Forest North News
April 5, 2024
Read below for all the latest news and happenings about the
Forest North Elementary School community.
Movie Night is tonight! Join us at 6pm for "Migration!"
We also hope you're planning to join our Eclipse Viewing Party on Monday! All students and staff will be provided glasses to safely view the total eclipse of the sun between 1:00 and 2:00pm. (Students must have a permission form on file to participate, so make sure you've submitted yours). It's not too late to RSVP and join us for snacks, music and enjoying this rare, natural phenomenon.
Attending our Event? Read below:
Arrival: The total Eclipse is expected around 1:30 and students will begin moving outside around 1:10. Plan to arrive for visitor check in between 12:45 and 1:00pm.
Parking: Park in the front of the building (feel free to use the grassy areas near the bridge for additional parking ) and enter school through the front doors. Our gates behind the main building will be closed, so do not plan to park in the back or report directly to the field.
Checking in: All visitors must report to the front office and sign in as a visitor. In the office, you'll pick up your pre-printed badge or present your DL/ID to get a badge printed. Then you'll walk through the school to the track to meet the students and staff. See the picture for grade locations. (Signs will also be posted).
Enjoying the viewing: Please assist with supervising your child by staying with his/her group and following the teacher's directions about where to be and how to participate, especially regarding safety and wearing eclipse glasses. The viewing party will be exciting and fun, but also unstructured and a bit dark, so it's important that all adults are actively assisting with supervision and safety.
Dismissal: Classes will stay on the track area until approximately 2:00pm. If you'd like to check your child out of school early, after the event, check in with your child's teacher who will have a sign out sheet.
In case of rain: We will view the eclipse in classrooms via livestream.
April 5: PTA Movie Night, 6pm
April 8: Solar Eclipse Party, 1:15, FNE track
April 10: Staff Professional Learning; No school
April 16: STAAR Reading, grades 3-5
April 18: STAAR Science, grade 5
April: 25: STAAR Math, grades 3-5
Apr 26-May 3: Spring Book Fair
May 2: K/1st Fine Arts Night, 6pm
May 3: Field Day
May 6-10: Teacher Appreciation Week
Eclipse Party Quick Links:
On April 8, 2024, a total solar eclipse will be visible on a path across Texas. Forest North is hosting an Eclipse Viewing Party for students, staff and families!
Safety and Permission:
Our campus is taking every precaution to make this experience both safe and enjoyable for all-- including providing certified safety solar eclipse glasses to all students and staff. These special glasses are the only safe way to look at the eclipsed sun.
Participation in our FNE Eclipse Event requires Parent/Guardian permission. Please submit this form to indicate signed permission for your child to attend the event and view the eclipse. If you do not want your child to participate, submit the form with a DO NOT GIVE PERMISSION response. Students not participating will stay indoors and will be provided alternate activities.
All FNE students must have a permission form in order to participate.
If you have more than one child at FNE, please submit a separate form for each one.
If you know your child will not be at school on April 8th, please use our report an absence form to let us know now so we can make plans.
Report a student absence for April 8.
Planning to attend our Eclipse Viewing Party as a guest? Let us know in advance if you'll be joining us, so we can pre-print your visitor's badge and make check-in a breeze.
RSVP for the Eclipse Party here.
More Information on the Eclipse:
Last week, all RRISD parents and guardians received an email regarding RRISD’s long-range facilities master plan. This plan serves as a guide for how Round Rock ISD maintains and updates facilities for the next five years and beyond. Forest North is featured prominently in many of the recommendations, so please take a look. Our Facilities Condition Index will soon be in the CRITICAL category and our Educational Adequacy Assessment is among the lowest in the district.
The committee recommendations for consideration are below. Please take a look, locate the email for more information, watch the video and take the survey to ensure your feedback is considered in this process. Besides the survey, there are virtual community meetings scheduled for today and the rest of the week. Please don’t miss this opportunity to ask questions and share your thoughts on the future of FNE, Pearson Ranch MS and McNeil HS. Your advocacy and support are important.
Future Plans for FNE - To Clarify
Consider converting Forest North ES into an Early Childhood Center (for Pre-K programming) and redistribute the elementary students to other schools in the community via boundary change.
Alternatively, consider Forest North ES as a Dual-Language Campus / Newcomers Center.
Timeline
The timeline for any changes made to our building or attendance zone is unknown at this time. The recommendations would have to be further studied and then made official/designated by the school board. Then the improvement projects would have to be funded through bond and further planned/built. Any changes made will not affect this coming 2024-25 school year. The time frame suggested was completion around 2028, so changes would affect our school in the next 2-5 years.
