September 23, 2024
Thoreau Families,
I want to extend a heartfelt thank you for helping us kick off the school year in a positive way! Your support and engagement during Back-to-School Night made it a huge success. We’re excited to continue strengthening our partnership as we move forward into the 2024-2025 school year, ensuring a wonderful experience for all our students.
Our School Advisory Council meets this week and consists of the following staff and parents: Rachel Levesque, Jacqui McKenna, Annette Howard, Jean Oviatte-Rothman, Mary Little, and Meaghan Sinclair. This week, we’ll begin work on the 2025-2026 School Improvement Plan. You can view the current plan here. The main responsibilities of the SAC are:
- Assisting in adopting educational goals
- Identifying student educational needs
- Reviewing the annual school building budget
- Formulating the school improvement plan
On Wednesday, we’ll hold our first All-School Meeting of the year! Our entire community will come together in the spirit of a classroom morning meeting to celebrate our accomplishments, get to know each other, look ahead at the exciting year, and have some fun.
Our Parent-Teacher Conferences will be held on November 1st. This is another wonderful opportunity to connect with your child’s teacher, but in a more personalized way. During the conference, you’ll gain insights into how your child is progressing academically, socially, and emotionally. We understand the importance of flexibility and work hard to accommodate the needs of our parents. While we aim to hold conferences in person, we are happy to offer Zoom meetings if necessary. We look forward to partnering with you to support your child’s success!
Our Playground Committee has been hard at work, collaborating with teachers, students, and vendors while incorporating feedback from surveys to finalize a design that everyone can get excited about. This is going to be an amazing play space for our kids, and we can’t wait to see it come to life!
With the HVAC project, it sometimes feels like one step forward and two steps back, but progress is happening. Contractors are still in and out, servicing and repairing. I’ll have a more comprehensive update after I meet with them for a walkthrough this week.
Our Bike to School Day is scheduled for Wednesday, October 9th. We’ll meet in the lot across from the prison at 8 AM, and we’d love for you to join us. It’s always a fun annual event for students, families, and staff! Please note, that students need an adult with them for safety reasons.
We’re excited to offer an opportunity for your child to be paired with a high school buddy. Through this program, students will get to meet with a high school buddy over Zoom or in person every other week, or more often if desired. The meeting times are flexible, based on whenever your child and their buddy are free, and can last between 30 minutes to 1 hour. During these meetings, students can engage in arts and crafts, play virtual games, get help with schoolwork, or simply spend time with a new friend. This is a great way for students to build friendships and have fun in a supportive environment. If you’re interested in having your child participate, please fill out the form here: High School Buddy Program Sign-Up.
Many have asked about our WINN (What I Need Now) intervention block that we added to the master schedule this year, so here’s a quick overview: WINN is a structured period during the school day dedicated to providing targeted support or enrichment for students, addressing their individual learning needs. Teachers identify students who may benefit from extra support based on academic performance and develop personalized intervention plans. These plans focus on areas like reading, math, study skills, or social-emotional learning. WINN helps students close learning gaps, build confidence, and grow academically in a supportive environment. It’s an important part of fostering continuous improvement and success within our school community.
Thank you again for your continued support and engagement! Please reach out with any questions or concerns.
With Gratitude,
Principal Sparks