Morris Memo
January 7, 2019 LWE Newsletter
Principal's Letter
Dear LWE Families,
Happy New Year! I hope all of our LWE families had an enjoyable winter break. It was wonderful to welcome students back to school this morning! We are excited and ready to kick off the second semester of the 2018-19 school year. We had quite a few new students enroll last week. We welcomed a record 18 new students this morning to start the new semester! If your family is new to LWE, welcome!! We are excited to have you join our outstanding school community.
In the fall, our third and fifth graders took the IOWA assessment. This is a standardized set of assessments which allows us to compare our students to others nationally. I am including our district's results as well as our school's results. The average you see listed is the average national percentile ranking. The 50th percentile is the national average. For example, a score of 70 indicates that on average, our students in that grade scored higher than 7 out of 10 students who took the same assessment. Individual student reports will go home with report cards on Friday for students in third and fifth grades. We are proud of our scores as LWE students scored higher than the district and national average in every content area. However, there is definitely room for growth! We will spend time with our teams analyzing and breaking down the scores, so we can address any deficit areas.
FCS & Lake Windward ES IOWA Results Fall 2018:
Grade 3
ELA
FCS: 50
LWE: 66
Math
FCS: 57
LWE: 78
Social Studies
FCS: 50
LWE: 69
Science
FCS: 57
LWE: 72
Grade 5
ELA
FCS: 53
LWE: 75
Math
FCS: 54
LWE: 81
Social Studies
FCS: 54
LWE: 78
Science
FCS: 52
LWE: 72
Have a wonderful week!
Julie Morris
Students Recognized for Character Trait of the Month
Each month as a school we focus on a different character trait. Teachers nominate students who exhibit the character trait we are focusing on. Students get their names read on the morning announcements as well as a certificate to take home. Below are the names of students who were nominated and recognized for the character trait of Compassion during the month of December:
Emma Kim, Kasey Crawford, Adi Fainer, Amelia Webb Nassiri, Anna Lisi, Aksha Ranjan,
Abdul Khan, Sofia Boles, Mannat Kaur, Sydney Lubin, Jake Burkett, Carver Jackson,
Annika Rao, Cameron Sadlock, Abigail Erickson, Sanvi Shah, Lauren Ji, Tony Borzello
Ana Beatriz Da Silva, Cecile Portwig, Michele Aka, Lorraine Dos Santos, Jessie Saldana, Michael Price, Haasini Koosam, Alexis Ellis, Avanti Kella, Kian Abolmaali, Judy Alatrista,
Mia Heacock, Kensley White, Grayson Hunter, Kfir Atar, Peyton Shepherd, Miles Hirsch,
Max Creek, Tyler Robinson, Jayden Loren, Holly McGuire, Brooklyn Zschach,
James D’Urban Jackson, Elizabeth Hom, Wissam Karout, Amelia Bryant, Cameron Savino,
Michal Fainer, Mahliya Wright, Valerie Villalobos, Maddie Forbes, Meera Iyenger, Kiran Coker
Cruz McNair, Ikshan Kodimyala, Amelia Johnson, Renee Proulx, Vihaan Iyenger, George Bixby,
Ovee Panwalker, Yogali Garcia, Veda Nair, Lauritz Adriansen, Joanna Samuel, Kiana Sabzevari, Saanvi Suraneni, Danny Krylov
NOTIFICATION TO PARENTS OF THE SPRING TAG SCREENING AND REFERRAL PROCESS
The consideration for gifted services may be reported or automatic as defined by the GA DOE Resource Manual for Gifted Education Services. The Fulton County School System screens all students for eligibility for gifted services twice a year and uses a systematic approach to identify highly capable students who may qualify for gifted services.
The gifted teacher routinely reviews available data to refer students for further assessment. Students meeting either the automatic screening OR the classroom screening criteria AND have supporting data gathered from test history, products, and/or advanced content levels are referred for additional testing to determine gifted eligibility.
I. Automatic Screening- identifies students who score at specified levels on a norm-referenced test as defined in the GA DOE Resource Manual for Gifted Education Services, for further assessment to determine eligibility for gifted services. At the beginning of the school year, TAG teachers review existing test data.
Standardized Tests
Students must have minimally a combination of scores that include > 85th percentile and > 90th percentile in two of the three areas on the IOWA exam, a standardized, nationally norm-referenced achievement test: Total Reading, Total Math, and Complete Battery.
