Friday Family Message
Hello Families
Our talented staff use our newly adopted materials to develop strong readers and writers across all grade levels.
There is a growing level of excitement in our schools as we inch closer to winter break, and I look forward to celebrating the winter season with you all at our upcoming concerts and celebrations.
Community involvement in our budget process
It’s vital for the community to know the details of the school district’s budget. Our Community Budget Advisory Committee (CBAC) met Thursday evening at Elger Bay Elementary to start the process of analyzing the district’s revenues and expenditures.
This committee’s input will help guide our annual budget cycle. CBAC will be asking probing questions, digging into data, and helping prioritze educational investments important to the community.
We are proud of our strong financial rating from the Washington State Auditor’s Office and want to include our community as a partner now and in the future. For more about our budget, view the Citizen’s Guide to the 2023-24 Budget.
We thank our community members who are volunteering their time about once a month to meet and discuss the budget. The next CBAC meeting is planned for Jan. 9 at Utsalady Elementary. If you or someone you know is interested in joining CBAC to help the district plan and prepare for its financial future, please email shoffman@stanwood.wednet.edu.
Snow route information now available
Our 2023-24 snow routes are now available on our Transportation webpage — if needed later this winter.
It is important to view, print, or bookmark these routes because in the event that the Stanwood-Camano School District needs to operate its buses in snow and ice, student pick-up and drop-off locations may be different than normal.
As always, you can find your bus route information on our Transportation webpage. Please remember that during a two-hour late start, students need to add two hours to the time posted online. For drop-off times during inclement weather events, please be at student's bus stop 10 minutes earlier than the regular time.
See our 2023-24 snow routes on our Snow Routes webpage.
What about weather delays?
We encourage families to be thoughtful of road conditions when frost or fog exists but do not result in school delays or closures, particularly among our student drivers. For your information, here is a summary of how our decisions are made as to whether we delay or cancel school:
Safety first! We consider the safety of our children on buses, our student drivers, families driving and walking to school, and the safety of our staff, including our bus drivers.
Road inspections. When there is a concern about school starting on time, our staff drives the roads throughout the district as early as 3 a.m. We take photos, check road conditions, monitor traffic, look for hazards, etc. We typically drive the roads multiple times in the early morning hours to determine if conditions are improving, worsening, or staying the same.
Communicating. We strive to decide about the school day by 5 a.m. Once the decision is made, we begin communicating with families and staff.
For more emergency weather information, visit our Emergency & Weather webpage. And for more information about inclement weather procedures, visit our Transportation department webpage.
Holiday happenings
- STANWOOD TREE LIGHTING EVENTS — The Stanwood High School choir and jazz ensemble will be part of the festivities during the city's Light Up Your Holidays event on Dec. 2. The Stanwood Commerce Alliance, City of Stanwood, and downtown businesses will host the annual tree lightings and holiday festivities throughout the day in both the west and east downtown blocks. In addition, check out a tree at the Stanwood Camano Arts Advocacy Commission on the west end of town that is adorned with unique ornaments created by Stanwood Middle School students.
- CAMANO TREE LIGHTING — Family friendly activities begin at 4 p.m. at the Camano Commons (848 N Sunrise Blvd). The annual festivities include Santa, the tree lighting at 5 p.m., and holiday sing-a-longs led in part by retired Stanwood-Camano teacher Rich Crouch!
- SANTA RUNS — Both North County Fire & EMS and Camano Island Fire & Rescue are hosting their annual Santa Run food drives. They'll be driving their fire engines throughout neighborhoods collecting nonperishable food items for the food bank. See the dates, times, and locations for the North County Santa Run on the department's website. And find the dates, times, and locations for the Camano Fire Santa Run on the agency's website.
- COATS & MORE — If your child needs a warm coat this winter, or a holiday gift, the Stanwood-Camano Food Bank can help. Nearly any child aged 0-18 living in the Stanwood-Camano area is eligible to receive a new coat and a visit to their Christmas House shop. Warm Coats For Kids services run now through Dec. 21. Christmas House services operate from Dec. 5 to Dec. 21. Both programs operate from 10 a.m.-3 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.
- STUFF THE BUS — Our big yellow school buses will be parked at three area grocery stores on Saturday, Dec. 9, collecting canned goods and dry goods to donate to the local Stanwood Camano Food Bank. Community food drives like ours help make sure those children and their families get emergency food assistance when they need it. The buses will be at Camano IGA, Grocery Outlet, and QFC. Our buses will also collect cash donations and and checks made out to "Stanwood Camano Food Bank."
We're adding another TK class
Our popular Transitional Kindergarten program is expanding to a new classroom at Cedarhome Elementary School in January.
Transitional Kindergarten (TK) is aimed at helping children who haven’t accessed preschool prepare for kindergarten. TK is a free, full-day early entrance kindergarten program for children who were 4 years old as of September 1, 2023.
Students are eligible for the program if they have not had prior access to early learning experiences and/or have been identified through a screening process as being in need of additional preparation based on academic or social-emotional deficits to be successful in kindergarten in the following year.
The program started in January 2023 at Twin City and Utsalady elementaries, and TK quickly proved popular among Stanwood-Camano families. Classes are taught by highly qualified teachers, and transportation will be provided. However, space is limited.
Want more information?
- Read more about the district adding the TK class at www.stanwood.wednet.edu
- Apply for the TK class
- Learn more on our Transitional Kindergarten webpage
Get the facts about our levy
Watch the video below for more facts and information!
Watch our next community levy presentation
The community is invited to join us at the historic 1906 Camano City Schoolhouse at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 7, to learn more about the levy and to ask questions!
The Camano City Schoolhouse, located at 993 Orchid Road on Camano, is decked out for the holidays with festive lights. We hope to see you there.
But if you can't make it, please watch live on our Facebook page and Instagram!
School Board update
A few reminders
Get social with us!
Please remember to follow the Stanwood-Camano School District on Facebook, Instagram, Nextdoor, and Twitter, and follow my tweets @rumbaughsupt.