Peirce School Family Newsletter

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April 1, 2017

Greetings Peirce Families,

This past week, I named Dr. Talyia Riemer as our new Assistant Principal. Dr. Riemer came to Peirce in the fall in the role of MYP IB coordinator and hit the ground running. She will continue to work as our MYP coordinator and oversee the operations in our middle school, ensuring a high quality Peirce-Senn partnership and MYP Program. Dr. Riemer will begin taking on additional responsibilities to support the entire Peirce community. Make sure to introduce yourself to Dr. Riemer when you see her.

Last month I shared the 20 for 20 campaign, supported by CPS, encouraging families to contact state legislators and local officials to stress the importance of adequate funding of public education. Please visit this website to learn more about how you can be involved in the 20 for 20 campaign. Without the support from Springfield, Chicago Public Schools run the risk of closing early.

Attendance continues to be a challenge, with Mondays and Fridays being common days taken off by students. Please make sure that students are in bed early on Sundays and are at school Monday morning. Continue to help us with our declining attendance issue.

Happy Spring!

Lori Zaimi

March Highlights:

• A HUGE thank you to Peirce Parent, Kathy Herwig for all of her work in getting our new website up and running. Kathy spent countless amounts of volunteer hours to get us to a place where we will save thousands of dollars each year while having a more functional site!

• Student Council & Life Service Action groups attended the annual “We Day” celebration of service at the Allstate Arena.

• 6th grade students, teachers and parents survived the one-night overnight field trip to the Indiana Dunes and reported two days of fun while working as a team and learning about survival and nature.

• Our 3rd grade team finalized their professional development cycle by studying the teaching and learning of fractions through “Lesson Study” a collaborative model where teachers plan together, observe teaching and discuss student learning.

• Peirce Parent Rebecca Hendrickson hosted our first Math Parent Workshop - thank you to everyone who attended, we had a wonderful turnout! Our next Math Parent Workshop will be on Friday, April 28th at 8:15am.

• Students in K-5th grades participated in a performance by the South Shore Opera Quartet.

• We concluded our final round of IB Behind the Scenes tours for the year - we look forward to starting these back up in the fall!

• Elliott Topp (6th grade student) finished in 13th place out of 50 students in the citywide Spelling Bee - congratulations Elliott!

• Thank you to Peirce Parent Sara McGuire for organizing the Babes with Blades fundraiser, to support our 7th & 8th grade students Washington D.C. trip!

• Thank you to Peirce Parents Laura Meyer & Susan Boyle along with Friends of Peirce for organizing our Mom’s Night Out - money raised is going towards the purchase of new desks! Be on the lookout for upcoming parent gatherings.

• Peirce students and staff celebrated the International Day of Happiness by writing positive messages and participating in a school-wide flash mob at the end of the day.

• Office Friendly visited with our PK & K students!

• STEAM Night was a great opportunity for families to engage in STEAM activities. Thank you to the Peirce teachers, staff and parents who helped make this event happen!

• Peirce students showcased their talents in our end of the year Spring Show - thank you to Ms. Thompson & Ms. Moritz for making this event happen.

• We had a wonderful coffee with the principal - I appreciate all of the feedback and questions raised by parents.

• Our Bilingual Advisory Council participated in a parent workshop around IB education and supporting English Language Learners.

• 8th grade students are finalizing their HS Acceptances and we have students going everywhere! We are very excited to have over half of our graduating class continuing into an IB high school program, with the vast majority going to Senn IB!

End of year MAP Testing will take place between May 15th and June 16th. Students in 3rd, 6th and 8th grades will need to have the test completed by June 1st as their test data is one of the criteria used to determine promotion. A schedule of test dates will be shared as we get closer to testing. Please remember that the data that comes from this test is also used in our final school rating - Peirce is currently a level 1+ due to a number of factors, but growth in MAP data last year being one of them.

Also, CPS announced on Friday, March 31st that the MAP test will continue to be used during the 2017-2018 school year for our school rating along with high school applications.

