Greetings St. Ignatius Families,
We have successfully wrapped up another week of school. Our seventh and eighth grade students heard from five local Catholic high schools on Tuesday. Our local high schools host Open House events during the month of October. We celebrated Mass and commissioned our 8th grade class as leaders of our school on Wednesday. Thursday we dressed in our Sunday Best for Picture Day. And we wrapped up the week with a ‘class color’ themed free dress day. Unfortunately, we did not have nearly enough interest in ordering from the Fresh n’ Local menu to meet the company’s minimum order of 50 lunches per day. Therefore, we will not be using Fresh n’ Local as a lunch option for this school year. My apologies to those families that did place orders for the month of October. Since we were not able to meet close to the minimum order, all students will need to continue to bring their own cold lunches through the end of the first trimester. We are actively investigating other possible options for the second and third trimesters of this school year. We are blessed to have a supportive community during this challenging time. As we close this third week of school, I am pleased to share we have had no students or staff cases of COVID-19. When families notify us regarding a possible or known exposure their student may have had to COVID-19, we take all of the information the families provide us and speak directly with our LPHA (Local Public Health Authority) to receive guidance on how to proceed and guide those families, so we can keep our school community as safe as possible. Each scenario is unique, and we err on the side of caution by asking families to keep their student out of school until we can confirm the correct course of action for each individual student from our LPHA. Should we have a student or staff member test positive for COVID-19, our LPHA will be notified and guide us through the notification process along with contract tracing. We keep up-to-date contract tracing logs for all grade levels by day and week. We appreciate the patience and understanding our families have demonstrated with all of the protocols we follow working to keep our students safe. One of our strongest mitigation measures is wearing masks inside and outside of school. Masks need to be worn properly to ensure the safety of all of our students. We encourage families to try different types of masks to find the best fitting mask for your student’s face. Proper fitting masks and the types of masks worn will result in the most effective mitigation effort. It’s a good idea to try out a few types of masks to find the best fitting masks for your students. If you have any questions about masks, feel free to reach out to your classroom or homeroom teacher or the school office. We may reach out to you if we see your student needs some mask adjustments. Thank you for working with us on proper fitting masks. Please know we are working hard at school to maintain mitigation measures such as wearing masks, sanitizing, outdoor eating, and social distancing. Each week, we re-view our COVID protocols as a staff to make adjustments as needed. As we roll through the fall and families participate in activities outside of school such as play-dates, birthday parties, and other gatherings, please wear masks at those events too. We appreciate all of the precautions each family is taking at home to keep the whole community safe. Our St. Ignatius School Foundation golf tournament is swiftly approaching. We still need at least one foursome for each grade level. Our 8th grade leaders nearly have a team ready! There’s still time to ‘sponsor a hole’ as well. And if you’re not a golfer, you can volunteer for fair-share hours at the event. You can also register to attend the outdoor banquet after the event. Let’s come together to support our school’s foundation! We are looking forward to another week full of learning, stretching, and growing! “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” Psalm 119:105 Peace be with you, Carol Pausz Principal Greetings St. Ignatius Families,
As we come to the close of our second week of school, we are grateful for the amazing students and supportive families. With our STAR testing nearly complete, our staff will begin analyzing the data to drive instructional planning. Our test results show, overall, we have strong students ready to learn and stretch themselves toward brilliant futures. STAR testing results will be shared with families during our fall conferences in October. We celebrated our whole school this week with an outdoor assembly to review our recess and uniform expectations. Several staff members helped us to review our uniform guidelines with a ‘what not to wear’ fashion show. We successfully completed our first fire drill of the year on Thursday afternoon as well. We have a few reminders for families as we head into our third week of school. It is extremely important that we work together as a community to maintain safety measures. The students are doing a great job at keeping their masks on and putting them on right away after eating. We need some assistance from home for two safety protocols. First, please do not drop your child off before we open the school at 8:15 AM. The playground is closed before school, and students should not be on the equipment before the doors open. Students arriving in the carline should remain in their car until our yellow-vested staff appear at 8:15 AM. Students who arrive just before 8:15 AM by foot or bike should stand six feet from each other in the bike rack area. Secondly, as we enter the cold and flu season, if your child is not feeling well, even if you don’t think it’s COVID and even if he/she is vaccinated, please consider getting a rapid COVID test. COVID tests can be purchased for home use at many local pharmacies. Since we know that people can carry the virus without symptoms, please consider regularly screening your family with home tests. In school, we have added social distancing dots back onto our floors. The air purifiers are up and running all day in all classrooms. Our bathrooms are cleaned frequently during the day. High touch surfaces are wiped down several times a day. All of our students are using hand sanitizer coming in and out of the classroom after recesses and many specialist classes. Since we do not have a digital learning option, many of our students that were home all of last year are back in the classroom. As you can imagine, everyone is nervous about the community spread of the virus, especially those families with children that have compromised immune systems or live with family members with compromised immune systems. We appreciate all of the precautions each family is taking at home to keep the whole community safe. With next week as our last full week of September, we have a class color day scheduled for Friday, September 24th! Students can wear school appropriate clothing in their class color next Friday. Here are the class colors by grade: Preschool - yellow Kindergarten - lime green 1st - tye dye 2nd - purple 3rd - pink 4th - turquoise 5th - orange 6th - green 7th - red 8th - blue Next Tuesday, September 21st, our local Catholic high schools will come visit with our 7th & 8th grade students. Next week, on Wednesday, September 22nd, there will be our first monthly “Visit with the Principal'' for parents event. This month’s event will be virtual, via Zoom, from 9:00-9:30 AM. We hope to move this event to in person when it is safe to do so and shift the time to right after school begins. We are looking forward to another week full of learning, stretching, and growing! Peace be with you, Carol Pausz Principal |
Carol Pausz, PrincipalArchives
June 2022
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