FLYER FAMILY UPDATES

Good Sunday afternoon Flat Rock Middle School families, this is Dr. Crawford with a few reminders for the coming week.

Parents, WSFCS has not had a change in school attendance zones in over thirty years. Fostering Diverse Schools has released three proposed maps for the community to review and give feedback. Your voice is critical to this process. Some changes to the maps have already occurred based on initial feedback from the community. I would like to offer a session to my Flat Rock families on how to maneuver around the maps and what each map means. There will be a link to a brief interest survey to determine if there is such a need. Please complete the survey, by this Wednesday March 26. Remember, this is a very important community process and your inclusion and your voice is critical for its success.

Parents, the WSFCS Panorama survey is now available! This is your opportunity to give important feedback to your individual school and to the school district about how things are going. Please take some time to complete the Panorama family survey. A link to the survey will be in the newsletter. The Panorama Survey will be open through April 7.

Parents, beginning Monday March 24, Flat Rock Middle School will begin to pilot a new metal detector system called Open Gate. This new system will require students to operate a little differently than they have in the past. In the newsletter, there will be a pictured list of items that students must remove from their bookbag before walking through the detector. We will use this system daily beginning Monday March 24.

Parents, you will also find in the newsletter information about a wonderful service for our scholars through a partnership with Atrium Health. In short, we have the ability, with your permission, to provide on-site telehealth services for our scholars. There is a range of services that can be provided from check-ups to full exams. If needed, providers can even have a prescription called in and all you have to do is pick it up. We hope you can take advantage of this service.

Parents, after school tutoring is now available. We now have only 35 school days remaining until we begin end of grade and end of course assessments. After school tutoring will be available through April 30 and your scholar must be picked up by 3:30 P.M. Please reach out to your scholar's ELA or math teacher to determine when the days and times for after school tutoring.

8th grade parents, we are planning for the 8th grade moving on ceremony in May. You will need to pay close attention to the information provided so you can be prepared. There will be a section of the newsletter created just for information on the 8th grade moving on ceremony, and will be updated regularly. Please check this section frequently.

Flat Rock Middle School continues to look for parents to serve as members of our school improvement team. If you are interested in the inner workings of a school including how funding is allotted, how staffing decisions are made, and even how curriculum decisions are made then the school improvement team is the place for you. Please reach out to me via email at jacrawford@wsfcs.k12.nc.us if you would like more information. Our next SIT meeting will be Tuesday March 25, 2025 in the library at 2:20.

Have a great rest of the weekend. We look forward to seeing all of our staff and scholars back in the building on Monday March 24.

The three proposed sets of maps each address current problems to different degrees. Map A significantly increases socioeconomic diversity, while Map B is slightly less diverse but has much more efficient transportation routes and more consistent feeder patterns, and Map C sacrifices more diversity for a bit more transportation efficiency. None of the proposed maps will have too many or too few students in a zone by default.

Maps will be revised again at the end of the spring and won’t go to the Board of Education for a vote until August, so there’s still plenty of time to offer feedback. Students, parents, and families are encouraged to go online starting today to review the maps and use the FDS webpage’s interactive tools to learn how each option would affect them.

From there, they can fill out a survey detailing their opinions. They can also attend any of the 11 upcoming listening sessions meant to keep soliciting feedback and improving maps before the new boundaries are finalized.

The proposed maps are available for review now at https://maps.wsfcsvoices.org/.

In preparation for the new Open Gate metal detectors that will be in use at Flat Rock Middle School, there are several new procedures students will have to follow. Parents, please take a few moments to share these procedures with your scholars before they leave for school Monday morning. Also, refer to the picture to see other items that must be removed from your scholars bookbag prior to walking through the gate.

Remove all 3-ring binders and Chromebooks from their bookbags.

• If your Chromebook is in a case, unzip the case.

• Remove any other tablets such as iPads and Kindles.

• Bookbags should be worn with both straps as you walk through the machine.

• Do not stop after passing through the machine to put items back in your

bookbag…that can be done away from the Safe Entry area.

We will update this section of the newsletter with information specific to 8th grade end of year events.

8th grade pictures--March 31

Dress Code for Promotion Pictures:

To ensure all students look their best, please adhere to the following dress code guidelines: Students will only be photographed from the waist up.

Polo/collared shirts, blouses or button-Up shirts. Students are allowed to wear a tie.

Dresses: No backless or strapless tops unless accompanied by a sweater to cover bare shoulders

We greatly appreciate your cooperation in following the dress code to help ensure that all students look their best in their promotion photos.

8th grade picnic--May 16 from 12:00-2:00 (approximate time)

8th grade moving on ceremony--May 19 at Grace Baptist Church 3305 Peters Creek Pkwy, Winston Salem, NC

We are thankful for Grace Baptist Church for hosting our ceremony this year. Because of space restrictions, scholars will only be allowed two guests inside the church. We will also live stream the ceremony, so if you have other family members who would like to watch, but will not be able to make it inside the church, there will be that option. At the conclusion of each ceremony (we will have two ceremonies as we split the grade level in half), you will also have the option of signing your scholar out of school and taking them home with you from the church.

Please return here for updates as we move closer to the event.

We want every bus ride to be safe, respectful, and pleasant for students and drivers. WS/FCS R.I.D.E.S. is an educational program and set of expectations for how everyone will behave one the bus. Please click on the section header above to take you directly to the WS/FCS R.I.D.E.S landing page! Thank you for your assistance in making the bus ride to school and the bus ride home safe.

Flat Rock Middle School seeks parents that can assist the school in forming a full PTA board. The PTA is an important part of an effective school and Flat Rock Middle seeks dedicated parents of our scholars to join us in this endeavor. If you can serve, please email the school's Parent Family Engagement Coordinator Mrs. Correa-Vega at icvega@wsfcs.k12, or Mrs. Candela at micandela@wsfcs.k12.nc.us. You can also call the school and ask for either staff member.

Parents, all scholar-athletes MUST have a new sports physical completed. All athletic paperwork, including the forms for the sports physical must be gathered from, and uploaded here, to the WSFCS Dragonfly Portal. NO PAPER COPIES OF PHYSICALS will be accepted! If you have more specific questions or need assistance, please reach out to Coach Wormack at jwormack@wsfcs.k12.nc.us or by telephone at 743.444.1305.

I thought I would streamline this so you had faster access to information you may need throughout the school year. If you click on the individual link, you will be directed to that specific item. Included here are access to:

Parent Portal Link

Code of Conduct, Character & Support

Edulog transportation portal,

new cell phone policy

immunization checklist

Parents Bill of Rights,

student & parent handbooks

Future Ready North Carolina Portrait of a Graduate

Attendance Matters

These links will remain here as part of the weekly parent newsletter for the remainder of the school year.

The school improvement plan is the document that governs how schools operate throughout the year. It is a legal document and all schools are requires to have one. All public schools in North Carolina are also required to have a school improvement team. I again invite you to join this necessary and important school team. Here is the link for members of the public to be able to access the school improvement plan for Flat Rock Middle School. The user name and pass words are the same GuestS16183

Website: https://www.wsfcs.k12.nc.us/Domain/1819
Location: 4648 Ebert Road, Winston-Salem, NC, USA
Phone: 336.703.6762
Twitter: @FRMSFlyers