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August Welcome Back!
8/19/2021August 18, 2021
Dear Beach Parents and Families,
Welcome to the 2021-22 school year. I hope this letter finds you and your loved ones safe and in good health. I’m honored to be entering my 5th year as your principal and want to express my commitment in service to every one of our Beach children and to our community. In the midst of so much difficulty and complexity both locally and globally, I’m grateful to be a part of our community, grateful for our devoted and talented staff and grateful for you and your children. I believe that together, we can keep our children safe and train them up to a better future. This will require that we intentionally pull together across our community, support each other, and teach our children to see and name injustice and take action toward a more just society.
Here are some important dates and details for you:
- Wednesday, September 1st is the first day of school for 2nd-5th graders.
- Arrival and dismissal will be similar to last year, with drop off and pick up happening either at the top of the stairs on the field side, at the gate on Concord, or at the main entrances along Humboldt. Care providers will not enter the playground or main building during arrival and dismissal. We’ll send further details before Sept. 1.
- Thursday September 2nd is the first full day for 1st graders.
- The first full day for our new Beach Kindergartners is Wednesday September 8!
- Here is info about our Kindergarten and 1st grade “Ramp Up” that went to K/1 families earlier. K/1 families, our office team is in process scheduling the 1:1 conversations with teachers, and the “warm up” days for kindergartners.
- Our Beach school day for students is from 8:45-3. Please aim for your children to arrive at school by 8:40. The bell that rings at 8:45 is the signal that all students should be in their classrooms.
- Breakfast is provided for all Beach students; this year students will have the option to pick up food as they enter either the annex or main building and take it to their classroom. Arriving right at 8:37 is ideal for eating breakfast at school in order for children to get to class, greet their teacher and classmates, hang up backpacks, eat and clean up before school begins. Teachers do accommodate needs but the earlier children can start their arrival routine, the better their day goes. (Thank you for all the hard work and beyond that goes into getting children to school on time.)
We launch into the year ahead with a phenomenal Beach Staff! Here is our 2021-2022 Classroom Teacher Staff (English Instruction teacher then Dual Language Immersion teachers) --
Kindergarten: Seann Combs, Deisy Guzman, Sujata (Suta) Hara
1st Grade: Wintry Whitt, Stachys Arroyo, Megan Nary
2nd Grade: Julianne Stevens, AnnMarie Fitzhenry-Juarez, Gabriel Dominguez Lopez
3rd Grade: Cameron Shaw, Ani Ponz, Rodrigo Aguirre
4th Grade: Mika Hilbers, Kimmy Kenyon, Molly Sheean
5th Grade: Ali Piff, Oskar Almazan-Lopez, Stephanie Macdonald
I’m proud to announce several excellent staff members joining our Beach team this year! Each cares deeply about building positive relationships, utilizing best practices in teaching and learning, and creating engagement, joy and strong learning outcomes for every Beach child. Please click for introductory messages from three of our new to Beach staff. We also welcome student interns Tyler Ngueyn (with Mr. Shaw), Emily Richardson (with Mr. Combs), and Lucie Whatron-Moeur (with Julianne Stevens) to our team!
As you saw above, and adding one more below, a few staff are making internal changes…
Ms. Suta will teach Kindergartners in our Dual Language Immersion program.
Ms. Fitzhenry-Juarez is “looping” with her class from last year thus will teach 2nd graders in DLI.
Ms. Hazard is our specialist serving our Emerging Bilingual students (“ESL Teacher”)
Additional staff and partner changes...
Ms. I (Ilza Pierre) is taking a leave and we will miss her dearly. Mr. DuBoise is hiring our new REAP partner. (REAP Inc. is our multicultural non-profit community partner that focuses on student leadership.)
Our evening custodian Dave Bierman was transferred to another school. Our new evening custodian is Sean Murphy, and we also welcomed Xander Ward to our custodial team last spring.
Monica Montiel will be with us for SUN programming. We welcome new .2 PE teacher, Codi Sanchez.
As the start of school nears, our staff will be reaching out to connect with you, to listen to your hopes for your child, and to learn from all you know and want us to understand about your child's strengths and learning.
How can I help during the start to the school year?
- Engagement in whole community care, healing and connection. All our families have different strengths and capacities to exchange and share. Please complete this "Beach Parent Return to School 2021-2022 Survey". You will find the question: Are there specific ways you could volunteer to support our Beach community this school year? For example, interest in sharing your family culture in some way, a skill you could offer, a resource, time, opportunities you could create, services, etc.) We began this collection of strengths last fall, and it was inspiring and helpful to be able to reference and reach out, even though we are still working on finding the best ways to utilize the diversity, passion and strengths within our community, to bring families together and families and schools together. We encourage families from all immigration backgrounds to share ways they can exchange services and connection with other Beach families on the survey. None of your contact information will be shared with anyone outside of our Beach community.
