Overlake Glossary

Discover a comprehensive glossary of terms related to the Overlake School community, providing insights into its unique culture and traditions.

Written By Kelly Vikstrom (Collaborator)

Updated at August 21st, 2024

The Overlake School Glossary
#	The way we tag all our email/Teams/Sharepoint groups here at Overlake. (e.g. #everyone is the group for everyone, #socialstudies is the group for the Social Studies Department). If you see # in front of a name, it indicates that it is for a group, not an individual.
Adult Collaboration	Time for adults on campus to work together from 8:15-9:30 on Wednesdays (late start for students).
Advisory	A group of students with an advisor, or the time that group meets. Middle school homerooms/advisory groupings are for one year, upper school homerooms/advisories are for all four years of upper school. (Also referred to as home room--especially in upper school)
Affinity	Spaces/time where students and a faculty/staff leader or two join together to speak about one piece of identity that they all share. We have student affinity groups that meet, and also employee affinity groups that meet.
Alumni Room	One of the meeting rooms in the Campus Center.
Announcements	Weekly gatherings of an entire division to have student and faculty announcements. US--Mondays at 9:20 in the gym, MS--Mondays at 9:35 in Fulton theater.
Armstrong (HUM)	The official name of the Humanities Building (sometimes abbreviated HUM). Named after Bill "Army" Armstrong, our longest-serving faculty member.
ASB	Associated Student Body--our student council/student government group. There is one group for middle school and one for upper school.
ATL	Advisory Team Leader (similar to a grade dean at other schools) helps organize the advisors for a grade level. In US, they stay with that graduating class over the years.
Atlas	A curriculum mapping software/interface that Overlake used extensively pre and immediately post-covid.
Axiom	The back end of Veracross, as opposed to the Portals which are presenting information in a more visually appealing way, Axiom is where the data is put in (and can be accessed). Axiom is not used extensively by most people - but some people's jobs live in Axiom all the time.
Back to School Night (BTSN)	An evening in September when parents come to campus and visit teachers in their classrooms. 10 minutes per class, including advisory/homeroom.
Board Room	One of the meeting rooms in the Campus Center.
CAT (Competing Academic Teams)	Teams that go to competitions in an academic subject. Some examples: Speech and Debate, Quiz Bowl, DECA.
CC	Campus Center - where we get food and eat! (And have meetings and gatherings.)
CSIG	Curriculum Standards Integration Group--a group that took overarching transcurricular standards (EE, DEJI, SEL, and TRIM) and has worked to find commonalities and create combined standards.
DEJI	Diversity, equity, justice and inclusion. Refers to the programming and assemblies on this topic, and the office overseeing this work, the curriculum around this, etc.
EE	Experiential Education. Refers to the department overseeing this work, as well as the programs and curriculum around this work.
Executive Functioning (sometimes abbreviated EF or EFT)	Upper school time from 12:05-12:50 on (mostly) Monday and Friday, which is mainly unprogrammed, giving students an opportunity to select what to prioritize to best suit their needs and wellbeing.
Field studies	A four-day overnight Experiential Education trip for the 8th grade in May.
Fieldhouse	The building with a gym, climbing wall, lost and found, PE offices, locker rooms, Gola room, etc. The first building you come to when you come up the hill from campus. (Note: This is a different building that what we refer to as the gym.)
Fishbowl	The room that is mostly glass across the skybridge from the library. Officially, this is TLC Conference Room 304.
FJG5/6	The 5th and 6th grade building (also home to the head of school's office). FJG is the initials of a previous head of school, Frank Grijalva, who the building is named after.
Flex	The generic name for the upper school block from 12:05-12:50 or the middle school block from 12:50-1:35. This block is where programming, clubs, DEJI, affinity, wellness, study hall, and executive functioning happen.
Fulton/FUPAC	Stands for Fulton Performing Arts Center--also called Fulton. The building with the theater, blackbox, choir and orchestra rooms, and an art gallery.
Gola	A game/sport invented at Overlake that middle schoolers (and all kids) love. https://www.overlake.org/node/415
Grads Return	A program where recent grads come back and speak to students.
