Shout Out
Shout out to Ms. Trotz, Ms. Guzman and Ms. Cullen for completing the necessary certification process to administer the ACCESS test when we return in 2016. They are the first three staff to submit their certification to the main office. Thanks!
Budget
BPS budgets came out last night and will be presented at SSC this evening. There are errors in the budget that have been caught early on and the budget office and working on fixing this in our favor. More details with the final budget will follow.Safe Mode Drill
An email will go to all staff around 7:30pm regarding the drill for tomorrow. This email will address several questions that have been coming up around Safe Mode. Stay Tuned.Staff Appreciation Breakfast
City Year would like to honor the amazing work that you do by welcoming you to a staff appreciation breakfast this Wednesday in the upper school teacher's lounge from 7:30 - 8:30 AM. We will have breakfast items, coffee, and a few surprises. We will also be raffling off a couple baskets of school supplies. We thank you for all that you do for our school community, and hope to see you there!Book Swap
Bring a Book, Take a Book, K-5 Book SwapBring in 2 or more lightly used books from home and choose 2 ‘new to you’ books from school. The deadline for bringing 2 or more books from home is Friday, December 18th. Please email all questions to Caitlyn Gable and Eileen Cronin.
ACCESS Certification
Training for ACCESS needs to be re-completed by the entire staff by Monday, December 21, 2015. To complete the training go to the wida website: https://www.wida.us Log on (if you can't remember your password remember that your email may have been yourname@boston.k12.ma.us ) all accounts previously created are still active. To create a new account: Type in username: massachusetts, password:patriot and create a new account. Once you log on you need to go to the paper-based Grades 1-12 training. Make sure you are under the Test Administrator tab (not coordinator). You will find a checklist that needs to be completed as well as the link for the tests you have to take. Once the test is completed please turn your training certificate to Kathy or Madeline. Kindergarten teachers need to take the Kindergarten training and test. All SAR and PACE teachers need to take the Alternate Access Training and test. If you have questions please contact Waverly.School Climate
School Climate Team meeting will take place on Wednesday, December 16th from 3:00pm-4:15pm in room 212. All staff are welcome!
PD
There will be literacy collaborative PD on Thursday for LC Cohort 1 & 2 as well as PACE from 3pm-5pm.
Writing Rubric Tracking
Please see the email from Katie on 12/9/15 regarding the tracking of writing data. We realize how long it has taken us to get this to you all and we apologize. I lot of thought and debate went into how to organize this document. Please check your grade level CPT folder on the drive and you will find your spreadsheet. Teach teams need to complete this for each write task students are completing as part of the writing curriculum map. Staff can have an extension on adding this as an artifact due to the late timing. Everyone should be adding a completed spreadsheet to EDFS by 12/23/15. If you submit it before you head on vacation you won't have to think about it! :) Please direct all questions and feedback to Eileen Cronin.
A2 ANet Testing
All action plans are due to teams administrators by Monday, December 14th (ELA) and Friday, December 18th (math).Safety Plan
We will be having our first Safe Mode Drill on Wednesday, December 16th. We wanted to communicate this so that staff had time to practice this with their students. While the drill is going on no staff or families will be able to enter or exit the building. We hope that when we practice this we will be able to work out any kinks in our plan. Some families have asked for the language that teachers will use when practicing with their students. Here is a sample specifically directed at early childhood aged students, “ We are practicing for an emergency outside the school. Just like a fire drill is practice for an emergency, like a fire, inside, the school, this is practice for an emergency outside. An example of an outside emergency I've given is if a truck spills something dangerous, like a chemical, into the street. It is not real and we have to show Ms. Grassa that we can be safe inside and stay quiet if we need to be.” We hope this language helps to support the conversation you have at home with your students. This language will be shared with families in the Paw Prints this weekend and we will also announce the date of the drill to them as well.
It is crucial that staff practice this with students before next Wednesday and that everyone listens carefully to the announcement once it is made. Students may be transitioning, in bathroom, outside, at lunch and we will look forward to feedback from staff on how to tighten protocols. It is most important that staff remain calm during this time. Also we are aware that facilities are not fully in place to follow all procedures. We are asking that staff do what they can do and we look forward to any creative ideas that may come from this practice. Here is a direct link to our safety plan for your review.
School Showcase
We have two more showcase sessions Friday, December 18th from 9-10am and Thursday, January 14th from 3-4pm.Tenacity
Attention Curley Staff! Tenacity’s Annual Mid Year Ceremony is next Thursday, December 17, 2015 in the lower school café! The invitation is open to ALL Curley staff who wish to come by and support Tenacity students’ hard work this semester! Please feel free to stop by (even if just for a quick hello J ) to check out our student work displays and mingle with Tenacity’s students, families, and staff! There will also be tennis activities and fun videos of students in action and playing tennis! A short presentation/awards ceremony will follow dinner and begin around 6:25pm. We hope to see you there!ELT Planning Meeting
Today 4 staff volunteered to attend the ELT Planning Meeting. We met at the BTU from 8:30am-3:30pm with 7 other schools that will be adding 40 extra minutes to their day in SY2016-2017. We want to be sure to communicate with staff after each meeting to assure that this process is transparent.Here are some key messages we would like to share from today's learning:
- Our Extended Learning Time initiative is about building a better school day for our students, teachers and families.
- With more time, our school will have more opportunities to provide targeted learning time for students, increase small group instruction, provide enrichment opportunities in order to increase student engagement and academic outcomes. At our first session we identified these urgent needs:
- African American and Hispanic males do not perform on standardized tests at the same level as their White and Asian peers.
- ELL and SPED students do not perform on standardized tests at the same level as their general education peers.
- Overall as a school we struggle with reading and writing skills according to standardized tests.
- We are just at the beginning and we need you to play an active role in the process of developing a new school experience for our community.
- Between January and June the ELT Team will implement a community engagement process moving forward, stay tuned for meeting dates and other pertinent updates.
- In the coming weeks you can get involved by reaching out to a member of the ELT team with questions and ideas (Ciardi, Grassa, Kidd, Peters, Wright). Click Here and you can submit your ideas and questions anonymously.