- Please be sure to go online and complete the PPS yearly verification form. In the interests of inclusion and connection for all our students, our Beach Community Union President, Kelly Orehovec, created a Beach School Directory last year, which will be updated this year and shared with all families. You may "opt out" from sharing directory information on your child's registration form (new parents) and verification form (existing parents). We are double-checking your preferences about sharing your contact information on our survey, and you can find information here: Directory information
- Please apply for Free & Reduced meals even if you won’t be accessing school meals or don’t think you’ll qualify. The percentage of students who qualify for Free & Reduced lunch has a direct impact on the number of teachers with which schools are staffed. The application process and whether you qualify are strictly confidential.
Who will my child’s teacher be?
We will finalize class lists during the days teachers are working before school for students begins. The classroom placement process has many steps that can’t be considered complete until as close to the 1st day of school as possible, in order to balance classes including students who are just being registered in those final days. Here are parts of the process--
- Removing students who have moved, adding students who are new to Beach
- Adding/Removing students who are transferring into or from other PPS schools
- Balancing for academic achievement, race, access, age, ESL, Special Education, learning styles
As soon as class lists are ready, by Monday August 30 at the latest, the classroom teacher’s name will be available on Parent Vue and in your child’s registration packet (details follow). A reminder that parent requests for specific teachers are not accepted.
“Back to School Beach Connect” Monday, August 30!
- Masks required and efforts to maintain 3 feet social distancing at all times is requested.
- Any time between 2 - 5 pm, children and parents are invited to come to the playground to pick up their registration packets and simultaneously, drop off school supplies
- If purchasing school supplies presents a financial challenge for your family at this time, please don’t worry. We will ensure every child has the needed materials.
- One table per grade level will be spread out around the main blacktop area. You’ll find the sign matching your child’s grade, drop off supplies if you have them, and pick up your child’s registration packet. Please bring supplies in paper bags labeled with your child’s name. If you can’t attend, supplies can be brought the first day of school.
- New families to Beach, we will offer quick guided tours to classroom locations.
- Staff will be working on setting up for school during these hours. It’s likely you’ll see at least a few staff outside, but generally, most staff won’t be available or able to visit during this time. We hope this option to drop supplies off before the first day of school will be easier for students, families and staff alike.
- We need volunteers! Please call the office if you can help pass out packets at a table any time between 2 and 5, or carry bags of supplies to classrooms between 4-5.
What are the safety measures?
This is the RSSL (Ready School Safe Learners) guidance: Support physical distancing in all daily activities and instruction, maintaining at least 3 feet between students to the extent possible. Maintaining physical distancing should not preclude return to full-time, in-person instruction for all students.
This PPSBacktoSchool2021 webpage is the place to find updated communications from district officials including answers to common questions about this year’s health and safety measures. PPS Communications is sending regular emails to families as additional information is added to this webpage.
Lunchtime will be one of our most challenging times of the day to maintain health and safety measures. We have planned a separate time for each grade level supervised by classroom teachers so teachers can make decisions that work best for their students. Our goal is that classes eat in separate spaces. We will utilize the cafeteria and non-cafeteria spaces including outside. We will be finalizing our plan once teachers return, but these safety measures will be in place:
- 3 feet of distance to every extent possible (complies with Ready Schools Safe Learners guidance); increase to 6 feet wherever possible.
- Limit the time students are unmasked and eating to less than 15 minutes (while also providing time for our slower eaters in creative ways) to limit the number of potential close contacts
- Students will wear masks at all times unless actively eating or drinking and may not share or trade food.
- If your child has food allergies that are not already known by our Student Health Assistant (SHA) Ms. Jamille Manning, please email her: jmanning@mesd.k12.or.us and cc Ms. Romero: eromero@pps.net. We will plan for lunch routines for these classes according to individual needs.
How does communication between home and school work?
- If you aren’t receiving PPS messages, text “yes” to 68453.
- To receive Beach Communications, text @ beacheleme to 81010, visit remind.com, or download the Remind app.
Childcare and Preschool
YMCA is Beach’s contracted child care organization. YMCA is working hard to fully staff their program by the first day of school. Our Beach waiting list is currently at 28 families.
- 211info is the agency that provides child care referrals to families along with many other social services such as rental assistance and parenting support. 211info can also provide information about state subsidies to reduce the cost of child care for working parents and guardians.
- If you have questions or concerns about child care, Sierra Warren is our PPS child care coordinator and monitors email at childcareservices@pps.net daily.
- As childcare staff are hired, YMCA will be able to open up more slots for our Beach families. If you know of anyone who would like to provide care to our Beach children before and after school, tell them to apply with the YMCA!
Multnomah Early Childhood Program (MECP) classes are available 4 days a week, morning or afternoon, at Beach. MECP is a David Douglas School District program that provides imaginative and lively classes.
We are seeking volunteers to keep time during our Kindergarten and 1st grade 1:1 Connections on September 1st and 2nd. You’d be outside (masks required) for an hour or so. Please call the office for details if you’d like to help.
Please don’t hesitate to reach out to me by email or calling the office. (If you put the words “message from Beach parent” in your subject line when emailing me, it helps me search for and find parents and caregivers within my email.) Here’s to a great 2021-2022 school year!
Warmly,
Lisa Hawking, Principal