Classroom Screening- Local schools select a two-week period (January 14-28), to review all students in the school (Grades K-11).
Classroom teachers use the Characteristics Instrument for Screening Students (CISS) to identify students with superior abilities in five or more of the following areas: motivation, interests, communications skills, problem-solving abilities, memory, inquiry, insight, reasoning, creativity, and humor.
Reported Referrals- All reported referrals (parent, teacher and/or administrator) are completed through the two system- level screening and referral processes each year. All referrals are first reviewed by the local Eligibility Team to consider if existing information warrants a formal testing for eligibility to be conducted in March.
Students who meet either the automatic screening OR classroom screening criteria AND who have supporting data gathered from test history, products, and/or advanced content levels are referred for gifted placement testing.
Once referred to testing:
§ Parents receive the Parent Notification for Testing Consent Form.
§ Student is tested for the gifted program.
§ Parents receive test results.
§ If state eligibility is determined, students are placed in the gifted program with parental consent.
For more complete information regarding Fulton County Schools Gifted Services, please visit the Advanced Studies page at: http://www.fultonschools.org/en/divisions/acd/learnteach/Pages/TAG.aspx
LWE Reminders
- Please be aware of students and their families crossing the street at the front gate during arrival in the mornings. Pedestrians have the right of way, so please be sure to come to a complete stop in order for students to safely cross.
- Support LWE by signing up with Publix. They will donate a portion of our school community's total sales back to our school each quarter. All you have to do is sign up here and enter your phone number each time you check out after shopping. http://corporate.publix.com/community/corporate-campaigns/publix-partners
LWE Calendar- What's coming up?
January 11- Report Cards go home
January 16- Family Balance Nights
January 21- MLK Holiday- schools closed
February 1- PTO Fundraiser- "Binglow" 6pm-9pm
VOLUNTEER REGISTRATION
All parents wanting to participate or visit classrooms must go through the volunteer registration process. Any person who has not gone through the training since June 2, 2018 must go through it again even if you did it last school year.
Applicants should be prepared to spend about 10—15 minutes for the training application process. In accordance with State Law, all volunteers must be current with Child Abuse Reporting Protocol Training BEFORE being allowed to volunteer in our schools.
It is very important that volunteers enter their full legal name as it appears on their government issued ID (please do not use nicknames or ‘goes by’ names on the application).
All applicants must wait 24 hours after applying for application processing and approval, before volunteering in our schools. When coming to the school to volunteer, you must bring your government issued photo ID to use when checking in at the front office.
For your convenience see link below:
http://www.fultonschools.org/en/community/Pages/volunteer.aspx
Updated Procedure for Absence Approval in Extenuating Circumstances
Students should be present in school every day unless illness or other extenuating circumstances exist. The Georgia Board of Education lawfully excuses students for the following reasons: personal illness, death in the immediate family, religious holidays, and other educational days as pre-approved by the school principal. The principal has at his/her discretion according to Board Policy the option to approve a maximum of six (6) days per student per school year in extenuating circumstances. Parents/guardians must notify the principal of their request by completing the request form located on the school website at least two weeks prior to the absence. Submission of parental/guardian request does not grant automatic approval. A school administrator or designee will contact the parents/guardian upon the final decision. As in the past, absences for illness, death in the family or religious holidays can be approved by your child's teacher by sending in a signed note from you.
- The principal approval form is to be used for extenuating circumstances only, as stated in the information above.
- Two weeks ahead of the planned absence, print and complete the request form located on the Lake Windward website.
- One form is required per student.
- Submit the completed, signed, and dated form to the Lake Windward front office.
- Your student’s attendance record will be taken into consideration when reviewing your request.
- A copy of the decision to accept, decline or amend your request, will be sent to you and your child’s homeroom teacher.
Email requests will not be accepted.
Are you a Dad looking for an easy way to volunteer?
We need a few (a lot) of good men! Come and join the Super Dads every Friday morning for carpool, starting at 7:00am. It only takes 45 minutes of your time on the Fridays that you choose. This is your chance to earn bragging rights for your child!! Be a Super Dad!! Please sign up at tiny.cc/superdads to help out! See you next Friday!
Stay in contact!
Email: morrisja@fultonschools.org
Website: http://school.fultonschools.org/es/lakewindward/Pages/default.aspx
Location: 11770 East Fox Court, Alpharetta, GA, USA
Phone: 470-254-7050
Twitter: @lwesprincipal