

Join the #LifeintheW Team! Woodland D50 is hiring a Network & Systems Infrastructure Engineer to join the Technology Department.

To check out this listing, and other available positions, please visit:
https://www.applitrack.com/dist50/OnlineApp/default.aspx