May 28, 2010
Summit View Community Letter – August 20, 2010 Thank you for taking the time to read through this information. This one may take two cups of coffee to get through. If you missed our previous Community Letters, they are available on our website at http://schools.dcsdk12.org/education/school/school.php?sectionid=59 Other information is also available there if you have not browsed it recently. Thank you for a wonderful start to the school year. We have completed 13 days of school thus far, and it has really flown by thanks to the excellent work of students, parents, and teachers. Thank you for choosing Summit View.
Important Dates:
Fundraiser Ends Tuesday! Hello Trailblazers! One more weekend left in our first big FUNdraiser of the year! Please remember to turn in your Frozen Food Sales Packets and checks by Tuesday August 24! Sell just one item to be invited to the big FUN SERVICES provided party! Sell 15 items and win a Limo Lunch! The class that sells the most items combined will win a pizza party! Several parents have asked about donations in lieu of food orders. At this time, we ask that you save donations for Move-A-Thon. If your family is not interested in any of the food products, but your child REALLY wants to come to the rocking' party, here is our suggestion: buy at least ONE food item and on your packet, indicate that it is a DONATION. That food item will be delivered to people in and around our community identified as in need. How simple! Questions? Don't hesitate to ask! In your child’s Thursday folder you should have received information regarding a new way to raise money very similar to box tops. The Tyson A+ Project is an easy way to raise money by simply clipping the label off their products. If you didn’t see this handout, you can visit their website to see what products qualify and what the label looks like. (The entire label needs to be clipped not just the little chalk board.) These labels can be returned with box tops—no need to separate them! Here is their website: http://www.tyson.com/projectaplus/ Have you checked the birthday board lately? We are filling in some balloons! Thanks for supporting SVE! Be a part of our school and join the PTsO! sverocks@gmail.com Stacie, Tara, Kristin and IndiraSafety
School Advisory Committee Dear Summit View Parents and Staff, In Colorado, it is a statutory requirement for every school to have a School Accountability Committee (SAC). The purpose of the Summit View Elementary SAC is to inform, encourage and provide opportunities for parents and community members to be involved in the planning and evaluation of the school's instructional program and quality improvement processes; and be a representative voice for the community. As an advisory body, the SAC makes recommendations to the school principal on the school-wide action planning and goals for improvement, as well as the school budgeting process. If you care about the strategic, big picture at Summit View Elementary, and the plans and processes to provide the best education possible for your child, you are encouraged to come visit any of our monthly SAC meetings. Besides normal business, each meeting will include presentations from the principal or district guests to provide insight on various important educational issues that affect you and your child.
Our first meeting is Tuesday, August 24th from 4:14 - 5:45 p.m. in the Library.
Please check out our page on the Summit View website for more information. If you have any questions, concerns, or would like to receive a copy of the agenda prior to the meeting, you may contact SAC at SummitViewSAC@gmail.com.
Sincerely, Laura Mutton, SAC Chairperson
Front Office Volunteers Due to cut backs and using our monies for the students, we are seeking adult volunteers to assist in the front office of Summit View Elementary School during the hours of 9 am – 1 pm during the school week. We would like to get a group of 10 volunteers who are willing to work on a regular basis; we will work out a schedule that meets everyone’s needs once we get our group together. This job will involve phone duties, parent/public window duties, attendance and general office concerns. This will involve confidential information and will require a more detailed background check. It is a wonderful opportunity to be more involved in your child’s school on a regular basis. We will be very flexible in regards to personal situations that require a deviation from the schedule. This is a volunteer position that will not only give you great elementary school experience, but enable SVE to provide efficient customer service while saving money for the school. If you are interested please drop off a brief resume to the front office as soon as possible.
Drills and School Crisis Plan Today we had our first of many practice drills as part of our safety plan and training. We completed a severe weather drill and an evacuation drill. These went very smoothly, and there were only a couple items for improvement that were relatively minor. We will continue to practice these and other drills in the coming months. Our School Crisis Plan is in place, and we will be meeting soon to refresh our training and reestablish everyone’s role in the event of a crisis occurring in the school or in the community. Thank you to Jennifer Murtha for organizing these efforts at maintaining a safe environment for our students and staff.
Expectations Assemblies, Hats, and Electronics in School Today we completed our final set of assemblies for each classroom. We covered expectations in the school, cafeteria, on the playground, and in the classroom. We also covered building relationships, bullying, sportsmanship, and including others in games. The most common questions were about hats and electronics at school. Hats are allowed at school while outside. Electronics, including cell phones, are to be shut off and left in backpacks during the school day. They may come out after school as the children leave in order to make connections with parents.
Dogs on Campus and Service Dog Thank you for everyone who has been keeping their dogs off campus. This is a district policy, and improves everyone’s safety. You are more than welcome to walk them to the edge of campus with your child. That having been said, we have the unique opportunity to have a service dog on campus for one of our students. The dog will be utilized in the child’s support classroom as a learning aide for some of his unique needs. We are one of the first schools to utilize this type of support, and we are looking forward to it.
