The Roar
September 5, 2025
Thank you for a FANTASTIC start to the school year! We are so impressed with how quickly routines and procedures have been established across the building. Beginning next week, we will start visiting classrooms and providing feedback. We can’t wait to see all the amazing teaching and learning happening at Linkhorn Park!
~Jennifer and Josh
September 9- Fire Drill
September 15- SCA Assembly (9:10- Grade 3 and 9:40am for Grades 4/5)
September 19- Fire Drill
September 19- 5th grade attends the Air Show
September 23- NWEA Map Window Closes
September 24- PAC Meeting
September 25- STREAM Night
September 29- Staff Day
September 29- ILT meeting 11:00am
All students in grades K-5 will have access to Lexia Core 5 for the 25-26 school year. Teachers must complete professional learning for this program by September 30. Please read the link below for implementation recommendations.
Beginning Sept. 15th, staff will be given access to student web browsing histories via the Securly portal. This tool can prove useful for classroom management. This information is also available to parents through the Securly Parent Portal (which can be beneficial).
All teachers, ITS, and school counselors will get an email from Securly confirming your access. Please note, TSTs are no longer able to access this platform.
Please see the information below from a recent Principal's Packet Memo:
Employees are encouraged to actively volunteer in schools, foster community engagement, and support educational initiatives that benefit students. Regulation 4-44.4, School Volunteering/Student Related Activities, was established to allow employees the opportunity to volunteer in a VBCPS school or participate in a student-related activity. Employees may receive up to two workdays of paid leave per school year for school volunteer work or student-related activities at a VBCPS elementary, middle, or high school, with administrator approval. Employees must submit the leave request one week in advance; leave should not conflict with the peak work schedule or create a hardship for the school. In addition, leave should not create the need for overtime, the employee must be in good standing, and not on a Performance Improvement Plan (PIP). There is no payment for unused leave.
To support employees during unforeseen emergencies and disasters, Regulation 4-44.3, Administrative Leave for Emergencies/Disasters, provides guidelines for granting paid administrative leave under specified conditions. This paid leave may be available to an employee who has been ordered to evacuate their residence because of a natural or man-made disaster, has sustained severe or catastrophic damage to or loss of their primary residence, or for volunteer members of the Civil Air Patrol.
Wellness Leave, which had been approved by the School Board in previous years, will not be available for the 2025–2026 school year.
New Grade Book - is now the default view for teachers. The New Grade Book provides the
same tools used in Grade Book Main and learn more, see the following user instructions and videos.
- New Grade Book (ES) and Video for ES
Elementary Teachers no longer have access to duplicate assignments in the grade book.
Moving an assignment to a different marking period requires approval from DTAL.
Elementary report cards grade 3-5 have been updated to provide additional space for
comments (from 775 to 1900 characters).
ES English Language Arts teachers have three new categories, Reading, Writing and Communication. Teachers can view by the assignments and filter for the category to make score entry more efficient.
Please let me know if you would like to do this for Linkhorn Park! See below.
The Office for Opportunity and Achievement (OA) will host a series of events and activities throughout the school year. We often rely on principals to share information about our events. To maximize outreach and minimize the administrative workload, we are asking each school to identify one person who will serve as a liaison between your school and the OA office.
The OA liaison can expect to do the following:
• Assist with your school’s student registration for OA events, such as Beach Girls Rock and Art of Humanity.
• Serve as a primary point of contact for OA events and activities.
• Ensure OA events are promoted in your school and broader community.
• Make requests for supplies and materials to support OA related activities in your school
We would like all principals to submit the name(s) of your OA liaison by Sept. 15. Aside from an introductory email and brief virtual meeting, outreach to liaisons will be strictly limited to OA business. There are no standing meetings or additional asks.
NEW THIS YEAR!! Hospitality dues will go towards funding a staff snack and drink cart and prizes for monthly staff games, such as pin the tail on the Turkey or the Egg hunt in spring. Snack cart tickets will get distributed at least once a month. Suggestions for what items to put on the snack and drink cart can be left in Alex Holkon or Norah Jock's mailbox.
Jeans and Workout Wear Wednesdays Fundraiser- These funds go directly to the food and venue for our Mid-Year and End of the Year Parties! If you have any suggestions of places to hold these events or know someone willing to work with a large group, please let Alex or Norah know! All payments for this fundraiser are due by 12/19.
Hospitality Dues: $25 for the Year
Jeans and Workout Wear Wednesdays: $25 for the year
Both are $50 total
Funds will only be accepted via school cash this year. Use the QR code below to pay! If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to reach out to Norah Jock or Alex Holkon.
Staff Breakfast-
We will continue with staff breakfast on the 1st Friday of each month. Each team will provide breakfast once. Teams are located at the bottom of the Google Doc Dates are tentative, but please sign up for a month using this google doc and if you need to date changed, please let Alex or Norah know.
For all members of the PAC team, please mark your calendar for the following meeting dates:
Wednesday, September 24
Wednesday, October 29
Wednesday, December 3
Wednesday, January 14
Wednesday, February 25
Wednesday, March 25
Wednesday, April 29
May and June: TBD
Schools will be allocated $600 for purchasing consumable or related materials to support science investigations. All materials purchased should support the scientific and engineering practices (SEPs) and the aligned content of the science standards. Materials listed on the grade level inventories will not be approved for additional purchase. Additionally, in accordance with recent guidance related to sustainable practices, products containing expanded polystyrene (styrofoam) will not be approved for purchase.
Approved vendors can be found on the How to Buy page through Procurement Services. All vendors require a formal quote.
If you need science materials please talk with your Grade Level Chairs. GLCs will submit a sheet to Freeman for approval.
The Annual Mandatory Employee Training (AMET) for the 2025-2026 school year is now open. This training is required for all Virginia Beach City Public Schools (VBCPS) employees and is based on federal and state training compliance requirements.
This training is an effective time management tool, as employees are able to build skills and professional knowledge whenever it's most convenient for them. Some of the training courses have changed again this year and have been customized to meet the needs of particular departments and schools. Some non-certification courses have a TEST-OUT (TO) feature that allows employees to take pretest assessments. If they pass the pretest (100%), they get completion for the entire course. Note: New employees that have not taken the AMET previously, do not have access to this TEST-OUT feature.
The training window will begin on July 28, 2025, and conclude on November 5, 2025.
Shout out to Kathy! Your patience this year is through the roof! I appreciate every little thing you do! Jessica Dennis
Shout out to Mr. Wilks for your help this week, getting things moving quickly! Jessica Dennis
Shout out to Lynda who has processed far more than 100 kindergarten registrations so far this school year, than she has done in her 13 years with the school system. And they just keep on coming! Way to go Lynda! You’ve got this!
Shout out to my perm subs, Nasharya and Bridget, who have done an AMAZING job since school began. We are so glad to have you both here. Stephanie
Shoutout to my 5th grade team! They never bat an eye with my millions of questions, and I love our team meetings after school to debrief the next day. I couldn't do it without you lovely ladies! <3 Alex Holkon
Thank you to everyone who supported Kindergarten this week!! We really appreciate your assistance as we get our littlest ones used to coming to school! :) Laura Steiger
Shout out to Karen Knight!! Looking forward to another year with you! I'm so happy I get to work with one of the BEST!! Laura Steiger
Thank you to all that have helped our new little kindergarten friends transition and learn the new routines.
September 11- Marguerite Alley
September 13- Tammy White
September 14- Carrie Sandt
September 29- Beth Estill
September 30- Nasharya Lake