"Converting" or re-purposing means no longer serving PK-5th graders as a traditional, neighborhood elementary school.
The option to convert FNE to an Early child Center or a Newcomers center would mean our traditional PK-5 school would be no more. Our building would be used to support one of those two district-wide programs, serving students in a specialized setting. Students currently assigned to FNE would be re-assigned to other schools in the surrounding area.
Dual Language v. Newcomers Program
Adding Dual-Language to FNE is not a large change. We would maintain the PK-5 programming for our attendance area while also supporting students in the district's Dual Language program from the surrounding areas. This could be done at anytime without widespread building changes and would not require a recommendation from the Master Planning committee. The committee proposal at this time, as we understand it, is to convert FNE to a different, more specialized Dual Language or Center for Newcomers. This would be similar to the conversion to an Early Childhood Center. We would no longer serve the neighborhood as a PK-5 school, rather we'd specialize and support district wide programs for emerging bilingual students.
Attendance Boundary Changes
One way to maintain our neighborhood school setting is to add more students. Re-drawing RRISD attendance boundaries is also an option being discussed by the committee. Increasing our attendance boundary to capture more families and students would solve our very small school problem and relieve overcrowding at other, nearby campuses.
No matter how the school board members decide to utilize our building in the future-- re-purposing the facility or adding more students-- it will need to invest money in infrastructure and other facility improvements.
If you have any more specific questions, I am happy to talk through them. Give me a call anytime at 512-464-6753.
Amy Jacobs, Principal
Recognize and celebrate a special teacher or a student by getting them a recognition ad (formerly known as pride lines) in the yearbook. You will find a button called "celebrate with ad' under your kid's profile on the Treering website. Please order and edit directly on a desktop PC.
- 1/8 ad costs $5 and 1/4 ad costs $10. School will get back 95% of each sale.
- Ads are due by April 19th to be able to be included in the yearbook.
Click the Buy Yearbook Ad button and consider placing a dedicated shout out to your student!
Still need to order a yearbook? Click here to register as a parent on the Treering website and order!
Please contact yearbooks@fnepta.org if you would like to support the Yearbook committee or have questions about ordering.
Since 2008, H-E-B has partnered with local schools to host a School Plastic Bag Recycling Challenge, which allowed them to recycle 4 million plastic bags last year! Again this year and in honor of April's Earth Month, Forest North will partner with HEB to continue this momentum and increase the recycled bag count this year. Here's how to participate:
- Start collecting plastic bags over Spring Break and through April 11. These can be any retail shopping bags (not just HEB), produce bags, bread bags, film, dry cleaning bags, newspaper bags.
- Bring the bags to school.
- We will get them to HEB for proper recycling.
Summer Camps at McNeil HS
McNeil summer camp registrations are coming soon and many are already open for sign-ups. There are camps for elementary ages through middle/high school, and all are led by McNeil coaches. Go to: https://roundrockisd.store.rankone.com/Camp/List and select "McNeil High School" to view camp information and updates as new camps are posted.
Four Convenient Locations
• Chandler Oaks Elementary School (July)
• England Elementary School (June and July)
• Herrington Elementary School (June)
• Pearson Ranch Middle School (June and July)
June 3 to 6
June 10 to 13
June 17 to 20
July 15 to 18
July 22 to 25
Round Rock ISD offers weekly, summer activity camps for grades incoming Kindergarten through grade 12, beginning the first week of June through the end of July.
- Morning camps, 9 a.m. to 12 p.m.
- Afternoon camps, 12:30 to 3:30 p.m.
- Full-day camps 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.
- Camps are held Monday through Thursday.
- Campers do not need to be students of Round Rock ISD to attend.
- Early registration is encouraged.
Topics include: Academics, Art, Music, Coding/Programming, Kinder & Pre-K Readiness, Creative Writing, Drones, Lego®, Engineering/Tech, Personal Enrichment, Robotics, Science, Sports/Fitness, Theatre/Film and more!
Fine Arts Nights - Save the Date
Families are invited and encouraged to attend a showcase of their students' talents at a special musical performance and art gallery. Mrs. B and Mr. Shuppert look forward to seeing all of you there!
K/1st Grades: "Jungle Beat"- May 2, 6-7PM
Forest North Elementary
Email: amy_jacobs@roundrockisd.org
Website: https://forestnorth.roundrockisd.org/
Location: 13414 Broadmeade Avenue, Austin, TX, USA
Phone: 512-464-6750
Twitter: @forestnorth