Yes indeed, WES, Falloween begins one week from today, kicking off with our Falloween Parade next Friday afternoon at 5:00 PM!

Walkerton will be very busy the next few days, but please take a few moments to review some Falloween Safety Tips with your children by clicking HERE!

Falloween is just around the corner, which means that our Falloween 5K and Mile Fun Run is not far behind: The Falloween 5K will be held on Saturday, September 30th!

If you are interested in joining, please click HERE for more information!

This past week our WES Student Council sponsored a Spirit Week to raise money for the Beacon Children's Hospital Oncology in South Bend.

WES, WE CRUSHED IT!!!

Walkerton Elementary Students and Families raised over $800 for Beacon Children's Hospital Oncology in South Bend!

Thank you to all of our parents and families for providing the dollars this week. We did an absolute great thing in helping honor Childhood Cancer Awareness!

Flyers will be coming home in the coming weeks!

Due to popular demand, we needed to split this event into TWO evenings!

Mark your calendars! The NEW WES PTA sponsored Grandparents Night will be Wednesday, October 4th for Grades KG -2nd and Thursday, October 5th for Grades 3rd - 6th: Both evenings from 5:00-7:00 PM!

This event will correspond with our WES Book Fair, so please plan on attending with your grandparent(s) to enjoy some ice-cream, make your very own bookmark, and shop at the WES Book Fair!

Falloween is back for another year on September 29th, 30th, and October 1st at John Glenn High School!

For more information on all things Falloween, please click HERE to be directed to the website or scan the QR code below!

Firstly, if you are interested in joining the WES PTA, please click HERE for the information form.

New This Year: Sponsor-a-Day! If you would like to sponsor a day at Walkerton Elementary School, please click HERE for more information. The way it works is that each day of the school year, you can be a sponsor (1 Day = $1, Day 46 = $46, etc.). Each week, we will shout out those who have sponsored, with all of the proceeds going to our WES PTA to help fund all of the wonderful events they host throughout the year!

Office Hours: 7:00-3:30

Doors Open: 7:45 AM (Bus Riders and Car Riders)

Breakfast Served: 7:45-8:00 AM

Tardy Bell: 8:05 AM

Dismissal Begins: 2:40 PM (Car Riders)

Dismissal Begins: 2:45 PM (Bus Riders)

Arrival

• Bus Riders: Students riding the bus will enter at Door #6 at 7:45 AM.

• Car Riders: Students who are car riders or walkers will enter at Door #1 at 7:45 AM.

• Click HERE for the map of our car rider procedures.
• Parents, a few reminder about car riders:
• Please form a DOUBLE LINE (BLACK LINE) as you enter at the far end of the parking lot: This process will be very similar to the double line at the McDonald's Drive Thru!
• The Double Line will end and merge into a single line (BLUE) all the way to the front of the building at Door #1.
• Please do not let your child(ren) exit your vehicle any sooner than the sidewalk (Green Arrow).

• Walkers: There will be a crossing guard to stop traffic so that our students may cross the street safely. Please talk with your child(ren) about the importance of listening to the crossing guard, as she is there to keep them safe.

Dismissal

• Bus Riders: Buses will be dismissed at a time starting at 2:45 PM from Door #6.

• Car Riders: Car riders will begin exiting the building at 2:40 PM from Door #1.

• Walkers: Please see the above information for Arrival.

You may have heard that WES is going to have some construction happening this year, and that is indeed correct!

WES is looking to improve various areas of our building, starting with new heating and cooling systems in our classrooms! Construction will not happen before the first day of school, but will happen throughout the upcoming school year.

But don't worry! Classrooms will be moved around so that there will be no students or staff in classrooms where work is being done.

JGSC is finalizing the construction bidding process, and once that happens, I will be able to provide more details on (1) when construction will start and (2) what rooms will be affected during certain times.

More details coming soon!

The Boys and Girls Club is back at Walkerton Elementary School this upcoming year!

Public registration is open TODAY on their website at bgcsjc.org.

Please send any parent questions our way - register@bgcsjc.org.

The First Day for Before and After School Care at WES will be Monday, August 14th.

Brooklyn and Benjamin are growing up way...too...fast.

It feels like only yesterday that Kristen and I brought our children home from the hospital, both of us figuring out those first couple of hours, let alone days with a newborn.

Recently, Brooklyn has gotten into that stage where her favorite word is 'no'...that little girl will even say 'no' sometimes to things she actually wants just to see our reaction :)

Her other favorite activity right now is to run...run as fast as she can. That girl will run so fast, that she, of course, falls right down when those little legs just can't keep up.

Brooklyn loves to practice running in the grass at the park, where she inevitably falls, rolls over, and wants to do it all over again.

This week I couldn't help but be so impressed with her because every single time she fell, she wanted to get right back up to try again.

I've always maintained that one of the most crucial lessons we can teach our children is simple: How to fail the right way.

I will fail. Brooklyn will fail. You will fail.

That's life.

But the real measure of success is how we emerge from those failures, from adversity, from those rugs being pulled out from underneath that will ultimately make us a stronger and better people.

This isn't to say that it's ok to tell your children to fail, but in order to learn from failure one must first...well, fail.

Teaching our kids that everything good in life comes with hard work and determination is essential: The key to success is to learn from our mistakes...creating opportunities through failure is how we teach our children to grow.

Brooklyn will master running in the coming months, but only if she continues to get off her butt and try again :)