Hello Wilson Wildcat Community,

I hope that everyone is having a great Hispanic Heritage Month (September 15 to October 15 is National Hispanic American Heritage Month). During this time, we want to celebrate and pay tribute to the generations of Hispanic Americans that have positively influenced our nation and the global society. I want to pay homage to one of the great Latina leaders who has influenced many and is continuing her work that will have lasting effects on generations to come.

“SONIA SOTOMAYOR, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, was born in Bronx, New York, on June 25, 1954. She earned a B.A. in 1976 from Princeton University, graduating summa cum laude and receiving the university’s highest academic honor. In 1979, she earned a J.D. from Yale Law School where she served as an editor of the Yale Law Journal. She served as Assistant District Attorney in the New York County District Attorney’s Office from 1979-1984. She then litigated international commercial matters in New York City at Pavia & Harcourt, where she served as an associate and then partner from 1984-1992. In 1991, President George H.W. Bush nominated her to the U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, and she served in that role from 1992-1998. She served as a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit from 1998-2009. President Barack Obama nominated her as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court on May 26, 2009, and she assumed this role on August 8, 2009.”

Please stay tuned for the many activities that we have planned for the month of October. It is our goal to engage our community in activities that will further assist us in achieving our goal of increased academic achievement for all. In closing I would like to thank those parents that join me for our very first Parent Advisory Council meeting that took place in the month of September. If you are a parent of students attending the Wilson School District and you would like to be a part of the Parent Advisory Council, please reach out to Mrs. Joyce at (602)681-2200.

First quarter is wrapping up quickly. It has been an amazing and productive quarter. The students are showing progress each day socially, physically, and intellectually. Students are following the Wilson Way; Be Safe, Be Responsible, and Be Respectful regularly to ensure that our school is a safe learning environment for all.

This quarter we focused on building relationships with the students and parents as well as setting routines and procedures inside and outside the classroom. Ensuring that our students have a safe place to learn where they are loved and supported is our number one priority. Even our youngest learners, the PreK students, learned to follow rules and procedures to build a sense of community for their classroom.

This year, our emphasis is on family engagement. We have had several family engagement events throughout this quarter. It has been so wonderful to interact with our families and community members. We will continue to have other family events that bring our community together. The positive partnership with our families is imperative for our student success.

In addition to family engagements, we also had events with our community partners. We had guest speakers visiting classrooms, K9 police unit giving a presentation, read aloud literacy event with Amazon volunteers, uniform bus providing uniforms to our students and much more throughout the quarter. Being able to connect with our community leaders and organization has been an incredible experience. We are looking forward to more events in the future.

Fall break will start on October 10th. Please be safe and enjoy the cooler weather. We will see you back on October 17th

Maki Wojcicki
Principal

Wilson Primary School

Hello Wonderful Wildcat Families,

We are looking into October with great anticipation. We are ever excited to usher in cooler temperatures and the holiday season.

We are beginning the implementation of our Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports (PBIS) Program. PBIS is an approach schools use to promote safety and good behavior. Students are taught about behavior expectations and strategies. Parents and guardians will hear about CLAWS – Collaboration, Leadership, Accountability, Willingness, and Success. These are the guiding principals of the PBIS Program at WES.

It is wonderful to Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month September 15- October 15. This year’s theme is Unidos: Inclusivity for a Stronger Nation. Diversity is the strength of our Hispanic population, and the contributions to culture, the economy, and the future of our nation cannot be denied. The Hispanic and Latino community represents one of the fastest growing populations in America, with about 62 million living in the United States. With roots in the Caribbean, Mexico, Central America, South America, Europe and North America, the diversity is robust.

I encourage you to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month throughout the year and beyond.

October 1-31 is Breast Cancer Awareness Month and Bullying Prevention Month. Your child’s teacher will have various activities throughout the month recognizing both.

Fall break will be October 10-14, 2022.

Your child will be receiving their first quarter report cards after fall break.

Wilson Elementary School will continue to strive to give our students the best education possible – and we encourage all parents and community members to become involved in our school community.

Dr. Demetra Baxter-Oliver,

Proud Principal

Wilson Elementary School

Wilson Community Center would like to give a special shout out to our amazing stakeholders! Thanks to them we are able to provide the workshops, classes and programs at Wilson.

Ballet AZ for their continued support to teaching our students the art of dance.

Nolan Rose our excellent ESL instructor for teaching our parents English.

APEX for their monetary contribution to help purchase items our students need.

University of Arizona HealthZone for providing our families with nutrition classes.

Swift Youth Foundation for providing our students with their after-school program.

First Things First for providing our Kith & Kin classes.

Our Wilson families for always being supportive.

THANK YOU.

Gaby Duran

Coordinator for Community Relations

Advanced learning Experiences is happy to announce that we will be conducting gifted testing in November and March. We will be testing all 2nd graders in January. Gifted classes are set to begin in the 2nd quarter. If you are interested in having your student tested for gifted, please contact the school office.

Have you noticed the following traits in your student? If you have, your student might be gifted!

