Hello Rosecrest Families!
November is one of my favorite months as it asks us all to take some time to show gratitude. I am sincerely grateful to be a member of the Rosecrest community! This has been an unexpected year that continues to lead us down different twists and turns. I have been impressed with the kindness and grace demonstrated by all members of our community during this time. Here are a few November highlights and reminders:
DISTANCE LEARNING DAYS
Our teachers continue to work hard preparing for online learning, including our distance learning days. These distance lessons are a continuation of learning that has occurred during the week and often include assessments that are used to determine student proficiency. Please plan to support your children to engage in learning on our distance days. It is so important for continued growth and mastery of core standards.
OPEN ENROLLMENT
Granite School District provides school choice enrollment in all schools where space is available. “Open Enrollment” is necessary for students to attend a school other than their home boundary school. The Early Open Enrollment period for the 2021/2022 school year begins on December 1, 2020 and ends on February 12, 2020. Open Enrollment Applications are available at all schools and are processed in the order received. If a student is accepted for Open Enrollment, annual reapplication is not required as long as the student remains in the same school, and space is available. When a student transitions from elementary school to junior high, reapplication is necessary to attend a junior high outside of the student’s home boundary school. EVERY CHILD? OR families grandfathered in?
OUTSIDE ATTIRE
Winter has arrived! I was so impressed this week with all the winter weather gear students had for playing outside. They came prepared! Please continue to remind your child to bring all the attire they need to play outside in this wintry weather. Our mitigation plan has us keeping grade levels in pods during recess. This means we are utilizing much more of our field during recess than we may have used in years past.
LUNCHBOXES
Our Community Council has met and decided to alter our mitigation plan regarding lunch boxes. We are continuing to strongly encourage everyone to bring disposable lunch containers to school. However, if you would like to send your student to school with a lunchbox, please prepare them for some changes. Your child will keep his/her lunchbox in their backpack until lunch time. When lunch is over, your child will be responsible for his/her lunchbox. This means they will need to take it outside and place it near the door they use to enter the building. When recess is over, he/she will grab the lunchbox on the way in and return it to their backpack. To limit students touching each other’s lunchbox and lunchboxes ending up in the wrong hands, we will not be storing student lunchboxes before or after lunch. Your child will be 100% accountable for their lunchbox. At the end of the week, if there are any lunchboxes left on the playground, we will dispose of them. We will not be storing lunchboxes in lost and found this year.
COVID and CHROMEBOOKS
As our Covid numbers across the state continue to rise, we are seeing more cases at our school. I want to assure you that at this moment in time, school is one of the safest places to be. Although we have begun to see cases at Rosecrest, none of these cases have been the result of a school transmission. We are closely following our mitigation plan as we continue to clean, keep grade levels apart and maintain assigned student seating in all classes. When we do have a positive case, the Health Department uses an abundance of caution to contact trace and place students/staff on quarantine. This is another safety measure put in place to ensure our schools stay as healthy as possible. When a student is asked to quarantine, it is because he/she was within 6 feet of someone who has tested positive for a cumulative time of 15 minutes. To those of you who have been directed to quarantine, thank you for your understanding and patience! When your child is directed to quarantine, or you choose to have them remain home for an extended period of time, they will switch to distance learning. All of our teachers are teaching both face to face and distance learners, so leaving the physical classroom for a time doesn’t mean learning needs to stop. We are happy to send home the necessary materials to help your child continue learning. When you come to pick up your child due to a directive to quarantine, we will send the chromebook home. If there are additional materials that need to be sent home, please allow your teacher 24 hours to gather those items.
VETERAN’S DAY
We want to acknowledge and THANK all of our veteran families! I’ve been told that in years past Rosecrest holds a lovely Veteran’s Day assembly. We look forward to more formally recognizing our Veteran’s as a school community next year.
A MESSAGE FROM MRS. MENDIOLA
Mental Health and the Pandemic
What can we do to take care of children’s mental health during this unusual time? The best thing we can do is teach resilience skills! But how do we go about doing this? Here are some suggestions:
- Teach your children to be grateful and look for the good in their lives. Focusing on what we have and can do. Not on those things that are no longer possible.
- Finding creative ways to fill in the gaps of things that are no longer possible and doing so in ways that keep ourselves and others safe.
- Finding creative ways to connect with others.
- Reading stories about people who have found ways to thrive during trying times (“The Diary of Anne Frank” comes to mind) and then discussing strategies for thriving during these times.
Remember children will follow our lead, so if we can do our best to remain positive and apply the above suggestions to our own lives our children will too. If you are worried about your child’s mental health or want some more suggestions please feel free to contact me.
Heather Mendiola (School Social Worker)