Wednesday, April 19, 2017 is “Conference Day” for all Chicago Public Elementary Schools. There is no school for students on this day. A separate handout will come home in backpacks where parents can request a prefered timeframe for their conferences.

Parent-Teacher-Student meetings will be held in two conference sessions. The first session will last from 11:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. and the second session is from 4:00 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. Please do not come to school from 3:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m. Teachers will not be available during that time.

Parents of students in Kindergarten through 6th Grades

Students in K-6th Grades will participate in student-led conferences. We believe that having students lead their conference encourages them to take ownership of their learning, students are highly encouraged to attend the conference with their parents/guardians. Please come prepared to spend a minimum of 45 minutes in your child’s classroom. If parents have confidential questions for the teacher, please ask to set up an additional meeting outside of the student-led conference time.

Parents of students in 7th & 8th Grades

This year you will pick up your child’s report card outside on the third floor from a staff member.

After reviewing the report card, if you wish to speak with an individual teacher about your child’s academic progress, please report to the classroom. An appointment sign-in sheet will be posted on the door, so that you may sign up for a five minute conference. If your child receives a grade of D or F on their report card, the teacher will have the students report card in the classroom.

A few reminders to help with traffic flow and student safety around Peirce:

• The morning entry period on Gregory runs from 7:55 - 8:05am, please use Gregory as your primary place to drop off students and avoid using Bryn Mawr until after 8:05am.
• Do not park in cross walks - this poses a very serious safety concern.
• Do not let students off in the middle of the street and have them cross on their own.
• There is a lot of parking available on Catalpa, Clark and the Jewel Parking lot for morning drop off - please use these spaces and walk students over to the school.

The Student Council is hosting a spirit week from April 3rd-6th, with funds raised going to support the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. Note the following:

Monday - Pajama Penny Day

Tuesday - Neon Nickel Day

Wednesday - Dazzling Dimes Day

Thursday - Crazy Quarters Day

Middle School Students will participate in Career Day sessions on Friday, April 21st. Career Day is an important day for our middle school students to learn about careers that they may be interested in pursuing in the future. Support Peirce’s Career Day by volunteering to lead a session or two or three… Visit here for more information.

Peirce T-Shirts are for sale for $10 and available in all sizes - the new design has our Peirce Panther on the front and the IB Learner Profile on the back in English and Spanish. T-Shirts can be purchased from the main office.

Friends of Peirce has a few events coming up to support Peirce School Programs such as arts integration, sports and afterschool programs.

• Be sure to visit Hopleaf (5148 N Clark) and purchase a drink from the Kegs for Kids menu - 100% of the cost of each drink goes to support Peirce School.

• Save the Date - April 30th will be our Peirce Hopleaf Day, 100% of all sales will go to Peirce! Last year over $30,000 was raised in one day!

All students in Kindergarten-8th grade will begin work with a new online math program - ST Math. Over the next month your children will come home talking about Ji Ji the penguin and will want to access the program at home. Once students have been assigned their login information, they can access the online site here, also found on the homepage of the Peirce website. Teachers will share parent-resource information as well once the program is up and running. If you have any questions about the program you can talk with your child’s classroom teacher or Ms. Zaimi.

Box tops are collected on a regular basis and bring in additional dollars to the school - please save box tops throughout the year and turn in during the box tops collection time periods.

Be sure to “like” us on Facebook - Helen C Peirce School of International Studies is Peirce’s official Facebook Site. In addition, the “Peirce School PSO” has a site along with a closed group “Parents of Peirce” there is a lot of information shared on all 3 sites and are great opportunities to share and receive information along with networking with other parents.

Follow us on Instagram at peircecps.

Email: lzaimi@cps.edu
Website: peirce.cps.edu
Location: 1423 W Bryn Mawr Chicago, IL
Phone: 773-534-2440
Facebook: facebook.com/peircecps