ParentSquare (in addition to email) is the primary way advisors communicate with parents/guardians. New advisors/staff receive ParentSquare training at the beginning of each school year. Advisors can message individual families as well as send class-wide communications, sign-ups and send field trip permission slips via ParentSquare. 

At the beginning of the school year, all advisors will send out a Welcome Letter post to their advisory families via ParentSquare two days before the start of the school year. After that, each advisor is responsible for sending out a weekly ParentSquare post before the Monday of the next week. The content of the post should be to inform families of the weekly happenings in class in all content areas: Advisory, Literacy, Math and Projects. Advisor teams should collaborate with each other to make sure their newsletter content is aligned. 

Parents/guardians should be directed to their ParentSquare accounts to view their posts/messages and the school calendar. 

Email, phone and in-person conferences are also utilized at Aveson to meet with families. The following guidelines should be utilized: 

• Respond to all emails and phone messages within 72 hours of receiving the communication. 

• No staff member at any time should be using their personal cell phones to call or text families. Phone calls should be made using classroom or other on-campus office phones. 

• Advisors should communicate with parents/guardians on an as needed basis. 

• Directors are available to sit in on any in-person conferences with families as needed. Just ask and Directors will be there!

• The Site Director leads an in-person "Connect with Casey" coffee/tea event the last Friday of each month for families. These informal gatherings with families take place right after drop-off on the lower blacktop cafe tables. 

Advisors use our Student Information System (SIS), called School Pathways,  to  report on student progress toward mastery of learning outcomes. Parents/Guardians access their students' progress report via their parent/guardian portal in School Pathways.  ASL adheres to non-traditional academic progress reporting consistent with our mastery learning philosophy. Instead of earning a traditional letter grade, students work toward proficiency in outcomes. Students receive a performance rating of emerging, developing, proficient or advanced skills in each learning outcome, and advisor assessments and observations are part of the progress report. The goal is to promote students' self-awareness about their learning and foster problem-solving and growth in learning.  Students receive a progress report three times per year (December, March, June) and an official transcript at the end of the year (June).

• • PML Proficiency Level Descriptions

Assigned - 

We are about to start learning this. We don’t have any data on it yet.

Emerging (1) - 

Student is acquiring basic knowledge on a brand new skill. 

Student has limited background knowledge or experience from which to build understanding. 

Student still needs a lot of help to learn this skill.

Developing (2) - 

Student has learned a new skill and is now practicing. 

Student understands the skill, but still needs support to do it.

They may still be just starting to grasp the skill -or- near mastering the skill.

Proficient (3)- 

Student has mastered the skill. 

They can perform it independently and consistently. 

Advanced (4) - 

This rare designation indicates that a student has shown exceptional skill, either by sustained effort, ability to apply the skill in a novel situation, or by sharing their strong interest in the skill with others.

Back to School Night is our first instructional event of the school year. This is a time when families get to come to our campus, meet fellow parents/guardians and staff. Families are eager to meet their advisors and learn abou the year ahead. This night sets the tone for advisor-parent/guardian relationships and should be organized and planned for accordingly by advisors and teams. 

This year, Back to School Night takes place over two nights from 6:00-8:00pm on:

• Tk-2 BTSN Tuesday, 8/29

• 3-5 BTSN Wednesday, 8/30

Advisors should use 2023-2024 BTSN Guide for Advisors/Staff to plan for the evening. 

Celebration of Learning (COL) is a time-honored school family ritual highlighting two essential qualities of our school: student voice and student reflection. It is a time honor, reflect upon, and celebrate student learning at ASL. Students get to showcase their achievements at two COL events during the school year in which they will lead demonstrations of recently acquired skills, present projects, as well as share progress towards established goals. COL is a time to recognize our students' passions and accomplishments and to honor their learning processes just as much as, if not more than, any product they may share. 

COL celebrates the interdisciplinary, authentic learning done at Aveson. COL is a festive and non-competitive atmosphere in which we acknowledge our students' hard work, recognize each student's different skills and interests, participate in the student's reflection process and proudly affirm the progress that each student has made. Families and friends are invited to join and will have an important job as our audience! In addition to viewing student’s work, guests will watch other students' presentations and have a chance to ask questions and provide meaningful feedback.

This year, COL will take place two times: 

1. Monday, December 18th and Tuesday, December 19th (one day will be for the Tk-2 cadre and the other day for the 3-5 cadre - TBD)

2. Monday, May 20th and Tuesday, May 21st (one day will be for the Tk-2 cadre and the other day for the 3-5 cadre - TBD)

COL events are minimum days for the entire campus. Family COL sign up and schedule communication goes out via ParentSquare by advisors. COL is a projects class leading event. Advisory, math and literacy classes will have a role, but is a secondary role to student COL projects presentations. The Tk-2 and 3-5 cadres approach projects based learning (PBL) in different ways. While the foundations of PBL and PML are the same, projects are embedded into the Tk-2 curriculum. Starting in 3rd grade through 5th grade, students have a stand alone projects class dedicated to PBL. 

For December's COL, 3-5 cadre students will engage in and present on their passion projects (student led, tri-fold board presentation format). For March's COL, 3-5 cadre students will engage in and present on their Global Perspectives Project (advisor driven, slideshow presentation format). 

Lisl Bondsmith, AISA (homeschool) 4-6th grade advisor AND lead PBL advisor/coach has created many resources to support both PBL and COL at ASL. New advisors to ASL will receive PBL and COL PD from Lisl throughout the school year. She will share her resources as the year progresses.  

During Student Led Conferences (SLC) students have the opportunity to share some of the learning outcomes they are mastering as well as demonstrate some of their learning. SLCs emphasize the core academic subjects of literacy and math. Through a SLC, students play an active role in sharing what has been recently learned as well as what will be learned. Here are a few things to know about SLCs:

• SLC is not a Parent-Teacher conference. At SLC, the emphasis is students articulating aspects of her learning. While advisors are present, they are not directly involved in the SLC event. They are of course very active in preparing students for SLCs. 

• Students will discuss, demonstrate and reflect on a few, pre-selected learning outcomes, not a comprehensive list. 

• SLC is designed to be an intimate conversation between parent/guardian(s) and student. This is a special time for families and their student, and should be prepared to be an active and focused listener for their student.

Components of a Student-led Conference

1. Student leads the conference.

2. Student shares learning outcomes.

3. Student demonstrates and shares evidence of learning outcomes. 

4. Student reflects on their learning.

Advisors should refer to Student Led Conferences - Advisor Guide Abridged document for details on SLCs. New advisors to ASL will receive SLC PD leading upto the event. 

Student Led Conferences - Advisor Guide Abridged