Kids Challenge Day This opportunity comes to us from one of my former schools. Northridge Elementary has invited us to participate in Kids Challenge Day which is a leadership development program they are hosting. We are awaiting further details, but it will take place on September 24th at Northridge. This is a student free day here at SVE. For a fee, students will be allowed to participate in business, mentoring, problem solving, critical thinking, and team building activities from professionals in the individual fields of study. As soon as we know specifics, we will send them on to you.
Enrichment Opportunities We have quite a number of enrichment and extension activities available in the information holders near the main office. In the next week or so we will also be sending out an email with these opportunities summarized for you. Please watch for this communication.
Science Materials and STEM Resource Lab Our science materials have arrived for our new STEM resource room. Thank you to the PTsO for ordering these items. The teachers will be working at implementing these inquiry based materials into the science program for this year. In the near future, we will be soliciting volunteers to help with these efforts.
CSAP Results CSAP results should be here soon. They will be sent out to families in September. Please watch for these.
Instrumental Music Update: CHANGE! – NOW INCLUDES 4TH GRADE! The entire district will now be offering instrumental music to 4th, 5th and 6th grades as a before and/or after school fee based program through a company named Springboard. Initial information to families in these grades was sent out via email this week. We are still waiting for specifics about times/days and registration. It is great that this opportunity is now available to 4th graders as well. We hope to have information in the next couple weeks about days and times for this new program.
Thank you for taking the time to read this through carefully. Please contact me if you have any questions. David Larsen, Principal Summit View School david.larsen@dcsdk12.org
Repeated Information from the last Community Letter
Douglas County School District’s Inaugural 5K Run/Walk Race Series! DCSD has set health and wellness as a top priority for our school community. They are hosting a series of three Saturday morning “races.” They are run/walk events, so everyone can participate. All races are at 8:00 am. Sept. 4th-Highlands Ranch HS, Sept. 11th-Cherokee Trail ES, and Sept. 18th at Castle View HS. Visit www.active.com and search Douglas County School District for more information.
Read Like a Rockstar Information and Awards
Elementary Progress Report – The district is rolling out a new report card for elementary students this next year. All of us have a great deal to learn about this new way of reporting student progress. Just yesterday an informational video for parents was loaded on the district website. You can access it at… http://online.dcsdk12.org/moodle/course/view.php?id=7141 I encourage you to look this over. At back to school night and at parent conferences we will have more information available to share with you.
Art, Music, and Science Room Move: Our choral music room has moved to the instrumental music room. We have subsequently moved the art room into the vacated choral music room. Rich McCurdy requested this change, and I think it is an excellent idea. This is a much improved space for the art program, and he is very excited. We will be using the “old” art room for our STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) resource lab. We are building this program beginning with the new science standards and materials that we are implementing this year.
Concerns about Large Class Sizes: The large class sizes that we have inherited this year are an important instructional challenge that we are taking on with all available resources and ideas. We have been doing some planning and discussion this week to build schedules for Educational Assistants and our “7th Teachers” to mitigate this reality for our students and teachers. If you do not understand the rationale behind the 7th Teacher model, one half of it is paid by the district for special education needs, and one half by the school. In the budget set up last year, they are charged with instructional support for all students. Reassigning the school funded portion of these teachers into the classroom as regular education teachers would involve forming multiple combination classes to gain an appreciable reduction in class sizes across the grades. This is not a viable option for us. These teachers are working closely with the classroom teachers to best determine the model for supporting the classroom instruction. We will also be improving the communication and opportunities for parents to support us in the school, and we will keep you updated with specifics. We share the concerns you may have about the class sizes, and we will come up with a successful model for meeting the needs of all students. The teachers are excited and have indicated to me that it has been a great start to the school year. We will continually look at and plan for this issue over the year.
Class Placement Information: The teachers worked diligently to determine class placements for this coming year. I am respecting these decisions, and I am pleased that there was a high level of integrity applied to balancing the classes for this school year. Your child now has the opportunity to make some new friends as well as keep their “old” friends. The classroom teachers have been (and will continue) to provide chances to develop new relationships. A parent this week told me about a saying that fits this new opportunity for our students. “Make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver, one is gold.” Please reinforce with your child the chance that they have to broaden their friendship base. We will be supporting them in this important, and sometimes challenging, experience.
Calendars For Sale: We have activity calendars for sale again this year. These are a great resource for families as they are preprinted with the planned activities for the year. They are available in the office for $10. Thank you Susan Mitchell for organizing this effort.
Homework Guidelines: The district guideline for homework is 10 minutes for each grade starting with 1st and adding ten minutes to each year (2nd=20, 3rd=30, etc). This includes the time spent reading. The teachers have already been working on developing consistent expectations around homework at each grade level. Sometimes it may be a bit more than the guidelines, and sometimes it may be a bit less, but if you have questions or concerns, please contact your child’s teacher.
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Thu, September 2, 2010
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