Friday, August 9, 2013 at 4:14PM
The Emergency Preparedness Committee, the WS School Board,
WS staff, faculty, and administration, Select Board members, local fire
and rescue responders, and interested parents and community members met
for a working supper on June 20, 2013, at the AVFD to discuss ways to
make our school safe, but still welcoming. That meeting and subsequent
discussions produced the plan outlined below, which was presented to the
school board and will be in effect for the coming school year.
Many safety changes have been made to the school to make it safer in the event of an emergency, including safety glass installed during the summer and a planned restructuring of the main office, scheduled for December.
We will continue to welcome volunteers and community use of the building. The procedure for the many volunteers who support our school is unchanged. Volunteers must have all necessary paperwork on file and will continue to check into the office for their visitor’s pass before going anywhere else in the school.
However, unless prior arrangements have been made for the use of the school, the school will remain locked. Office personnel will be on duty until 4:00 pm. After that time, the school will be closed.
In accordance with new state laws, fire drills and lock down drills will be practiced during all 10 months of the school year, from September to June, with a minimum of 5 drills of each in the course of the school year. Our teachers will continue in a calm and nurturing way to train our students to remain safe. The intent is not to frighten children, but to empower them to react appropriately and to think on their feet when confronted with the unexpected. The first fire drill and lock down drill, each in September, will be announced in advance, so teachers can have thoughtful conversations with children before and after those two drills, to promote good thinking and to practice in a safe and calm way.
The exterior doors of the school will be locked during school hours. Visitors will be buzzed in from the outside of the building by the office staff.
Parents are asked to drop their children off at the main door between 7:00 and 7:50 am in the morning, rather than walking them to their class or locker, or visiting in the all purpose room. On the first day of school this year on August 26, 2013, parents of students in grades K-4 will be able to walk their children to class.
Morning bus duty personnel will greet children coming to school by bus at the main door, opening the door for them to enter. Children will go directly to the all purpose room, as in previous years.
Parents who wish to speak with teachers or other school personnel before, during, or after school need to go to the main office to see if that staff member might be available. If the staff member is unavailable at that time, parents are asked to make an appointment, which can be done via email, telephone, or through the secretaries in the office. Teachers will respond to email by the end of the following school day.
At bus dismissal time, 2:20 pm, bus students will line up at the front door, which will remain closed and locked until bus duty personnel walk students out to the buses. We will be boarding all five buses in rapid succession, which represents a change. The buses will be lined up from the front right of the school as you face it, all the way back to where the kindergarten classrooms begin. The school will maintain the sidewalks, even in winter months, to ensure that this process is fluid and safe. We are anticipating bus dismissal will take approximately 10 minutes. We encourage parents to call the school prior to 2:00 pm with any transportation changes, so the office staff has adequate time to alert teachers and children regarding the change in plans. Please do not take your child out of the bus line. In case of any emergency changes, go to the front office, and a secretary will assist you.
Parent pick-up and dismissal of walkers will look different this year. Parent pick-up students and walkers will remain in their classrooms until the buses have left the school. The parent pick-up entrance will be the same door, next to the kitchen, but will not be opened by school personnel until 2:20 pm. Please go directly to the all purpose room and wait for your child. The sign-out procedure will not change. No child may be taken from the all purpose room without being signed out by the parent or otherwise authorized adult. In the event the staff member on duty does not know or recognize the adult accompanying the child, the school reserves the right to ask for identification. It is important that the office is clear of distractions during bus dismissal time. Once buses have departed, which we anticipate will occur at 2:30 pm, parents who wish to speak to school personnel will be able to go to the office to make arrangements.
FY 14 Report Card and Progress Reporting System
Larry Dougher will be working with K-4 teachers this fall to train them on how to use the new electronic report card. Students in grades K-4 will have an electronic, standards-based report card starting this fall. We will still have four quarters as marking periods, and the reporting dates can be found on the FY 14 calendar. Teachers need to become familiar with PowerSchool Grading and all of the Common Core Standards for all subject areas in K-4, and owing to the complexity of this new system, there will be no progress reports from teachers in grades K-4 until the third midterm closes on February 28th, and then only for at-risk or failing students. Parents will still be able to contact teachers to see how their children are doing, and parent-teacher conferences will be held as usual in November. The changes will be in the look of the report card and in how often we report out midterm grades for K-4. We are in the emergent stages of these many changes, so we will do our best to make it a smooth transition. Though we will be using PowerSchool to document grading for K-4 in FY 14, the PowerSchool parent portal will NOT be open this year for K-4 while we implement the new system.
