To translate this newsletter, click on it then use the link to the right.

If you are on a computer, open this in a new page. Then to translate this newsletter, click on the link to the right. If you are on a phone, touch the person in the black circle to get the translate button.

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Se você estiver em um computador, abra uma nova página. Em seguida, para traduzir esta newsletter, clique no link à direita. Se você estiver em um telefone, toque na pessoa no círculo preto para obter o botão de tradução.

(Portuguese)

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Si está en una computadora, abra esto en una nueva página. Luego, para traducir este boletín, haga clic en el enlace a la derecha. Si está en un teléfono, toque a la persona en el círculo negro para obtener el botón de traducción.

(Spanish)

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إذا كنت تستخدم جهاز كمبيوتر ، فافتح هذا في صفحة جديدة. بعد ذلك ، لترجمة هذه النشرة الإخبارية ، انقر فوق الارتباط الموجود على اليمين.

إذا كنت تستخدم الهاتف ، فالمس الشخص الموجود في الدائرة السوداء للحصول على زر الترجمة. (Arabic)

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Եթե ​​համակարգիչ եք, բացեք սա նոր էջում: Ապա, այս տեղեկագիրը թարգմանելու համար կտտացրեք աջ հղմանը: Եթե ​​հեռախոսով եք, դիպչեք սև շրջանի անձին ՝ թարգմանության կոճակը ստանալու համար: (Armenian)

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Если вы работаете на компьютере, откройте это на новой странице. Затем, чтобы перевести этот информационный бюллетень, щелкните ссылку справа. Если вы разговариваете по телефону, коснитесь человека в черном кружке, чтобы получить кнопку перевода. (Russian)

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Bilgisayar kullanıyorsanız, bunu yeni bir sayfada açın. Ardından, bu bülteni çevirmek için sağdaki bağlantıya tıklayın. Telefonda iseniz, çevir düğmesini almak için siyah daire içindeki kişiye dokunun. (Turkish)

No School October 8th

No School October 11th Indigenous People's Day

Let's Chat- Night Event- Transitioning Back to School

Message from Mrs. Phelan- Breakfast/Lunch/Snack

Test and Stay Program

What I Love About Me

Message from Dr. McGuinness

Equity Audit Focus Groups for Families

We're Hiring- Jobs at Lowell- Join the team!

PE Newsletter- Ms. Donahue & Ms. Loguidice

Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging Council Meeting Minutes

Watertown Free and Public Library offers Race Reels Film & Discussion

Invitation to School Site Council

Quarantining Flow Char and Response to COVID-19

Up-coming Events

Our SEL team (Guidance Counselor, Social Worker, and School Psychologist), in partnership with the Lowell FTO, invites you to a "Let's Chat" gathering by Zoom for all Lowell parents and caregivers. Please join us on Thurs. 10/7 at 6:00 pm to meet the Lowell Student Support Team and to chat about the transition back to school!

Join Zoom Meeting https://watertown-k12-ma-us.zoom.us/j/84767180413

Greetings,

Movie Night was a huge success! It felt great to bring back the long-running tradition. Our current students had a great time playing with friends, eating treats, and watching the film. Some former Lowell students came by to say hello. It made my week to see middle and high school students stop by to visit a tradition from their past.

Tuesday is the Grand Opening celebration for the new Cunniff School. While the Hosmer and Cunniff were designed by the same firm and have a similar aesthetic, the two buildings are quite different. We support and congratulate our Cunniff neighbors in their exciting move and look forward to our own grand opening in February!

Mondays are our day for pooled testing, so we will be testing students tomorrow. Here's hoping for a fourth week of negative pools! This week also marks the beginning of our district "Test and Stay" program. Information about this policy is included below and was sent to families by the Superintendent. You can revisit the full newsletter here.

Breakfast, Snack, and Hot Lunch Program

Beginning Monday, October 18, 2021, we will bring back our hot lunch program and indoor eating. We will continue to honor those families who have asked explicitly for outside lunch. Currently, we have 27 students who need to eat outdoors for lunch according to our lunch preference form. If you wish to change your status, please notify Ms. Flynn of your change. We will bring students out for lunch until the weather requires mittens. When we can't eat outdoors, we will have those students sit in the hallway to eat lunch.

We will reinstate the before-school breakfast program as of Monday, October 18th Breakfast service will take place between 7:45 and 8:10. This service is open to all students free of charge. Doors open for breakfast at 7:45.

We will continue to offer snacks at school. Students will grab their snacks as they enter the building to bring to class. Also free of charge.

Monday, October 4, we will transition back to indoor snack time. We are currently losing instructional time due to the time needed to transition outdoors to eat snacks. It takes between 20 and 25 minutes to facilitate an outdoor snack period. Snack time has adversely affected our instructional time and, specifically, our writing block.

We feel our metrics, weekly pool testing, and the move to "test and stay" supports these decisions.

We are excited to bring back our hot meal service and our breakfast program. I thank you for your cooperation and support.

Enjoy the week ahead.

