Principal's Weekly
Principal Beth N. Choquette, Bridge Street School
Bridge Street School
2 Parsons Street
Northampton, Massachusetts 01060
413-587-1460 (phone) 413-587-1484 (fax)
Beth N. Choquette, Principal bchoquette@northamtpon-k12.us
Elizabeth Peterson, Administrative Assistant epeterson@northampton-k12.us
Nicole Soutra, Senior Clerk nsoutra@northampton-k12.us
A Message From Principal Choquette 8/24/18
Good afternoon! As promised, here is a summer weekly to update families on our new hires. As of today, I was still interviewing for the 4th grade position to replace Mr. Darling and need to hire a part-time paraprofessional for the preschool.
I am very excited about our new hires and I know you all join me in welcoming them to our BSS family. I hope that you can get away to come over to the school on Monday, August 27th from 3:15-4:00 p.m. for a very informal "Meet Our New Faculty and Staff Playground Mingle."
There are a couple other items I did put in this weekly. I listed some upcoming important dates as well as an update on our library renovation. You will also see the lunch menu for August/September attached.
I hope you all enjoy your last few days of summer! I can't wait to welcome our students next Thursday!
New Faculty and Staff:
Dr. Andy Koerner: School Psychologist. Dr. Koerner comes to us with many years of experience as a school psychologist. We have already been working together over the summer to prepare for the upcoming year. He will be a very important part of our social/emotional/behavioral support team.
Nina Shrayer: BCBA (Board Certified Behavior Analyst). Ms. Shrayer is our new BCBA who will be working closely with our social/emotional/behavioral support team and will be overseeing our ESP's who work with our students who receive Discrete Trials and who may have specific behavior plans.
Kelly Junno: Comes to us from teaching in Vermont and is our 2nd grade long-term sub for Mrs. Nagle who will be on maternity leave this fall.
Nicole Bunnell: Miss Bunnell is our new 2nd grade teacher replacing Katie Galenski. Miss Bunnell is a newer teacher and most recently was teaching 2nd grade in West Springfield.
Jill Tellier: Ms. Tellier comes to us with over 20 years experience in the Holyoke Public Schools as a special education teacher. She also has completed a reading specialist certification program and will be replacing Deb Willis as the 2nd grade special education teacher. She will be co-teaching with Miss Bunnell.
Joanne Morgan: Ms. Morgan comes to us with many years of experience and most recently has been teaching 1st grade in Greenfield. Ms. Morgan also has a degree in school psychology and is our new 1st grade classroom teacher.
Jenna Daniels: Miss Daniels has worked with students from birth through fifth grade and did one of her student teaching assignments in the fifth grade at Jackson Street School. She too is a newer teacher and is excited to part of the BSS fifth grade team.
Educational Support Professionals (ESPs): We have several new ESP's joining us this year as well. Please welcome: Melissa Black, Valerie Podolak, Kimberly Timmons, Grace Schultz, and Sheila Bolger to our BSS family! We still have one more part-time ESP for the preschool to hire.
Finally, due to having 3 sections of 1st grade, we needed to add another teaching block to art and music. Ms. Michaud will be coming over to BSS from Leeds on Friday afternoons to teach music to Ms. Morgan's 1st grade class as will the art teacher at Leeds, Leslie Macutkiewicz. She will come over to BSS on Wednesday afternoons to teach Ms. Morgan's 1st grade art class.
Update on Library Renovation
At this time, students will not be able to check-out books as all 10,000+ books are all packed in boxes!
Thank you for your patience. We can't wait for the big reveal!
Important Dates
August 27th: New Student Orientation 1:00 p.m. BSS Lobby
August 30th: First Day of School Grades 1-5 (8:35 supervision begins, 8:45 1st bell, 8:50 tardy bell).August 30th and 31st: Kindergarten Orientation
September 3rd: No School-Labor Day
September 4th: Kindergarten and Preschool Begins