Green and Gold	Two “houses” in the middle school - decided by a “sorting hat” at the beginning of the year, the two sides battle by earning points in fun competitions held mostly at lunch. Each week at announcements, the total scores of each team are tallied to much cheering and applause.
Gym	Differentiated from the field house (which also has a gym in it), the gym is the second building you come to when you walk up the hill from the main campus. It is newer than the fieldhouse and sometimes still called the "new" gym. It houses a gym, weight room, athletics offices, training room, locker rooms, and a classroom.
Homeroom (HR)	A group of students with an advisor which or the time that group meets. Middle school homerooms/advisories groupings are for one year, upper school homerooms/advisories are for all four years of upper school. (Also refered to as advisory--especially in middle school. MS teachers often call their HR kids their "homies.")
ILT	Information Library and Technology--the recently combined departments of library and technology. Housed in the library.
MAC (Major Assessments Calendar)	The major assessments calendar. Linked in Canvas - a calendar where you should put any major assessments for your courses, to ensure that students don't have too many assessments in a day/week.
Math/Sci	The building where most of the math and sciences classes take place. (Also called Whitten or WMSC.)
MESH	Math, English, Science, and History - usually referenced related to middle school grade-level meetings of the core academic subjects.
MOSAIC	Multicultural Overlakers Sharing an Inclusive Community--An affinity space for members of our community who represent racial and ethnic minorities within our school, to provide space to build community of people who may share similar experiences, whether it is language, or other experiences.
MS	Middle School (5th - 8th grades).
Owl’s nest	A program where upper school students are paired with middle school students for fun activities once a quarter. Also the area around the flagpole in the center of the campus.
Paylocity	The HR platform the school uses. Accessed through the Veracross Portal, this is where you can see your paystub, or request time off.
PFSA	Parent Faculty Staff Alliance--this has been renamed the PGA.
PGA	Parent Gardian Association--our parent support group.
PLC	Professional Learning Cohort.
POG	Portrait of a Graduate.
Portal	Veracross--there is an employee page, a student page, and a family/parent page - you see only the page of the group you belong to. These pages link out to lots of other resources - therefore are an information portal.
Project Week	A week at the end of March where regular classes are cancelled and all students and faculty participate in week long experiential learning "projects".
The Sanctuary	A space for students or faculty to practice spirituality and faith, mindfulness, meditation, etc. Used by some as a place for daily prayer.
SEL	Social emotional learning.
Service Day	A day in the fall and spring when classes are cancelled and each division's faculty and students do service with or for outside organizations.
SPACE	The aspects of our wellbeing pillar of the strategic plan. Social, physical, academic/intellectual, community, emotional
SRB	Student Review Board--a panel of upper school students who work to recommend restorative and collaborative consequences for student infractions to the Director of Student Experience.
SST	Student support team--a group of faculty and staff who work together to support a student. Usually involves a counselor, the advisor, and teachers of the student.
Stewardship Day	A day in the fall when classes are cancelled and each division's faculty and students work to improve our campus.
TLC	Technology and Language Center--the red building behind the library. Note that it is divided into two sections above ground, but extends below both underground.
TRIM	Technology, research, information and media literacy. The curriculum associated with ILT.
UBD	Understanding by Design--a method of curriculum design and unit planning that we use at Overlake.
US	Upper School (9th -12th grade).
VCX	The abbreviation for Veracross.
WARE	White Antiracist Educators group--one of our adult affinity groups.
Wellness	The curriculum, assemblies and programming associated with our strategic pillar of improving our community's sense of wellbeing.
Whitten (WMSC)	The building where most of the math and sciences classes take place. (Also called Math/Sci.)
Wise	Overlake's knowledge base of all things ILT, and more. A place to search for help and how-to for most Overlake platforms and some policy
Writers' Symposium	A yearly program where an author is brought in to present to a division and then works with students in their English classes on writing.

The Overlake School Knowledge

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