Stacy

We are excited to begin our 'Test & Stay' protocols on Monday, October 4 for students in preschool through grade 12. This will allow unvaccinated students who are identified as close contacts to a COVID positive individual at school to remain in attendance instead of quarantining.

If you are planning to have your child participate in the Test & Stay program, please complete the consent form prior to the start of the program. This will make the process much easier if your child is a close contact and needs to be part of the Test & Stay program.

The process is:

• Unvaccinated close contacts will need to test negative for COVID using the BinaxNOW rapid antigen test every morning before school for one week following the in-school exposure. The BinaxNOW will be provided at school prior to the start of the school day. Please note that Test & Stay only applies to COVID exposures in school.
• Unvaccinated individuals who are close contacts of a positive case outside of the school setting need to quarantine.
• *In order to have your child participate in the 'Test & Stay' Program, please sign this consent form at your earliest convenience. Consenting in advance will help to expedite the process if your child needs to participate in Test and Stay.

Reach out to your school nurse or to the Director of Students Services, Kathleen Desmarais, kathleen.desmarais@watertown.k12.ma.us if you have questions regarding this program. Please see this document for more information.

Mrs. Antonellis' fourth grade students, Iris and Gillian, explain what they love about them—celebrating being unique and special.

Rubicon Atlas Curriculum Management System (Atlas, henceforth)

It’s October and as promised, our WPS Atlas Curriculum Management System is open to our parents, guardians, and students on our public site. Our Principals have shared our K-8 curriculum brochures (K| G1 | G2 | G3 | G4 | G5 | G6 | G7 | G8) and our grades 9 - 12 WHS Program of Studies, which house a general overview K - 8, and specific course descriptions at the high school level. If you desire more detailed information around your child’s curriculum, you may find it on our Atlas Curriculum Management System’s Public Site link. Directions for use are on the homepage.

The curriculum maps in Atlas identify the following sections for public view on most courses. (The course development is ongoing.)

1. Course Descriptions

2. Unit Description

3. Standards & Benchmarks

4. Enduring Understandings

5. Essential Questions

At the elementary level, Curriculum Maps and Course Descriptions are available for all core elementary subjects: Math, Science, Literacy - Reading & Writing, Social Studies. Some elementary units that take place later in the year are under construction and will be updated in Altas prior to implementation. Elementary English as a Second Language units are under construction.

At the secondary level (WMS, WHS), ~90 percent of the courses display curriculum information. Secondary ESL units for English Language Development (ELD) classes are still under construction.

Parent/Family Orientation

Try following the simplified instructions on the Atlas homepage link. In addition, our Digital Learning & Libraries Department will schedule Parent/Family Orientation Sessions both during the school day and again in the evening in October. These sessions will be recorded and then shared on our curriculum webpage for viewing anytime. The October date and Zoom links will be shared via upcoming Principal Newsletters.

MCAS 2021 Results ~ A Unique Year of Data

The Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) recently released statewide MCAS test results from the spring 2021 exam. Results at the State level (and at WPS), show that many more students had gaps in their knowledge of math and, to a lesser extent, English language arts, compared to students in the same grades in 2019 (before the COVID-19 pandemic, as MCAS was waived last year), and fewer students met or exceeded grade level expectations.

In this unique year, DESE removed all percentiles in public reports suggesting they are not interested in district comparisons as there are so many varying circumstances that you need to take into account, which would invalidate those comparisons. They urged caution in making ‘across schools within district’ comparisons as well as across districts. In grades 3 - 8, individual students only took ½ the test, which resulted in less precision of results at the individual student level.

In Watertown, MCAS is one of multiple measures of ‘Unfinished Learning’ that we are comparing with other assessments (i-Ready, literacy, pre-assessments, etc.) at the student- and grade-levels to better target individual student instruction and monitor growth. As we work to help students make grade-level progress, we are using DESE’s resource --the Acceleration Roadmap, which emphasizes the importance of understanding students’ strengths and needs and the use of just-in-time supports to help students learn grade-appropriate material.

MCAS Parent/Guardian Reports will be mailed home on October 15th and we will present our 2021 MCAS Results at the November 8th School Committee Meeting.

Watertown Public Schools has hired Public Consulting Group (PCG) to conduct a districtwide Equity Audit. The goal of this audit is to identify strengths and areas for improvement in WPS and to make recommendations on how we can move towards achieving the best outcomes for each student in our community. An essential component of this work is hearing from a wide range of voices from across our district.

As a part of the Equity Audit, PCG is conducting a series of family focus groups and we invite you to participate. These focus group will be held virtually on:

Tuesday, October 12th at 7:00 PM

Wednesday, October 13th at 7:00 PM

Thursday, October 14th at 8:30 AM

Please sign up for a focus group using the following link as soon as possible: WPS Equity Audit Family Focus Groups Registration

La auditoría de equidad de WPS El formulario para participar en los grupos de enfoque para las familias

Once you sign up you will receive a calendar invite that will include additional information regarding the details of the focus groups and a summary of what to expect. Please contact Sydney Menzin with PCG at smenzin@pcgus.com if you have any questions.