• Unusual alertness, even in infancy
• Rapid learner; puts thoughts together quickly
• Excellent memory
• Unusually large vocabulary and complex sentence structure for age
• Advanced comprehension of word nuances, metaphors and abstract ideas
• Enjoys solving problems, especially with numbers and puzzles
• Often self-taught reading and writing skills as preschooler
• Deep, intense feelings and reactions
• Highly sensitive
• Thinking is abstract, complex, logical, and insightful
• Idealism and sense of justice at early age
• Concern with social and political issues and injustices
• Longer attention span and intense concentration
• Preoccupied with own thoughts—daydreamer
• Learn basic skills quickly and with little practice
• Asks probing questions
• Wide range of interests (or extreme focus in one area)
• Highly developed curiosity
• Interest in experimenting and doing things differently
• Puts idea or things together that are not typical
• Keen and/or unusual sense of humor
• Desire to organize people/things through games or complex schemas
• Vivid imaginations (and imaginary playmates when in preschool)

We had a great time at our first AVID Parent Night! As we are a district-wide AVID program, all Wilson students are AVID students. AVID Parent Nights are conducted quarterly. Students earn service points for parent attendance!! We look forward to seeing you at our next AVID Parent Night.

Cindy Campton

Director of Advanced Learning Experiences

1st Quarter Celebrations in the Human Resources Department include the launching of the new Employee Access portal. Employee Access is our new Employee Self Service application that provides a more user-friendly interface and increased security to protect our employees.

Employees Access replaced the former iVisions Employee Self Service portal. With Employee Access, employees will now have better access to view their contracts (that were accepted through the portal), pay and tax information, benefits information and much, much, more.

To access the portal, employees will need to log in to the Employee Access URL: https://wilsonesdt7az.tylerportico.com/tesp/employee-selfservice/

The employee’s username and password will be their email address (example: jdoe@wsd7.org) and network password for the district (i.e., password used to log into the computer). Thank you.

Alex Dumas

Director of Human Resources

Not every one can teach children… thank goodness those who choose not to teach have come on as support staff at Wilson School District!! From the Custodians to the Drivers, Maintenance to IT, and Food Service and Finance – We are blessed to have such an incredible team of people!!

Maintenance: Thank you!! Roy and Mark – you both are an incredible team!

As you may know, our air conditioning system for the Primary has been on “life support” recently… Hats off to our very own Mark Sikora! He is our A/C skilled technician, who also helps with general maintenance and even jumps in to support transportation. Along with Roy, our facilities manager, they have put in some crazy long hours, even weekends, working to keep the temporary and portable A/C units servicing our teachers and students. When you see him around campus, give the man a positive fist bump – he absolutely deserves it!! Thank you, Mark!!

Custodians & Landscapers: Thank you to each of you! You make us look good!

And a call out to Mary Leon, Lead custodian, what an amazing person! She has led the way for her team of custodians – working tirelessly in hot rooms and less hot rooms – making sure our students and teachers have a clean environment at the start of day! Even when short staffed, or working with new staff, she jumps right in to help to meet the goals each day! She is our unseen hero – when you come into a clean classroom, surprise her by leaving her a thank you note before you leave school that day! As you know, a simple thank you can make a person’s workload feel just a bit lighter!

Transportation: Thank you drivers! Daring to drive in Phoenix! Wow!

Special shout out to Kiko! Whether he is supporting the district’s sports program, or field trips or running the daily routes, he still makes time to jump in and help with warehouse, mail deliver, county runs, and provides that extra hand that Roy and Mark sometimes need while they are fixing this or that to support our teachers and students. When you see him around campus – give him a big smile and a thank you!

Remember, Food Services is anxiously awaiting the receipt of each family’s Free and Reduced Lunch application! Yvette and Candice can help show you how to find the application if you aren’t sure where to find it (psst… it’s on the Wilson School District website under Departments and Food Service.)

To the teams in IT, Food Service and Finance – my heartfelt thanks to each of you for all you do every day to ensure the District can provide the wonderful teaching staff with a place to teach, instructional aids, curriculum and software, food for sustenance, and all the layers of red tape associated with public accounting and procurement. Thank you!!!

Catherine King

Director of Business Service and Operations Department

Child Find, a component of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), enables states to locate, identify, and evaluate all children with disabilities, aged birth through 21, who need early intervention or special education services. Special education services are available for children of any age (birth through 21 years). Wilson School District is responsible for locating, identifying, evaluating, and serving all children with disabilities (ages 3-21) and referring children ages 0-3 to AzEIP for evaluation and appropriate services. AzEIP is the Arizona Early Intervention Program for infants and toddlers. Wilson provides free and appropriate public education that includes special education and related services to children at public expense, under public supervision and direction without charge to parents. For all school-age students who are new to the district, the classroom teacher will complete screening activities within 45 days of enrollment. If any concerns are noted, the child will be referred for help. Parents who have concerns regarding their child’s education may contact the Special Education Department at Wilson, (602) 683-2400, ext. 4205.

Are you currently experiencing temporary living arrangements due to eviction, job loss or a traumatic event? Wilson School District offers services to families through the McKinney-Vento Assistance Act. Services such as enrollment and immunization assistance, uniforms or school supplies, community referrals and in some cases, transportation can be available. Your family may qualify due to living with another family or friend due to financial hardship or living in a shelter, transitional housing, or motel. Please contact your school office or Mariana Melendrez at 602-683-2515, ext 6002 for more information about this program.

Excellence in education

Website: https://www.wsd.k12.az.us/
Location: 3025 East Fillmore Street, Phoenix, AZ, USA
Phone: (602) 681-2200
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WilsonSchoolDistrictNo7