Dear BES families,

Five years ago, we introduced a new report card to help parents know better what their children knew and were able to do.  It was based directly on the end of year standards for each grade level, and as you are aware, communicated the progress of the students toward that end of year goal.  This fall we will be unveiling the next step in this communication tool.

First, the standards have undergone minor changes to keep up with the changes at the federal, state and district level.  Unless you look very closely, you may not notice much of a change there.  There will still be the familiar 1-4 number system and still have comments for each area.

However, we thought we could do a better job communicating just where kids were in their progress.  This summer a team of teachers worked for days to define what our expectations for the children in elementary school for the end of each marking period.  These documents, which are available online through the Quick Link on www.rsd17.org/bes, now allow us to let parents know whether their child has learned what they were supposed to, can do it with some help, or have not made the progress we hoped.   It is my hope that this precision will help our teachers communicate more clearly to our parents and to help parents know exactly what we expect out of our children.  I highly recommend perusing these documents.  While they may not be light reading, they are a treasure-trove of information about what we believe in RSD 17 is valuable for our children to know.

Our first report cards of this generation will be going home in the children’s’ backpacks on December 21, along with a brochure more fully explaining the changes.  This will be 3 days later than we published in our handbook.  We added a few extra days to make up for the 5 that we missed due to weather-related closings this fall.  If you have any questions about the report, please talk to your classroom teacher or contact me at elarson@rsd17.org.

I hope that the peace of this holiday season is able to penetrate your busy lives.  Thank you for sharing your most precious gifts with us every day.  I get to see them wrapped up in smiles as they come through our front doors every morning.  I hope that we return them to you with the same expression.

Have a wonderful December,
Eric Larson

PS  Please remember to use a parking place to drop your children off.  The morning is a busy time in our parking lot and a couple of extra seconds on your part will help keep our children safer.