We appreciate your participation as we work towards identifying and addressing practices, policies, and communications that may contribute to inequities across our district. We are committed to building a WPS in which each learner reaches their full academic and personal potential in safe, welcoming, equitable, inclusive learning environments.

JOBS AVAILABLE IN WPS

Are you or do you know someone who may be looking for an opportunity to work in a school system? We have positions open for a school nurse, substitute teachers, instructional assistants, family liaisons, tutors, school nutrition workers, and more! All open positions can be found on our Human Resources webpage.

The Watertown Police Department is also actively seeking crossing guards for our schools. Please see the posting for these positions here.

Hello Lowell students, parents/guardians,

Ms. Donahue and Ms. Loguidice, the Lowell School P.E. teachers welcome you to our first monthly P.E. Newsletter. In this P.E. newsletter, you will find the activities learned in the month of September. We are excited to share our activities and lessons taught throughout the year .

Don't forget to check at the beginning of each month to see what your child is learning in P.E. class!.

Sincerely,

Eileen Donahue eileen.donahue@watertown.k12.ma.us

Tina Loguidice tina.loguidice@watertown.k12.ma.us

Opening and Welcome

Parents introduced themselves and stated their hopes and dreams for the year ahead.

· In-person meetings

· Continued work supporting antiracist work in our community and school

· Stronger Awareness of neurodiversity and explicit instruction for adults and children

· Work involving gender identity and preferred pronouns

· Specific work looking at equity and inclusion as it relates to the school and classroom

Current School Demographics

History and Accomplishments of previous Diversity Council Work

New Business:

· Calendar Committee focused on traditions and holidays of all students. Celebrate all not eliminate all.

· Themed months

· Continued focus on Student Speakers for our Student Diversity Council

· Begin Black History month at Martin Luther King Jr. Birthday Week – Focus on celebration and not on the struggle and dehumanization faced by black people

· Continue to celebrate and black culture throughout the year

· Guest Speakers for adults and children (speaker series) Maybe collaborate with the other two elementary schools or WMS on this initiative

· Mental Health Awareness

· Sex Education and important Health topics

· Supports for students as we tradition to our new schools

· Kid Padlet for questions and answers

Next Steps

· Sub-committee work chaired by Liz Marino and Becky Curtiss ( calendar committee and speaker series)

Meeting Slides

Watertown Race Reels provides a common experience, through short (~70-80 minutes) documentary films about race and ethnicity (different racial/ethnic identities will be explored each month). In providing a common experience through short films Watertown Race Reels provides a jumping off point for conversations around race that are difficult to start and develop an audience/community that embraces discussion around racial and ethnic identity, the impact of racism on our community members and our community as a whole, and goal oriented actions to make our community more aware and welcoming of differences. After viewing each film, community members, young and old, gather in a circle to meet with speakers, directors, or relevant citizens to ponder the issues raised by the film.

Date(s):

Wednesday, October 20, 2021 - 5:30pm to 8:00pm

Location:

Watertown Savings Bank Meeting Room

SECOND AND THIRD GRADERS RECEIVED RANDOM PIECES OF CONSTRUCTION PAPER AND WERE ASKED TO USE THEIR CREATIVITY TO TURN IT INTO SOMETHING, ANYTHING.

A newly created Quarantine Flowchart helps illustrate the COVID-19 protocols. Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words or, in this case, a flowchart.

A special shout out to parents and community members Lily Rayman Read (WPS SC), Nicholas Zinser, and Tyler Kemp-Benedict for their help creating this flowchart!

Monday, October 4th School Committee Meeting 7:00 PM

Webinar Link

Tuesday, October 5th Cunniff School's Ribbon Cutting Ceremony 4:00 PM

Thursday, October 7th Let's Chat brought to by our SEL Team 6:00 PM

Join Zoom Meeting https://watertown-k12-ma-us.zoom.us/j/84767180413

Friday, October 8th NO SCHOOL for Students

Tuesday, October 12th FTO Meeting 6:30-7:30 Via Zoom

Wednesday, October 13th Watertown Building Committee Meeting Via Zoom

Thursday, October 14th School Site Council 6:00 PM Via Zoom

Join Zoom Meeting https://watertown-k12-ma-us.zoom.us/j/81702274606

Monday, October 25th Antibias Coalition Meeting 5:30-7:00

Meetings will be held in a hybrid model.

The physical location will be on the 3rd floor of the Phillips Building in room 301.

The recurring zoom link is listed below.

Join Zoom Meeting
https://watertown-k12-ma-us.zoom.us/j/82142739210?pwd=MjZZL3JURU5RdUtYc3ZNVHlockVCQT09

Wednesday, October 20th

Watertown Race Reels Film Series-Presents UNSPOKEN America's Native American Boarding Schools and Quest Speaker Thalia Carroll-Chacimuel.

Friday, October 22nd Lowell School Fall Festival

Principal, Stacy Phelan ext. 33002

Main Office ext. 33001

Email: stacy.phelan@watertown.k12.ma.us
Website: https://lowell.watertown.k12.ma.us/
Location: 175 Orchard Street, Watertown, MA, USA
Phone: (617) 926-7770
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JRLowellElementary