Good Afternoon NMS Families!

I hope you all had a great holiday break. We are nearing the end of the second quarter already so don't forget to check your child's grades in Infinite Campus. We are going to have a virtual parent meeting on Thursday, January 19 at 6:30 pm. I have a few other updates for you which I will discuss below.

Have a great afternoon!

John Diorio

NMS
Community-Pride-Commitment

Upcoming events:

1/19- Virtual Parent Meeting

1/19- MCAS prep class begins

2/01- Virtual parent meeting with DA

2/8- NJHS induction ceremony at 6:30pm

2/15- 6th grade field trip to Gillette

2/17- 7th grade field trip to Gillette

On Thursday, January 19, we will have a virtual parent meeting at 6:30pm. We will have updates about our school and have 2 important guest. Maeve William, our district SEL coordinator, will be with us to talk about ways we can work together to support our students social emotional needs. Dawn Stockwell and Eric Tracey will also join us to talk about the opportunities at the high school. Hope to see you all there. The link is included below:

meet.google.com/tez-zqwb-ths

This week we had house assemblies to reaffirm our school expectations and discuss ways we can prevent bullying. The students did a great job and were very respectful during the assemblies.

The DAs office will visit our school Feb. 7,8, and 9 to discuss Cyber Safety/Bullying Prevention. Thank you to Ms. Palmer-Howes and Ms. Wildfeuer for setting this up!

The high school admin team will be with us at our parent meeting Jan 19 to discuss different opportunities they have for incoming high school students. Then on Feb. 3, the high school will visit NMS to talk to our 8th graders about all the options at the high school. We will be joined by administration, guidance counselors, and students. During the month of Feb and the first week of March, 2 homerooms a week will visit the high school to spend the day touring the school.

Our Community Closet will be open: 1/18 & 2/1 from 2:15-4:15pm. Lots of great apparel items to choose from in our new space.

Completed applications are due by 1/11/23. I am including an information link for NJHS below.

Our induction ceremony will be February 8, 2023.

I want to extend a warm welcome to our 2 newest staff member:

Angel Burley joins our special education department and will be teaching in the connects program.

Joe Sinasky also joins our special education department and will be servicing students in house 1 and 2.

Welcome aboard!

Northbridge Middle School offers a Vaping Diversion Program for students who are involved in vaping. Parents and Guardians may refer their students to the program. The program is managed by Lori Johnson, the School Nurse Leader. Students who are referred to the program participate in a 5 week program involving reading 2 articles and completing an online video program developed by the MD Anderson Cancer Center to teach adolescents about the dangers of vaping. The students meet with the nurse once a week. At the end of the program, students will write a 1 page essay on the dangers of vaping and develop a written plan to quit vaping. If you are concerned about your student and vaping, please contact Mrs. Johnson at ljohnson@nps.org or call her at 508-234-6221, ext 5110.

Names of students referred to the program by parents/guardians will be kept confidential and no disciplinary action will be involved because of participation in the program.

We are excited about the new science curriculum purchased by our district. OpenSciEd was launched to improve the supply of and address demand for high quality, open-source, full-course science instructional materials, while at the same time supporting the implementation of middle school science instructional units.I am including a link to learn more about the program, and a pdf explaining what you and your student can expect from the program.

https://www.openscied.org/about/