​For the last few days the PTO has been celebrating two very important groups of people in our student's lives:  teachers and mothers.  To all the people who fill those roles, we say THANK YOU!

Miner Elementary School is fortunate to have an amazing, hard-working, and extremely dedicated group of teachers who fill their days not only educating our children, but also helping shape them into model students and citizens. As a small token of our appreciation, the Miner PTO sponsored a breakfast last Friday during Teacher Appreciation Week to thank them and all of Miner's staff for everything they do.  But this breakfast would not have happened without the PTO's Appreciation and Recognition Committee or the many families who donated food and/or time to help make it a success.  We would like to give a special thank you to Jessica and Justin Burniske and Emily Cahill for organizing the event.

Additionally, with the help of our social workers Ms. Kraemer and Ms. Woodard, the PTO sponsored Mother’s Day Flowers for some of our moms and mother-figures who could use some extra support this Mother’s Day.  Thank you to the Family Support Committee for putting smiles on a few amazing moms’ faces with a bouquet of roses on their special day.

We are so grateful to our Miner teachers, our Miner moms, and our Miner families who help out with events like these.  Thank you!

​As we come to the end of the school year, we are conducting a "Year In Review" survey to take stock of the PTO's activities this past school year: what we accomplished (well or otherwise), what we need to do better, and how useful our activities and events were. At our June meeting we will go over the results of the survey.  Regardless of whether you plan to attend the meeting and provide feedback in person, or if you won't be able to attend at all, we'd love to get your thoughts on this topic prior to the meeting. We've created this short and anonymous survey to collect feedback. We’ll leave the survey open through the end of May.

You can click here to fill out the survey. Additionally, copies will be sent home in your student's folder next week and will be available in the main office.

Thank you so much for your continued support of the Miner PTO.  We are always looking for ways to improve, and we appreciate your opinions.

​On April 22, Miner’s smallest Bears celebrated Earth Day with a celebration on the ECE playground.  The PreK Parent Committee and the School Garden Team joined forces to organize an event with a variety of stations for the students to explore and learn about the environment around them.  Students were able to practice sorting and recycling; they planted seeds to take home and grow; they made bird feeders out of Cheerios and filled up the bird feeders on the playground with bird seed; they tasted different foods that grow in a garden; and finally they painted an Earth Day banner to hang in the school.

The day would not have been such a success without the hard work of our teacher, staff, and parent volunteers.  We are so fortunate to be a part of such an amazing community at Miner, and to everyone who played a part in the role—even if only as an attendee—we are grateful for your support of our students and our school.  

​On Friday, April 12th, The Miner PTO Family Engagement and Events Committee hosted the Third Annual Miner Spring Dance.  Approximately 290 Miner Family members enjoyed an evening of fun, dancing, food, and an overall good time.  The evening consisted of Miner Bears and their families dressed up all while dancing under enchanted cherry blossoms!  

We crowned the 2019 royal court to showcase students who have excelled this school year.  There was a cool raffle where one lucky family won an iPad!

The Miner PTO would like to thank the many parent volunteers and donors who helped to make the evening a huge success.  We would also like to thank the staff members, whose contributions to the planning and execution were immeasurable.  We would like to give a special thanks to Principal Jackson for his leadership as well as Ms. Offor for her countless hours in planning and securing catering for the event; Ms. Olazo and her team for the beautiful decorations in the gym; and Ms. Kirby for transforming the cafeteria into the Miner Restaurant :-) Also, thank you to Ms. Rosettie for providing the arts & crafts activity and for designing the Miner Boutique sign.

The Family Events and Engagement committee would like to personally thank the treasurer Ryan Cahill for your patience and for securing the many Amazon orders :-)

Jill Da Silva and Concetta Aires, thank you for coordinating the volunteers and donations that were vital in pulling this all together.  Dave Treat, thanks for cutting down the branches used for the decorations.

Thank you again for continued support of Miner!

Ms. Dorsey and Ms. Jones 
Family Engagement and Events Co-Chairs

​On Saturday the Miner PTO hosted Miner's 4th Annual Community Yard Sale.  The event was a huge success, and the PTO would like to thank the families, teachers, staff, and members of the community who played such a huge part.  Even though the event was earlier in the year than it has been in the past, we still managed to receive more donations than ever before.  The PTO is incredibly grateful for the support this community event continues to receive.

