Dear Fairview Families,

Happy New Year! It was great to be back at school this week with our students and staff! While the winter break is always a special time to enjoy family and some time for relaxing, it is wonderful to see our students again in the new year as we continue learning together as a school community. I hope you and your family had a nice winter break and holiday season. This past week, students participated in their winter MAP assessments in reading and math as a check in point for teachers to use to help measure student growth and identify areas of focus for instruction. We also use this data to help us determine who might need some additional support or enrichment along with the other data we will collect this winter. Next week, students will participate in a short reading fluency assessment and over the next two weeks, they will have had the chance to take the MCAP assessment to get a snapshot of their current math skills. These assessments are all taken three times annually and also help us determine who might need additional support. We realize that there are many students who are required to quarantine or have missed school recently. In some cases, these assessments can be administered online. In other cases, we will hold make-up sessions to make sure everyone is caught up.

As we head into the winter months, please take extra caution on the roads around Fairview School during drop off and pick up times. As snow piles start to form, this can cause roadways to narrow or can decrease visibility, so we appreciate your caution. We also request that, for parents picking up in the north lot, rather than attempting to make a left turn into the lot, approach the entryway from the west so that you can make a right turn into this drop off zone. This will help us avoid traffic back-ups on Gregory. Thank you for your help!

In December, D57 hosted a parent night about the topic of recognizing anxiety at home and what to do to address it if your child is showing signs of anxiety. If you haven't had a chance to view it yet and are interested in learning more, the presentation from representatives at Rogers Behavioral Health can be found at this link. Also, as shared previously, many of our students have had the opportunity to have both of their COVID vaccinations. Once you’ve done this, we encourage you to send a photo or copy of your child’s vaccination card to Fairview nurse, Kelly Brunning, at kbrunning@d57.org. You can also make a copy and drop it off in the front office if you prefer. The guidelines provided by local health authorities related to quarantining for close contacts change for students who are vaccinated, so it is helpful for us to have this information on file. Thank you for taking the time to read through today’s newsletter. Have a wonderful weekend!

Sincerely,

Dan Ophus