Dear Parents and Guardians,

Spring is here! We've been very busy at Carpenter so I'm sure that everyone is ready for a little rejuvenation. Our 3rd-5th Graders completed their PARCC assessments over the past week and a half. The Board of Education met at Carpenter where they approved a full-time assistant principal for Carpenter in 2018-2019, as well as additional support for special education with the addition of a special education coordinator. Our Board approved work to be completed on our HVAC system which has continued to be problematic, particularly in our main hallway (3rd-5th grade classrooms and art/music room). We are also preparing for work to our Learning Center over the summer. I will update our parent community on all of the specifics in future Couriers.

We are continuing to reinforce March Manners and hopefully you are using our monthly focus as a springboard to conversations at home as well. As we move into April, similar to last year, we are going to focus on April Attitudes. Although it doesn't necessarily align with our Second Step lessons as previous month focuses were intended to do, we feel that it is a focus our students can easily relate with and is a great connector for daily conversations. It's important to approach our relationships, our school work, and each day with a positive attitude. It speaks to having a growth mindset and it aligns with continued work we are doing with our students on accepting feedback. As we return from Spring Break, you can help support our mission by encouraging our students to return to "student mode" and set goals to finish the school year strong with a positive attitude.

Thank you for your continued partnership.

Sincerely,

Mr. Brett Balduf, Principal

Carpenter Elementary School

Springtime turns thoughts to warmer weather, outdoor activities, and spring break travel. However, please continue to take time to regularly check your child for the presence of head lice. The Center for Disease Control has information regarding head lice, and can be accessed at:

http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/lice/head/parents.html

In addition, your Building Nurse can provide you with useful materials regarding identification and treatment of head lice. This information is also available on the District website:

http://www.d64.org/health-services/health-safety-tips

After spring break, the Carpenter faculty works together on a very difficult but important process. At this time, we begin to create class lists for the next school year. It is a very long process that has many stages.

Because the placing of students in classrooms for next year is such an important decision, we use a very specific and detailed process for all children. We consider six criteria in making our decisions, with no one being more important than another. The following criteria are considered together as a whole before placements are made:

• The total number of children in all grade level classes needs to be equal.

• The ratio of girls and boys should be balanced in each grade level class.

• Ability levels of students need to be balanced in each grade level class.

• Leadership skills and other affective characteristics need to be balanced.

• Students’ learning styles should be matched appropriately with teachers’ instructional styles.

• Some student combinations should be split for social or academic reasons.

We will also be coordinating co-teaching opportunities that may dictate how we group and cluster groups of students in all grade levels.

If you would like to provide specific information about your child to assist in the homeroom placement selection, please submit a letter by Friday, March 23, 2018. That information might include the parents’ view of how the child learns best, the environment that seems to suit him or her best, peer social matches to possibly avoid (not always possible), and any other pertinent details. Such information will be considered as one component of our process, but the final decision about class assignments rests with the principal and the teachers. In the past, I've shared that if you have submitted letters in the past, you didn't need to resubmit. However, this year, I'm asking if you'd like something to be considered for 2018-19, I would like a new letter.

Due to the nature and complexity of this task, we cannot reduce the process to simply accepting requests for specific teachers. PLEASE BE AWARE THAT LETTERS THAT CONTAIN TEACHERS’ NAMES WILL NOT BE GIVEN CONSIDERATION IN THE PROCESS. I ALSO ASK THAT YOU NOT PUT OUR TEACHERS IN AN AWKWARD POSITION BY ASKING THEM SPECIFICALLY FOR A HOMEROOM PLACEMENT. At times, they are not able to follow through on a request and I do not want them to feel responsible for not being able to follow through or for those requests to interfere with our other considerations.

Any letters received after Friday, March 23rd will not be considered in the process.

Please note that the teachers and I spend an inordinate amount of time on this particular process and we take it very seriously for all of our students.