Teachers in grades 5-8 used PowerSchool Grading last year, so they are familiar with the process. The parent portal WILL be open on PowerSchool beginning this fall for grades 5-8, so there will be no need to send progress reports home four times a year, as has been the practice. Teachers will keep student grades up to date, so parents can access their child's progress electronically at any point in the year. Report cards will still go home four times a year on the dates provided on the FY 14 calendar. Any parents who do not have access to their child's grades electronically should let their child's teacher know, and a hard copy of a progress report can be made available. Numerical numbers for effort will no longer appear on the report cards, so they will not be used to determine eligibility for sports and extracurricular activities.
This whole system is new and complicated, and like anything new it may have nuances that are different and maybe even confusing. We ask for your patience and support as we move forward to implement this new reporting system. If you have any questions, please feel to call Principal Oakman at the school at 674-5400.
Kindergarten to Grade 4 Grades 5 - 8
Academic Indicator Academic Indicator
4 = Outstanding – Consistently exhibits skills A – Excellent (100-90%)
3 = Very Good – Exhibits skills most of the time B – Very Good (89-80%)
2 = Making Progress – Experiencing some difficulty C – Average (79-70%)
1 = Needs Improvement – Experiencing difficulty D – Poor (69-60%)
F – Failing (Below 60%)
Art and Library/Media are Pass/Fail classes for Grades K-8.
Report Cards
Report cards will be issued four times per year at the conclusion of each marking period on the dates specified below. Midterm reports will be available as outlined above.
Midterm Report Dates Quarter Ending Dates Report Card Dates
Quarter 1 – October 4, 2013 November 1, 2013 November 6, 2013
Quarter 2 – December 13, 2013 January 17, 2013 January 24, 2013
Quarter 3 – March 7, 2013 March 28, 2013 April 4, 2013
Quarter 4 – May 16, 2013 To be determined Last day of school
HONOR ROLL
The following procedure is used to determine merit, honors, and high honors status in grades 5-8.
1. All subjects are considered for honor roll eligibility.
2. Students must make up Incompletes within five school days upon return to school in order to be considered for honor roll.
High Honors All A’s
Honors All A’s and B’s
Merit All A’s and B’s with maximum one C offset by an A in an equivalent (core academic or special) course
Many safety changes have been made to the school to make it safer in the event of an emergency, including safety glass installed during the summer and a planned restructuring of the main office, scheduled for December.
We will continue to welcome volunteers and community use of the building. The procedure for the many volunteers who support our school is unchanged. Volunteers must have all necessary paperwork on file and will continue to check into the office for their visitor’s pass before going anywhere else in the school.
However, unless prior arrangements have been made for the use of the school, the school will remain locked. Office personnel will be on duty until 4:00 pm. After that time, the school will be closed.
In accordance with new state laws, fire drills and lock down drills will be practiced during all 10 months of the school year, from September to June, with a minimum of 5 drills of each in the course of the school year. Our teachers will continue in a calm and nurturing way to train our students to remain safe. The intent is not to frighten children, but to empower them to react appropriately and to think on their feet when confronted with the unexpected. The first fire drill and lock down drill, each in September, will be announced in advance, so teachers can have thoughtful conversations with children before and after those two drills, to promote good thinking and to practice in a safe and calm way.
The exterior doors of the school will be locked during school hours. Visitors will be buzzed in from the outside of the building by the office staff.
Parents are asked to drop their children off at the main door between 7:00 and 7:50 am in the morning, rather than walking them to their class or locker, or visiting in the all purpose room. On the first day of school this year on August 26, 2013, parents of students in grades K-4 will be able to walk their children to class.
Morning bus duty personnel will greet children coming to school by bus at the main door, opening the door for them to enter. Children will go directly to the all purpose room, as in previous years.
Parents who wish to speak with teachers or other school personnel before, during, or after school need to go to the main office to see if that staff member might be available. If the staff member is unavailable at that time, parents are asked to make an appointment, which can be done via email, telephone, or through the secretaries in the office. Teachers will respond to email by the end of the following school day.
