Outplacement News for Families

Welcome to Outplacement News for Families, the latest resource for parents, guardians, and caregivers for students enrolled at LEARN's Outplacement programs. We are happy you are here, choosing a LEARN school education for your child.

This newsletter will be delivered electronically on the 1st Tuesday of the month and will include:

• Kudos Corner
• Resource Roundup
• Community Happenings
• & more!

September is here! Staff have been busy at work getting ready for the start of our 2024-25 school year. This year, we open the doors at OALA for the sixth year and the doors to LEARN Transition Academy for the first time at our new location! It is an exciting time in our programs, already students and staff have embraced new routines, community members, and opportunities for learning.

As we get organized for a fresh start, please remember to review important paperwork shared by our office team - this allows us all to best serve you and your child. Our social emotional learning theme for the month of September is Building Connections and Teamwork. We hope you will take advantage of our upcoming events to connect with our school community!

Important Reminders:

• Please complete Lunch Forms for your learner
• Be sure to check Talking Points regularly for updates
• 9/13 and 9/27 are early dismissal days for students
  

Kudos to Ms. Nichole & Ms. Hayley! Their classroom wasted no time getting to work on the first day of school with reading, puzzles, and movement breaks. We love to see our students experiencing joy while learning 😆

Kudos to Jean-Anne Jordan, our Assistant Director of Special Services! Jean began working with LEARN Student Support Services in August of 2023 and has been a vital part of the team ever since. To get to know a little more about Jean we ask her a few questions, here's what she had to say:

• How would you describe our LEARN community?
• Compassionate and wise.
• What is your favorite thing about working at LEARN?
• Obviously, the people! After working in another district for many years, I wondered if I would gel with the team here. Everyone across our sites has been a team player, talented, and supportive of each other.
• Outside of work, what might we find you doing?
• Walking my dogs at Hammonasset, riding a bike with a friend, or enjoying a great show. We recently saw Little Shop of Horrors in Ogunquit, ME!
• What is your favorite local coffee spot?
• Ashlawn Farms Coffee in Old Saybrook! The coffee is perfect and their house made snacks and desserts are delicious.
• Can you share a fun fact about yourself?
• I am a figure skating fanatic - go ahead, ask me some figure skating trivia!

One of the most important functions we have as humans is communication! There are many ways we communicate with one another, with the primary being speech and language. You can engage with your learner in every day ways to help strengthen their speech and language skills.

A Simple Everyday Activity:

• Need to make a trip to the grocery store? Talk with them about what's on the grocery list! Tell them how many things you need and what you will use those items to make. Talk about the sizes of items, their shapes, and their weights.
• You can add additional steps -
• Talk about where items are in the store. Are they on the top shelf? At the end of the aisle do you need to go left or right?
• Try describing an item on the list and have your learner guess what it is before going to find it. For example, "we need a fruit that is yellow, long and curved, and you have to peel it before we can eat it. What fruit might that be?"

For more activities ideas visit American Speech-Language-Hearing Association's website!

Students and their families are invited to join us for Back to School Night on Wednesday, September 25th from 5 PM - 6 PM at their respective schools. This is an opportunity for students to engage with classmates, families to meet and interact with staff, and see where your students are attending school each day!

• Ocean Avenue LEARNing Academy is located at 660 Ocean Ave. in New London.
• LEARN Transition Academy is located at 58 Pennsylvania Ave. in Niantic.

🚩 We ask that you please RSVP by September, 18th using this brief form - RSVP here!

The Miracle League of Southeastern Connecticut opened registration for 2024 Fall Sports! Fall programs include soccer, baseball, and adaptive dance.

For more information visit The Miracle League of Southeastern CT website ⏩ https://miracleleaguesect.org/fall/

The United Way Mobile Food Pantry is at Ocean Avenue LEARNing Academy every 4th Wednesday of the month! This pantry is walk-up only and we strongly encourage folks to bring bags or a cart if able.

The September food pantry is on Wednesday, September 25th from 4:30 PM - 5:30 PM.

The United Way also hosts their Mobile Food Pantry at other locations throughout the month. Looking for more information? Visit their website here ⏩ https://www.uwsect.org/calendar

Southern Connecticut State University proudly presents Empowering Connections: Bridging Human Communication through Emerging Technologies! This one day expo is open to the community for a fee of $25 (includes lunch).

For more information & to register, view the flyer here 📰

LEARN is proud to let all parents and caregivers know that we offer GoGuardian Parent, a mobile app designed to provide parents/guardians insight and control over your child's online activity when on school-managed devices and accounts.

GoGuardian Parent provides you with an additional set of internet controls that you can set for out-of-school hours at home. GoGuardian Parent was created to help provide students additional educational support and is a companion to the GoGuardian classroom engagement and internet filtering tools that our district uses.

📳 Find more information & download the app!