11/13/15 Daily Bulletin

Shout Out

Shout out to our Curley volleyball team with an impressive 25-15 and 25-20 win over the Edison to improve to 6-3 overall. A great TEAM effort by all. The Curley qualified for the city playoffs and will be the #4 seed in tournament play starting next week. We will be playing either the #1 Roosevelt or #2 Murphy nextWednesday, 11/18, with time and location, T.B.A. 

Parking Lot

Today a teacher's car was hit in the Upper School Parking Lot. Please let the main office know if you have any information about this situation.

Tech Goes Home

Please make sure to send home the Tech Goes Home flier and encourage students and families to participate. If you have any questions reach out to Traka Smith at tsmith8@bostonpublicschools.org

WIN

As we settle into the first full month of WIN - our Response to Intervention (RTI) program for reading in Grades 3-8, there are two critical next steps that we must now plan; review of current student placements and determining a system of ongoing progress monitoring. To this end, I am asking that grade level teams schedule 30 minutes during CPT meetings the week of November 16th to begin this work.  Please come prepared to discuss the current performance of students in your WIN block, including recommendations for any changes in WIN assignment.  As you recall, because we did not have sufficient staff to provide tier 3 intervention to all students who met the criteria, some students were placed in alternative WIN classes.  Also, as part of our discussion, I will outline a plan to systematically progress monitor student performance beginning in January.  Without consistent progress monitoring, we are not able to determine if the interventions we are providing are meeting the needs of the student. I look forward to working with each grade level as we take this important next step in assuring that our RTI program provides “What I Need” for every student at the Curley.  Please contact Eileen Cronin with any questions, or let me know if you need to schedule an alternative meeting time.

Standardized Testing Update

Here is a portion of  a memo sent from Mitchell Chester, Commission of Education:

Today I made my recommendation to the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education regarding the future of student assessments in Massachusetts. The attached memo and press release will be shared with the media today at 1:00 p.m..  I’m recommending that the state transition to a next generation MCAS that would be given for the first time in spring 2017 and would use PARCC as a starting point. The Board will vote on the recommendation at its regular meeting that starts at 8:30 a.m. November 17 at 75 Pleasant St., Malden. For spring 2016, districts that administered PARCC in spring 2015 would do so again, and the remainder of districts would continue with MCAS unless they affirmatively choose to administer PARCC. The MCAS tests in spring 2016 would be augmented with a limited number of PARCC items in order to help make statewide comparisons easier and to offer students and staff the opportunity to experience PARCC items while the new assessment is being developed. My memo calls for the state to:

·         Award a new MCAS contract to include a next-generation assessment for English language arts and math using both PARCC items and items specific to Massachusetts;

·         Commit to computer-based state assessments with the goal of implementing this statewide by spring 2019;

·         Remain a member of the PARCC consortium in order to have access to high-quality assessment development while sharing costs with other states and to be able to compare next-generation MCAS results with those of other states' assessments; and

·         Convene groups of K-12 teachers, higher education faculty and assessment experts to advise ESE on the content, length and scheduling of statewide tests; testing policies for students with disabilities and for English language learners; the requirements for the high school competency determination (currently the 10^th grade MCAS); and the timeline for reinstating a history and social science test. Under my recommendation, any districts that administer PARCC in spring 2016 for the first time would be held harmless for any negative changes in their school and district accountability levels, which is consistent with the state's approach to districts that used PARCC for the first time in spring 2015. I propose that every district would be subject to accountability levels in 2017, when all of the state's districts would use a single test. The full recommendation is attached and will be posted at www.doe.mass.edu. From 4-7 p.m. November 16 at Malden High School, the Board will hold its sixth and final public comment session on the direction of Massachusetts' next statewide assessment system.  On November 17, the Board will vote on the Commissioner’s recommendation during a meeting at ESE's Malden office that will start at 8:30 a.m.

Middle School 1st Term Grading Window

The first term grading window is open from October 29th until November 12th at 11:59 p.m. If you have any questions or problems, please contact Adrian Ward-Jackson. Also grades close on Friday, November 6th.

Water Fountains

New water fountains will be installed by 1/1/16. These means that their will no longer be the bottled water or jugs here at school. Each station comes with two water sources a drinking fountain and a water bottle filler and we will have 7 stations installed. In the Lower School they will be located outside the Gym/Cafe, and by the bathrooms in the first floor hallway. In the Upper School there will be three in the cafeteria, one outside of the doors between the gym and the auditorium and directly above behind the upper auditorium on the 2nd floor. To celebrate this moment we will give out free water bottles to all students.

Wellness Champions

If you are interested in being a BPS Wellness Champion and earning a stipend to help the Curley recycle please let Katie Grassa know ASAP.

INTERNATIONAL WEEK UPDATE

Be sure to schedule time(s) with your Big-Little Buddy colleagues to visit one another’s classes on Monday &/or Tuesday, November 23/24. This is when students will teach about their country and stamp visitors’ passports (LINK).
Passports and stamps will be delivered to your homeroom by next Monday. Please be sure to have students sign them before traveling to their buddy classroom. Students who have Ms. Mehari, Ms. Drakes, or Ms. Bourgeault should bring their passports with them when they go to their specialty next week.

Bulletin Boards

A new instructional bulletin board should be up by Monday, November 30th. We know that not all boards have been hung up yet and we apologize for this. Please know that we have not forgotten about you! There has been regular reminders sent to facilities to get these boards hung and we are waiting on space in a specific persons schedule to make this happen. You need a special insurance to be able to hang these. Make sure that you are hanging work up inside you class! Also all boards should be accompanied by this form.

November 25th

We will have an early release on November 25th. This means that we will dismiss students starting at 12:25pm and all adults can dismiss starting at 12:45pm. There will be no after school programming on this day including CASP, Tenacity and City Year.

Vision Screening

NEEI will be back Monday, November 16th to finish K1 & K2 vision screening and any students who were absent.