Principal's Update

August 29, 2007

Lice issue

Dear Families,

We hope you are enjoying these last few days of summer with your children. As you can imagine, the school is a busy place right now. The office has been open full time since last week and the teachers have been busy getting their classrooms set up and organized for your children.

As always, with the start of a new school year, there is a lot of information to share with you. Thank you in advance for your attention to all of the information in this email.

As most of you know, at the end of last school year, we said goodbye to several of our staff members. We have heard from each of them this summer and all are happy with their new positions and direction in life. We welcome the following new faculty and staff members to Sacred Heart School: Barbara McGrath, grade 4; Emily Potts, grade 5; Fil Tribble, 7/8 religion; Zak Cunningham, 7 humanities; Claudia Jorissen, 9 math; Henri Miller, 8 humanities; Richard Allen, music; Susie Jensen, art; Julie Noll, school office, and Amy Davis, ESS Director. As we shared with you last spring, Mr. Schmid elected to move to 7 th grade math.

Mr. Gustafson was one of the applicants we interviewed for the library position. Since Mrs. Tull’s move to Nevada one year ago, we were fortunate to find Ms. Kownover as our interim librarian. The past year also afforded us the time to evaluate the library and its function in the school. For instance, it is important that the library be accessible to students during lunch time, several times each week. Our middle school students in particular have expressed an interest last year to be able to study and research prior to their afternoon classes. It was equally important to acknowledge that communication and technology contribute to the change of a library’s objective. While one of its goals will always be the introduction of the printed word, to young students in particular, it also needs to be a center for learning and communication. Mr. Gustafson’s previous experience in business and community relations makes him uniquely qualified to take the Sacred Heart library from its present status to that of a Learning Resource Center.

Last June, Betsy Marsh shared with us her desire to retire. Betsy and her husband will be celebrating the wedding of their daughter in San Diego this coming December and Betsy was looking forward to having more time for her family. While remaining a member of the school’s administrative team, Renee Doyle moved to the Parish Administration building to manage the administrative needs involving the Annual Fund. We welcome Julie Noll to the school office; a former Catholic school parent she comes to us from Holy Family Parish, Kirkland, where she worked in a similar administrative capacity.

We moved Pam Helberg, Director of Technology and Computing Services, downstairs, into Renee’s former space and converted that area into a separate office area. This move allows Pam to be closer to the teaching staff and to assist with the further incorporation of the ActivBoards into the classrooms.

Speaking of technology, we have used the summer weeks to add more ActivBoards throughout the school; look for them in kindergarten, in both first grade classrooms, in Mrs. Wood’s second grade room, in Mrs. Dennehy’s third grade class, and in the fifth grade with Ms. Potts. Additionally, we replaced the laptops in the current 6 th grade and purchased new desktops for the fourth and fifth grades. New for Sacred Heart School this year is the First Move Chess Program. Mrs. Brooks, one of our second grade teachers, stepped up to bring the program to SHS.

Students in grades four through eight have new science textbooks; similar to our math curriculum in the intermediate and upper grade, this science curriculum has an online component. Mrs. Hooper was the faculty representative taking part in an extensive science workshop this summer. The workshop was taught by University of Washington faculty and sponsored by the Catholic Schools’ Department.

Since the inception of our Spanish program in 2003, we have heard from many parents in the middle school how much they appreciate the foreign language component while wishing that their students could retain the music/art options. For the coming school year, Mr. Lester has come up with a schedule that gives students the block schedule, Spanish and a rotation through art and music. This is possible because in his new role, Mr. Lester is able to meet with larger groups of students thus providing the schedule with the breathing room needed for rotation. We’re excited to have the fine and performing arts return to the middle school curriculum and look forward to some terrific art work and great performances!

To avoid confusion, all 7 th and 8 th grade students need to report to the Moore Theater by 8:30 AM, Tuesday, September 4; we will take the opportunity to distribute individual class schedules and to introduce the new 7 th and 8 th grade faculty.

Our Open House dates for this school year are Monday, September 17 th for 5 th-8 th grades and Tuesday, September 18 th for K-4 th grades. On both nights, we will begin at 6:30pm in the gym. As we did last year, fall conference sign-ups will take place during Open House. If for some reason, you are unable to attend the Open House, you will be given an open conference time and your child’s teacher will notify you after the Open House as to when your conference was scheduled.

Our first school mass is scheduled for Friday, September 7, at 9AM. Beginning with our September school mass, we’ll offer an opportunity for informal conversation with school administration immediately following each First Friday mass, for about 45 minutes following the end of mass. The objective is to have yet another venue in which to share information.

As a reminder, the Magazine Sale is being conducted online. Families can log onto our website and under the link for Fundraising, conveniently renew or purchase new magazine subscriptions through QSP.com. Families can fulfill their fundraising requirement as set out in their Tuition and Fundraising Agreement by purchasing and/or selling magazines. Forty percent of every dollar spent will come back to Sacred Heart School so don’t forget to remind your family and friends!

Both the school and parish offices will be closed for the remainder of this week as we gather for our annual retreat. Fr. Richard Basso will be our presenter. Please keep us in your prayers as we prepare for the beginning of another school year. Our offices will also be closed on Monday, September 3 th in observance of Labor Day. We look forward to seeing everyone on Tuesday, September 4 th as we kick off the start of the 2007-08 school year. As a reminder, kindergarten will be dismissing at 11:35 on the first day and 1 st through 8 th will be dismissing at 11:45am. ESS will be open from 11:45am-6:00pm on Tuesday, but students attending will need to bring their lunch. With the exception of Kindergarten, which will be dismissing at 11:50am for the rest of the first week, we will begin our regular schedule on Wednesday, September 6 th. Hot lunch will begin Monday, September 10.

If you have a buddy family, please invite them to our Back-to-school Coffee, immediately after drop-off, on Tuesday, September 4, in the gym.

We look forward to seeing you on the first day of school.