Weekly Update

April 29, 2020

Dear Families,

I hope that you are well and enjoyed some time away from remote learning last week. Thank you to all the parents that joined our virtual Family Crew meeting. It was wonderful to see so many faces and to receive your feedback. There were a lot of requests for an increase of video use with students. In addition to Crew, teachers may conduct small group video sessions for check-ins or academic support. We are committed to maintaining an asynchronous schedule to support the varying demands students face and allow for flexibility to ensure that accessing learning is as equitable as possible. We continue to be impressed with the level of student engagement. After a week away, we have had very high attendance rates upon return and we are proud of our students!

We value the feedback we received and would like to provide another opportunity to come together for a Parent Crew meeting. On Monday May 4th, at 3:00 PM we will host another meeting . We will use a format that will allow families to ask questions. We will have a process for moderating the discussion. It would be helpful for us to have a sense of some of your questions ahead of time. Feel free to to submit them HERE We look forward to seeing you next week!

In an effort to to maintain a school tradition we are going to complete a yearbook for the 2019-20 school year. Despite the fact that we left school 3 months early there is a lot to celebrate. We would love to include you best pictures from Remote Learning. They can be fun and capture a typical day. Get creative and we will do our best to get all pictures into the yearbook. Submit pictures using this LINK. More information about purchasing yearbooks will be shared in next week's newsletter.

Beginning this Friday, May 1, students will receive a weekly Remote Learning HOWLs score every Friday afternoon. Teachers will also enter grades into Infinite Campus to report on academic standards and provide students with ongoing feedback using our traditional 1-4 grading scale. As the Superintendent communicated, there is a shift in grading for the third trimester. At the end of the trimester students will receive a grade that says they have “met” or “not yet met” standards. This summative score will be based on the trend of scores from the third trimester.

Thank you for your ongoing support during these challenging times. Be well and take care!

Caitlin

PPS has created a website for Frequently Asked Questions during Remote Learning

CLICK HERE

Please see the below message from our Parent Crew

We are so impressed with the teachers and staff at King for all of the hard work they are doing for our children through this time. Transitioning their classrooms, connection and work, what a big and unexpected shift. To that end, we would like to shower them with love and appreciation during this year’s Teacher Appreciation Week (May 4-8). Since we cannot do the typical in person activities, we are putting a call out for virtual love.

Let's send abundant notes of appreciation, support and love throughout the week through their emails. You can see a full staff email list using this link. Showing them we are still here even from a distance, we see them showing up still and in new ways, and we all miss them.

Also, it would be custom for us to make and bring in food to celebrate the teachers throughout the week. Since we can not do this yet, we are asking for donations for a future Teacher Appreciation party once they can be together, hopefully over the summer, to celebrate their success through such a difficult time. To make a donation, please use this link. Thank you!

We love and miss King Middle School daily, and are so incredibly grateful for the continued dedication to the education and community they are providing our kids.

Please stay safe, healthy and well!

Victoria Parker and the entire Parent Crew