K-8 Registration and Picture Days are Coming!!

It's hard to believe, but registration days are just around the corner! The first day will be Thursday, August 12^th. The second day will be Tuesday, August 17^th. In an effort to make the process more efficient, we ask that families whose last names begin with letters A through K come on August 12^th and families with last names that begin with L through Z come to the registration session on August 17^th. We invite you to come any time between 2:30 PM and 6:30 PM.

At the registration, we will have the following activities:

• Student photos will be taken for the 2010 - 2011 school year
• Registration forms will be collected
• Registration fees will be collected ($10.00 for elementary, $25.00 for Middle School)
• Middle School students will receive their class schedules after all fees have been paid
• Elementary class lists will be posted
• Riteway Bus Company will be available for bus route information and to answer bus questions
• The Poynette Parent Club will have a representative available to answer questions

We are in the process of mailing registration forms along with picture forms and you should see those in the mail this week!

Please call the Elementary Building (635-4347 ext. 6) if you have any questions!

See you at Registration!

K-8 Poynette Parents Club Meeting

We will have another Joint Parent Club meeting on Monday, May 10. The meeting will be at 6:30 in the Poynette Elementary Building IMC. Please note that childcare will once again be available.

The agenda will include the following:

1) Adopting bylaws

2) Nominations and election of officers

3) Presentation about activities Done by each group and discussion about what should be kept for next year

4) Planning for next year

5) Open Forum

We hope you can attend!

Notes From Arlington and Dekorra Joint Meeting

On Tuesday, April 22 Mr. Sutton hosted a meeting with parents who have children that currently attend Arlington and Dekorra who will be attending school in Poynette next year. Following are notes from the meeting:


Transportation

• The school district has been piloting adding bus stops in Arlington in anticipation of more riders next year. The district went from on stop at Arlington School to a total of four stops at various places in the village. This seems to be working well, and we will work with the bus company to create stops that make sense as we move along this spring and into the summer.


• Students in Grades 1-5 will be transported from their pick-up site to the Poynette school (what will be the "1-8" building next year). The kindergarten students will be transported into Poynette and then will get on two shuttle buses that will take them out to Arlington. There will be supervisors in the area outside of school on Cleveland Street side of the building to help the kinders get on the right bus (At the beginning of the year, there will be a number of extra staff members outside as well including Mr. Hausser and Mr. Sutton)


• Parents who have children who will be transported by bus will get letters in late July or Early August giving details about time and location of pick-ups. Representatives from the bus company will also be available at the August Registration days (August 12 and August 17) to answer questions.

Classrooms

• There will be four teachers at each grade level with the exception of 3rd grade and 4th grade. Each of those classes will have three sections due to smaller overall class sizes (Each of those classes is around 75 students and the other classes are over 80).
• The average class size is around 20 students although the 3rd and fourth grade will be slightly larger. Due to these larger numbers, it is likely that there will be assistants in the rooms at various times during the day.

Curriculum

• The Curriculum for all grade levels will be the same. In fact, we are hoping that the ability to work in the same building will create more opportunities for our teachers to collaborate together making our students' learning experience even better!

Transition Days

• Each of the grade levels, Kindergarten through third grade, will come into the Poynette building in May to get to know the students from the other buildings, meet the teachers at the grade level they will be at for the 2010 - 2011 school year, and eat lunch with their classmates.
• It was suggested that we set up some days in the summer when families could bring kids in to tour the school. We will look at days and see if this is possible over the next few weeks. We will put information out with the report cards at the end of the school year to let you know when these days are scheduled.

Please note that there is a Poynette Joint Parent Club will be held on May 10 at 6:30 PM... Child care will be provided.

As always, if you have questions you can call Mr. Sutton 635-4347 x6, or leave a comment with this post.

Parent Club Meeting

Mr. Sutton will be hosting a meeting with our three parent clubs (Arlington, Dekorra, and Poynette) on Monday, March 8th at 7:oo PM in the Poynette K-8 building IMC. The main topic of discussion will be transitioning from three groups to one group next year. We will also discuss some of the activities the Parents Club may consider doing next week.

More information will go out to our families later this month. We encourage anyone interested in being involved in this group to attend.

Poynette School District Reconfigures

At the December 21st School board meeting, action was taken to reconfigure our elementary schools. For the 2010 - 2011 school year, the Poynette Elementary and Middle School building will be used to house all first through eight graders in the school district. Following are the numbers of sections at each grade level:

• First Grade - 4 sections
• Second Grade- 4 sections
• Third Grade- 3 sections
• Fourth Grade- 3 sections
• Fifth Grade- 4 sections

The Arlington School building will be used to house the four sections of kindergarten. In addition, the Arlington building will house our Early Childhood program. The Four Year Old Preschool program will continue to operate out of the three Childcare Centers in our community (St. Peter's, Kids First, and Main Street Youngsters).

This configuration will allow all of our students at a particular grade level to be under one roof. It will give us opportunity to place students in classrooms with the right mix of kids to help maximize learning for our students.

We are currently working on the details of the changes and the logistics of all the moving that will need to take place. We have also begun preliminary discussions about activities we will do for students and families later this spring. We are tentatively looking at doing activities in mid-April, and will give more specific information when it becomes available.

We hope you will use this blog space as a place to ask questions and post concerns. We will do our best to answer these questions for you.