February 22nd, 2013

Good Afternoon Parents/Guardians:

Thanks to all of our parents who took the time to do our accountability parent survey. Results are in and we are sorting through them. We had a discussion regarding the survey at our accountability meeting last night and our administrative team will take a more in depth look at the results in the next few weeks. When we finish sorting through the information I will post the results of the survey under the accountability tab on our website.

Last night I also shared with our accountability committee that next year we will again be facing a cut in our staffing. We will be losing a total of 1.6 FTE which equals little more than one and a half teachers. We will be able to absorb the 1.6 through some natural attrition in the building and will not have to cut any individual teachers.

We are currently spending a lot of time to develop a master schedule for next fall. The schedule will be very similar to what we are currently operating under. Our main issue is to balance the class sections the best we can and keep class size reasonable.

Our T-CAP testing schedule has been posted on our website. If you go to the front page of the website and click on the T-CAP button you will be able to access the schedule. The testing dates will be March 11th through the 18th. We have condensed the schedule by a day this year in order to shorten the number of days we give the test.

Last week I sent some information regarding the new call box, buzz in systems that are being installed by the district. Our call box will be functional on Monday, March 4th. I previously sent out instructions on how to use the box and I will resend those instructions next Friday.

If you have any questions or concerns please feel free to contact me at any time. Have an enjoyable weekend.

Respectfully,
James O’Tremba
Principal, Newton Middle School