This Week at Brown School
9/21 Monday
Virtual Back to School Night (see information below)
9/22 Tuesday
NWEA Fall testing begins (K-5th grade)
9/23 Wednesday
Late start day! (9:45 student arrival)
PTO Playground Painting Party @ 4:00 (see information below)
Coming Up...
9/30 Late Start Day
Virtual Back to School Night
For the safety of our students, staff, and families Back to School Night will be a virtual experience this year. This is not a live event - you are welcome to view the videos when it is convenient for your family.
Please click here to access the Brown School Virtual Back to School Night 2020.
NWEA Assessments
Our fall NWEA testing will begin this week for all kindergartners through fifth graders. Students will take two computer-based assessments: reading and math. We use the data collected to drive our instructional decisions based on your child's unique learning path. These assessment results will provide your learner and his/her teacher with a learning target (goal) for the spring. The testing window will be open for two weeks to ensure all students have ample time to complete both assessments. You will receive a report with your child's first trimester report card.
SJPS Digital Handbook
Thank you for taking time with your child to review our digital handbook (linked below). We greatly appreciate your support!
SJPS Student/Parent Digital Handbook
Thank you for helping your child connect
virtually with his/her teacher and class this past Friday!
Attention Young Fives and Kindergarten Families:
Please help our lunch staff and your child have the most successful and safe lunch experience by carefully packaging items for ease of opening. We would greatly appreciate it if you would consider starting the tearing of packages and selecting drinks that are simple for your child to open. You might even consider practicing at home. Building this independence is a win-win for everyone. Thank you for your help!
Per Friday's email, please plan to pick your Y5 and/or K student up at 3:40 p.m. to help with safety and traffic patterns. If you also pick up older siblings, you might consider having your youngest child wait in a designated spot outside of his/her classroom to meet the older child (at this time 1st-5th graders will not be released early with Y5/K students). They will then walk to the office pick up location together. Instead of parking to pick up your children on Garden Lane, you'd be able to circle around the Brown School office lot and pick them up together at 3:50pm.
Not to worry, your child's teacher will help with this as it is a common practice at Brown. Please email the teacher if this is your plan moving forward.
Fourth and Fifth Grade Pick-Up Line
When picking up your child along Yukon Drive (4th/5th grade pick up location), please pull all the way up to the media center lot to allow for more cars to stage along the curb. Cars should not line up across the road. This presents a safety concern for our students. If you are running behind (4:00), your child will walk to the office entrance off of Brown School Road. You will meet him/her there. Thank you for your patience and attention to these reminders.
Classroom Blogs
Our Brown School classroom teachers will each have their own blog this year. Simply click on your child's class below to view weekly updates from his/her teacher.
ECDD
Mrs. Rank and Mrs. LeClear's Class
Young Fives
Kindergarten
First Grade
Second Grade
Third Grade
Fourth Grade
Fifth Grade
PTO Corner
We were happy to see our families at our first virtual PTO meeting this past week. There have been a lot of exciting things going on behind the scenes the past few weeks. Something I’m personally excited about is the arrival of our playground stencils. We can’t wait to create new recess activities for our students.
We’d like to invite you to come out on Wednesday and help us stencil the playground. See Mrs. Bawk’s section for more information.
We appreciate the support from our families so much!
-Sheri Baker
-PTO President
A sneak peek of our stencils:
Thank You
Thank you April Soyk for cleaning, stocking, and decorating the teachers lounge to start out the school year!
Thank you Jessa Calderwood and Jenna Hawkins for the Y5-2nd grade mask straps.
Thank you Sheri Baker for starting our staff out with a back-to-school gifts.
Reminders
Please download the Box Tops for Education app by visiting https://www.boxtops4education.com/.
Box Tops receipts for delivery services, such as Shipt, now work with the digital Box Top collection. For more information, visit https://boxtopsforeducation.knowledgeowl.com/help/electronic-receipts
Upcoming Volunteer Needs
Volunteering will look very different this year, but please let us know events you are interested in by filling out the form at http://bit.ly/VolunteerAtBrown. You will be contacted by the committee with specific needs at the appropriate time. Please note that some positions may not be utilized this year.
We have a number of committees that need chair or co-chair positions filled. If you are interested in any of these, please fill out the volunteer form or contact Kristen Bawks or any PTO board member. We will provide as much assistance or information as possible to get new committee chairs started:
5th Grade Events - work with Mr. Lignell and Mrs. Lokey to plan events for the 5th graders.
Credit Union - work with Honor Credit Union to schedule and assist with the student credit union. If we don’t implement the CU this year, the ground work could be established for next year.
Mileage Club Chair(s) - similar to our old walkathon format. This will be a larger scale event without the fundraising component. Co-chair positions are welcome, and we have a few experienced members to help get you started. This event will not happen this fall and spring is to be determined, but we would still like to form the committee.
Staff Luncheon Chair - facilitate staff luncheons via donated items 3-4 times a year.
Ways and Means Chair - we are looking for someone interested in organizing a few giveback or other small scale fundraisers each year.
Save the date for these upcoming virtual PTO meetings:
October 20 @12pm
November 17 @7pm
January 19 @12pm
February 16 @7pm
March 16 @12pm
April 20 @7pm
May 18 @12pm
In addition to adding money to your child's food service account, families can now pre-order school lunches from home! Here is the link to access your child(ren)'s account: https://www.
Click on the video linked here to learn how to order your child's lunch from home! Thank you for your help to streamline this process.
St. Joseph Public Schools Meals Program Update
BIG NEWS! We recently learned that the USDA extended many waivers regarding the National School Lunch Program. One temporary waiver that was extended was that ALL students can receive FREE breakfast/lunch and St. Joseph Public Schools is going to participate in this waiver! This means that all students can get 1 breakfast and 1 lunch per day at no charge! Please understand that this is a temporary program and we are not sure of the end date, so please continue to fill out Free/Reduced lunch applications if needed when the program is over. We are still asking parents/students to pre-order their meals through the www.sendmoneytoschool.com website. Only lunch meals can be pre-ordered and this will help our food service staff plan for your student. Any student that ate breakfast or lunch since 9/8/2020 has not and will not be charged for those meals. If you have any questions please contact me, Demrhy Youngquist at dyoungquist@sjschools.org.
It is the policy of the St. Joseph Public School District that no person shall, on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin or ancestry, sex, disability, height, weight, or marital status be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to, discrimination during any program, activity, service or in employment.