This year the PTO raised over $2,000 for the PTO’s general fund.  This money will be used to directly benefit Miner's students and teachers for the remainder of this school year. This includes field trips, school events and activities, classroom libraries and technology, or whatever else may be needed to ensure that our Mighty Bear scholars receive the best possible academic, social, and emotional experience.

The PTO leadership would like to thank everyone who took part in the Community Yard Sale—if you donated, volunteered, baked, shopped, or helped spread the word, you played a role in making this event a success.  To the many volunteers who took time on Friday to set up and on Saturday to sell, roam, pack up, and haul everything away, we thank you for all of your hard work!  The PTO also wishes to thank everyone who contributed to the bake sale. Your delicious goodies made the event even sweeter!

And last but certainly not least, The PTO would like to give special thanks to Maggie Ben-Or, Sara Saxton, and David Treat for serving as co-chairs of the event planning committee. Your hard work is greatly appreciated!

Miner's librarian, Ms. Williams (michelle.williams2@dc.gov) is gathering a team of enthusiastic, creative, and talented volunteers to help out at the Book Fair, and would like to invite you to help out. 

Please take a moment to view the online sign-up sheet to see what roles interest you. Spread the word to your friends and invite them to help us have the best Book Fair ever! Current areas of need:

• Set-up assistant
• Shopping assistant
• Restocking assistant
• Break-down assistant

Shifts run one hour and are available beginning as early as 8:00 am and ending as late as 6:00 pm.  We hope you can help!  If you have any questions, please reach out to Ms. Williams at the email address above.

​Now that the new year is in full swing and spring is just around the corner (despite today's bitter cold), the Miner PTO has begun planning for our 4th Annual Community Yard Sale. The sale will be Saturday, March 9 from 9:00 AM until 1:00 PM.

As you clean and organize for the new year, please consider donating any toys, games, clothes, household items, furniture, decor, or other items in good condition to the PTO. All proceeds from the sale are used to directly benefit Miner’s students and the school community.

As in previous years, the PTO has arranged for storage at the school, so you can drop off your items anytime starting Monday, February 4 during regular school hours, 8:00 AM - 6:00 PM. If you'd like a receipt for tax purposes, just email us at minerpto@gmail.com.

Once again as part of the Yard Sale, we will accept dropped off e-waste and other household hazardous waste at the school on the day of the sale, after which we will transport it to DPW’s Ft. Totten facility as a community service. We will accept DPW-approved e-cycle items (https://dpw.dc.gov/node/414902) and household hazardous waste (https://dpw.dc.gov/node/466802).

Check out our dedicated Community Yard Sale webpage for all the details on how to donate, volunteer, and participate in this new Miner tradition.

The PTO would like to thank everyone for their support of our first annual Family Movie Night!  The turnout for “Smallfoot” was amazing, and everyone seemed to have a really great time.  The Family Engagement and Events Committee and all the volunteers did a fantastic job of planning and organizing—Special thanks go out to Mariana Jones and Ms. Dorsey, the Committee Co-Chairs.  We had several requests to make Movie Night a new Miner tradition, so thanks to everyone who came out, we're off to a great start!

Come out for food and family fun while watching this 2018 animated adventure!

When: Thursday, January 17, 2019, 5:30 pm - 8:00 pm
Where: Miner ES gym
​ALL STUDENTS MUST BE ACCOMPANIED BY AN ADULT

Thank you so much to everyone who participated in Miner’s Third Annual Holiday Greenery & Bake Sale!  The three-day event was wildly successful, raising $5,800, which is $800 more than our goal. It was also a fun community event that filled us all with some holiday cheer! Miner also partnered with the Eliot-Hine PTO to sell poinsettias alongside our greenery.

A huge Thank You goes out to Maggie Ben-Or, the chair of the PTO's Fundraising & Grants Committee and lead organizer for the event. She and her team worked tirelessly with two separate vendors and multiple delivery times and dates to be sure we had the best, freshest, most beautiful trees and greenery available.  Her team kept the trees watered and protected, overcame a few delivery “hiccups,” and organized our legion of volunteers all so we could have a successful fundraiser and some beautiful holiday greenery in our homes.