At bus dismissal time, 2:20 pm, bus students will line up at the front door, which will remain closed and locked until bus duty personnel walk students out to the buses. We will be boarding all five buses in rapid succession, which represents a change. The buses will be lined up from the front right of the school as you face it, all the way back to where the kindergarten classrooms begin. The school will maintain the sidewalks, even in winter months, to ensure that this process is fluid and safe. We are anticipating bus dismissal will take approximately 10 minutes. We encourage parents to call the school prior to 2:00 pm with any transportation changes, so the office staff has adequate time to alert teachers and children regarding the change in plans. Please do not take your child out of the bus line. In case of any emergency changes, go to the front office, and a secretary will assist you.
Parent pick-up and dismissal of walkers will look different this year. Parent pick-up students and walkers will remain in their classrooms until the buses have left the school. The parent pick-up entrance will be the same door, next to the kitchen, but will not be opened by school personnel until 2:20 pm. Please go directly to the all purpose room and wait for your child. The sign-out procedure will not change. No child may be taken from the all purpose room without being signed out by the parent or otherwise authorized adult. In the event the staff member on duty does not know or recognize the adult accompanying the child, the school reserves the right to ask for identification. It is important that the office is clear of distractions during bus dismissal time. Once buses have departed, which we anticipate will occur at 2:30 pm, parents who wish to speak to school personnel will be able to go to the office to make arrangements.
FY 14 Report Card and Progress Reporting System
Larry Dougher will be working with K-4 teachers this fall to train them on how to use the new electronic report card. Students in grades K-4 will have an electronic, standards-based report card starting this fall. We will still have four quarters as marking periods, and the reporting dates can be found on the FY 14 calendar. Teachers need to become familiar with PowerSchool Grading and all of the Common Core Standards for all subject areas in K-4, and owing to the complexity of this new system, there will be no progress reports from teachers in grades K-4 until the third midterm closes on February 28th, and then only for at-risk or failing students. Parents will still be able to contact teachers to see how their children are doing, and parent-teacher conferences will be held as usual in November. The changes will be in the look of the report card and in how often we report out midterm grades for K-4. We are in the emergent stages of these many changes, so we will do our best to make it a smooth transition. Though we will be using PowerSchool to document grading for K-4 in FY 14, the PowerSchool parent portal will NOT be open this year for K-4 while we implement the new system.
Teachers in grades 5-8 used PowerSchool Grading last year, so they are familiar with the process. The parent portal WILL be open on PowerSchool beginning this fall for grades 5-8, so there will be no need to send progress reports home four times a year, as has been the practice. Teachers will keep student grades up to date, so parents can access their child's progress electronically at any point in the year. Report cards will still go home four times a year on the dates provided on the FY 14 calendar. Any parents who do not have access to their child's grades electronically should let their child's teacher know, and a hard copy of a progress report can be made available. Numerical numbers for effort will no longer appear on the report cards, so they will not be used to determine eligibility for sports and extracurricular activities.
This whole system is new and complicated, and like anything new it may have nuances that are different and maybe even confusing. We ask for your patience and support as we move forward to implement this new reporting system. If you have any questions, please feel to call Principal Oakman at the school at 674-5400.
Kindergarten to Grade 4 Grades 5 - 8
Academic Indicator Academic Indicator
4 = Outstanding – Consistently exhibits skills A – Excellent (100-90%)
3 = Very Good – Exhibits skills most of the time B – Very Good (89-80%)
2 = Making Progress – Experiencing some difficulty C – Average (79-70%)
1 = Needs Improvement – Experiencing difficulty D – Poor (69-60%)
F – Failing (Below 60%)
Art and Library/Media are Pass/Fail classes for Grades K-8.
Report Cards
Report cards will be issued four times per year at the conclusion of each marking period on the dates specified below. Midterm reports will be available as outlined above.
Midterm Report Dates Quarter Ending Dates Report Card Dates
Quarter 1 – October 4, 2013 November 1, 2013 November 6, 2013
Quarter 2 – December 13, 2013 January 17, 2013 January 24, 2013
Quarter 3 – March 7, 2013 March 28, 2013 April 4, 2013
Quarter 4 – May 16, 2013 To be determined Last day of school
HONOR ROLL
The following procedure is used to determine merit, honors, and high honors status in grades 5-8.
1. All subjects are considered for honor roll eligibility.
2. Students must make up Incompletes within five school days upon return to school in order to be considered for honor roll.
High Honors All A’s
Honors All A’s and B’s
Merit All A’s and B’s with maximum one C offset by an A in an equivalent (core academic or special) course
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