From the Principal’s Desk
Mr. Kevin Dick
The education of our children at Pettigrew School happens best when there is a partnership between home and Pettigrew School. Neither Pettigrew nor the family are solely responsible, but research shows that children have the most successful education when family and schools work together to help students succeed.
As children grow, they tend to gain more and more independence, but family involvement is still crucial. Research shows that having strong, involved family is more important to academic success than a family’s background, socioeconomic status, or education. Family involvement will not only affect children’s education, but also has significant impact on their social lives and their futures as adults.
A vast amount of research has been conducted that shows a wide variety of benefits for students whose families are highly involved in their education. These include:
· Higher academic success, including higher literacy rates, test scores, grades, and graduation rates
· Increased attendance
· Less discipline issues
· Higher involvement in extracurricular activities
· Increased class participation
· More likely to ask for help when needed
· Stronger student confidence in their abilities
· Stronger student-teacher relationships
· More positive attitudes towards school
· Better social skills
· Lower dropout rates
· Less likely to engage in high-risk health behaviors
In addition to student benefits, high family involvement can also have other benefits, such as:
· Building a positive school climate and school programs
· Providing community for parents
· Teachers seeing parents as assets and can building stronger relationships with the family to better engage and motivate students.
· The school staff being more aware of and responsive to issues.
At Pettigrew School, we are so blessed to have a supportive community of parents that support our efforts. One evidence of this support was seen these past few weeks, as we have now wrapped up our Fun Run Fund-Raiser, and for the third year in a row, we have attained the goal we have set out for ourselves. That only comes because of the support you, the parents and community members, have shown at Pettigrew. The number of parents attending the event is another strong indicator of the community interest in our activities. Well over 200 adults attended last Friday’s Fun Run to support their students in their running activities. We always pack the gym for concerts and other evening events that are open to our parents and the community. Our PTO experiences great attendance at their scheduled events. Please consider ways to get involved with our PTO group at Pettigrew. They share these opportunities on emails from the school and at their Facebook site, consider liking that site. PTO’s Facebook site is found at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/RFPettigrewPTO . Our school’s Facebook site is found at https://www.facebook.com/RFPettigrewElementary . Consider following or liking both of those sites, if you don’t already. You can find an article about the Fun Run event at the school Facebook site. We’ll talk about other ways to get involved at Pettigrew in upcoming articles. Happy October!!
R.F. Pettigrew PTO
Email: rfp.president@yahoo.com
Website: rfpettigrew.org/pto
Location: 7900 West 53rd Street, Sioux Falls, SD, USA
Phone: 6053623564
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/RFPettigrewPTO/?ref=share