The Little Judges' Docket

Wow - what a fantastic turnout for our block party! I love being a part of the VACDES community. We had about 500 people show up for bounce houses, face painting, fairy hair, games, and the food trucks that showed up were amazing. A goal for us this year is to be more family focused and engaged with families so we will also have our annual Lunch on the Lawn next week. We will send home a paper reminder this week and to see who needs the cafeteria to have a lunch ready for adults (with the price of the adult lunch). It will be on September 18th at 11:35am weather permitting. Make sure you fill out the bike bus papers that went home if you are interested in your child biking to school with trusted adults.

We are still working on our attendance challenge for the division this week! Make sure your students are coming to school each day so we can get the Kona Ice Truck on Fridays! We were in last place last week, but VACDES does like a come from behind victory!

Car Riders: Please do not enter the parking lot until after 2:10pm to make sure all of our students have come in from recess and are safe crossing the parking lot. We also need to make sure that we are following our guidelines for students of being safe, kind, and responsible.

Information from Winchester City: Due to the necessity to replace the existing old water and sewer pipes, Winchester City will be closing National Avenue to through traffic from the traffic circle at the Timbrook Police Station to the intersection with North Pleasant Valley Road (see attached map). The project will begin September 3, 2024 and should take about 4 months. Please be aware we anticipate travel disruptions for WPS bus transportation. Woodstock Lane will be established as the detour route during the project for through traffic. We appreciate your patience as we navigate this disruption to schedules and the associated traffic.

Please make sure you have signed into your parent portal and completed the annual verification forms. Part of that is to make sure your child can be issued a Chromebook to use at school, without the agreement your student cannot be issued a Chromebook which we use for testing and instruction.

Just a reminder that announcements are at 7:45am so we can begin instruction right at 7:50am.

Here is the Parent/Student Handbook for the 24-25 School Year.

Thank you as always for your support for our school. We need to work together as a community to make our students successful because we are creating Local leaders today - Global leaders tomorrow!

Lisa Pluska, Ed.D.

Principal, Virginia Avenue Charlotte DeHart Elementary School

540-665-6330

We have started our new Language Arts curriculum called Bookworms. Ask your students what books they are reading. I saw a lot of engagement and excitement in the classroom. In math, we are doing small group instruction. Science has a lot of experiments and fun while social studies is teaching about our world from past to present. Ask your students what they are learning!

Attendance Competition is continuing this week! All elementary schools are trying to get the Kona Ice Truck on Fridays through the month of September. This includes all absences - excused or unexcused.

Our attendance protocol this year is for a phone call home if a student is absent. If a student has missed 3 days, a principal, assistant principal, or social worker will be calling to check in. As we miss more days, we will send letters, request meetings, and set up an attendance plan. Attendance is so important. If a student misses even one day a month, they will be considered chronic absentee. Please make sure that your child is at school unless they have a fever or are throwing up. Of course if they are sick, they need to stay home. Please send a note to school if they are absent. We will be having our monthly Perfect Attendance celebrations again this year. Students also receive PBIS points for coming to school.

Our first big PBIS Event of the year will be our Fall Festival on October 11th. Students will be able to use the points they have earned for following rules to attend. We have PBIS celebrations every quarter for the students that are earning points for being safe, kind, and responsible.

Every day on the announcements we will be talking about the three school wide rules -

1. Keep hands and feet to self and use kind words;
2. Stay in your assigned area; and
3. Follow directions quickly and quietly.

City of Winchester residents under the age of 5 can register online to receive a FREE book in the mail each month until their 5th birthday. Use the link below to find out more:

https://lvwa.org/literacy-volunteers-winchester-area-imagination-library/

WISH is collaborating with Healing Hands to provide a series of parent engagement events focusing on student mental health. Please fill out this survey to see the needs of our families.

The 2024-2025 Superintendent’s Equity Advisory Council meetings have been scheduled and will focus on completing an equity audit tool.

September 9 - Grandparent Lunch for 2nd grade at 11:05am (Rain date 9/13)

September 9 - 13 - Fire Drill during the week

September 17 - SEAC family session 5:30 - 7:30pm see photo above

September 18 - Lunch on the Lawn at 11:35am

September 20 - Dean/Cambridge to MSV 9-11:30

September 24 - Bucey/Ramirez to MSV 9-11:30

September 26 - Fall Pictures

• Here is the link for the Student/Parent Handbook .
• If there needs to be a change in transportation, please call the office (not the teacher) at 540-665-6330 before noon to let us know. Car riders must come to the back of the school by Pleasant Valley, walkers to the bus loop doors, and bus riders will be let on and off the bus on the Van Fossen St side. Staff will be there to help guide and get your child into the school safely.
• If you arrive after 7:50 A.M., you must accompany your child to the office to sign your child in.