Peter Noyes Friday Flyers
Friday, January 14, 2022
Upcoming Events
January 17.....No School - MLK Day
January 21......Food Pantry
January 26.........No School - Teacher Professional Development
January 31.......School Council Meeting 2:40p
January 31.........Report Cards published
February 9.....Early Release Day Dismissal 11:45
February 9.......100th Day of School!
February 11......Food Pantry
February 21-25.......No School February Vacation
March 2.....Early Release Day Dismissal 11:45 Parent Conferences
March 9.....Early Release Day Dismissal 11:45 Parent Conferences
March 16.....Early Release Day Dismissal 11:45 Parent Conferences
March 30.....Early Release Day Dismissal 11:45
A Note From Mrs. Doyle
Dear Noyes Families,
Happy Friday! I promise not to email you for 3 whole days!! (but please read this one, thanks!)
We celebrate the great Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on Monday, January 17, 2022. On this holiday, we remember an American hero of the Civil Rights movement and the progress made thanks to his remarkable leadership. One of my favorite MLK quotes is unsurprisingly about education. He once said, “The function of education is to teach one to think intensely and to think critically. Intelligence plus character - that is the goal of a true education.” May we all aspire to meet this essential goal.
If you would like to talk with your children about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., I encourage you to explore this book list from The Conscious Kid for some great literature options. If you are looking to expand your own learning as I do, consider joining a special webcast on Monday through the National Museum of African American History & Culture. It’s free and there is no registration required, just join at 1 p.m. on Monday. You may also be interested in the King Center events this weekend; there are a few virtual options here too.
CONTACT TRACING AND TEST AND STAY
And, now back to COVID. The past 2 days I have emailed 17 classrooms with our new standard Close Contact letter. I send out this letter if your child is in a classroom with a student or staff member who tests positive. We have many different staff members who work in a variety of classrooms, so sometimes I will be emailing a handful of classes for 1 positive case.
Why are we making these changes? It was simply no longer possible for us to individually contact trace every case to the level we have been doing, which involved looking at seating in the classroom, talking with the classroom teacher about other potential contacts, checking with the specialist teachers, the special educators, the support staff, looking at the cafeteria seating placement, whether the potential close contact was present during the infectious period, whether they had already had COVID, whether they were vaccinated or not, and so on. It really has been quite a lot.
Please keep in mind that for school purposes, if people are 3 feet apart or more from a positive case over the infectious period (48 hours prior to symptom onset or positive test), there is no need to quarantine or participate in Test and Stay. This is why monitoring for symptoms is so essential and testing if symptoms develop is so important. We still use Test and Stay since we have students who are closer than 3 feet, such as all preschool students and some students with special needs. If a student is under 3’ from a positive case, we reach out to you to give you the opportunity to have your child quarantine or participate in Test and Stay.
UPLOAD YOUR CHILD(REN)’S VACCINATION RECORD
If you haven’t already, use this link to submit your child(ren)’s COVID-19 vaccination record.
SCHOOL WORK AT HOME DURING ISOLATION/QUARANTINE
If your child must isolate or quarantine at home and he/she will be out of school for more than 3 school days, the classroom teacher will provide work and craft a plan for staying connected. Teachers have 2 school days to put together the plan once they know a student is out for confirmed COVID reasons (isolation or required quarantine) for 4 school days or more. Teachers will contact you when the work is ready for pick-up at school; you do not need to reach out to them unless you want to tell the teacher that your child is too ill to do the work so a plan is not needed. I kindly ask you to be supportive of our extremely hard-working teachers. If one teacher gets a quarantined student on a Google Meet on Day 1 and another teacher does not do that until Day 4, that second teacher is still following the district guidelines as listed above.
POOL TESTING - WHEN YOUR CHILD IS IN A POSITIVE POOL
When we have a positive pool during our weekly surveillance testing, we take all the students or staff in that pool and we do an individual rapid test to determine who the positive person is. We are no longer emailing or calling you when your child is in a positive pool and testing negative; however, you will receive a notification from CIC Health that your child has been tested and what the result is. If your child tests positive on the rapid, Carol Bradford calls you as soon as possible so you can pick up your child and begin the isolation period. If we have an “inconclusive” pool or an “invalid” pool, we retest everyone individually and the same rules apply. You’ll get a notification from CIC Health with your child’s results.
PAUSE ON VOLUNTEERS
With the spike in cases, SPS has put a temporary pause on in-person volunteers and high school peer leaders. We are keeping our COVID Pool Testing volunteers, but we will do a rapid test on them on the morning of weekly pool testing. We are also allowing select Educational Enrichment programs so long as the presenter is vaccinated and is negative on a rapid test the morning of the event. We all look forward to relaxing these restrictions again after we get through this surge.
REPORT CARDS
First semester report cards will be posted on January 31, 2022. They will be available in Aspen after 4 p.m.
Thank you for reading this all the way through. Now, take the weekend off and enjoy your family. I am hoping to do the same.
Warmly,
Annette Doyle
Peter Noyes Elementary School
Email: kristin_moffat@sudbury.k12.ma.us
Website: http://bit.ly/PeterNoyes
Location: 280 Old Sudbury Road, Sudbury, MA, USA
Phone: 978-443-1085
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/peter.noyes.3
Twitter: @NoyesSchool