ASRMS Update

Wow.

Who would have believed all this? I do not know about you, but I am still in the processing stage of not coming back to school! It is so difficult to think about this...as I begin to think about it I am bombarded with an array of end of the year activities...Graduation, Awards Assembly, Incoming 5th-grade tours, Graduation Dance, D.C. Trip, Canobie, Mountain Classroom, Memorial Day Assembly, Band Concert, Trills & Thrills, Spring Musical, yearbook signing, last day of school at the buses..and on and on....each thing that will never be for us this 2019-2020 school year.

Imagine for our seniors. The ones we taught and helped form. I imagine their dismay as they face the prospect of no Senior Prom or High School Graduation....

As I fire off this list, I am deeply saddened for us, our students, and their families. Most of the time I can rise above the sadness, but sometimes, I allow myself to feel it. Then I think, if I, as a grown adult (or at least I should be) feel this, what must our students be feeling?

It is a very challenging time for every one of us. And then, it's not just about the loss of things that structured our work-life...what about the losses/stress in our personal lives?

When you think about all of this as a whole I hope you agree that we deserve a big round of applause for forging through this uncharted, ever-changing presence of Remote Learning, Zoom connecting, scheduled Chromebook distribution, drive through lunch provisions and empty school custodial cleaning.

But somehow....we will reach the other side. We will continue to figure out the best ways to reach, teach, and grade remotely. We will push through our disappointments, heartaches, and worries to help guide and support our own children and the children we teach. We can do this. We are teachers. That is what we do...rise to the occasion....every day..every year.

I salute you for your creativity, tenacity, kindness, and willingness to go the extra mile for our students.

Take care of yourself and those you love most.

Berta

Thank you to all who attended the ASRSD Parade. It was a huge success in both Ayer and Shirley. Many of our current students and former students have commented on how great it was to see so many of us. We have also received many accolades from parents. They too were deeply moved by our show of support

A big thank you to Fred Deppe, PHT Principal, for leading the charge. We are also thankful to Jenn Bigelow, SRO, for mapping out the Ayer route and to Lt. Alfreda Cromwell and Detective McGuinness for mapping out the Shirley route. Both police departments worked collaboratively with their respective fire departments. Team work made it GREAT!

Please find below some very important information:

• All teachers should be entering grades into the portal. Parents were told by Dr. Malone that we would be entering grades weekly.
• Progress Reports will be emailed on May 13th. Grades will be P=Pass, F=Fail, with the qualifier that F means the student did not participate in Remote Learning
• If you have yet to decide (as a team) how you are grading individual work, please do that by the beginning of next week.
• Please send us your chart/grading system by the beginning of next week.
• This is an example of how one team decided to grade https://bit.ly/2xZv8KW

Some upcoming things:

• We will be creating Virtual Tours for the incoming 5th graders. If you have any ideas, please email Cynthia Esielionis
• Our Grade 8 Graduation will also be done virtually. We are in the process of working on that as well. Your input is appreciated.
• We have somewhat of a plan for locker cleanout and curbside pickup. Stay tuned!
• Bryan will be sharing a Google Form with you to expedite, document, and streamline the process to alert the administration to students who are not engaging consistently in Remote Learning.

REMINDER

The school is open from 7 am-4 pm daily. In order to access the school, you must:

1. Email Ray Maillet rmaillet@asrsd.org and Bob Briggs. Bob.briggs@asrsd.org.

2. If you have a swipe card, you can enter any time between 7 am and 4 pm on the day you said you would come in.

3. If you do not have a swipe card, you must alert Bob and Ray as to the specific time you will arrive on the date you set. A custodian will meet you at the door as all doors are locked.

4. Once you enter the building, please sign in at the table in the lobby and sanitized your hands with the hand sanitizer on the table.

5. Once you are done in your classroom, sign out.

6. The custodians will re sanitize the area in which you worked. If you have used the copier or laminator, rest room etc, please let the custodians know so they can sanitize that area.

Thank you for reading through this Update!

Inspired by Savanna's unit on poetry, I wrote some free verse poems tonight. This one may not be perfect, but right now it describes some of the feelings that we may be feeling, now that we know that we won't go back to our "normal" school routine this year. Every weekday I get the awesome privilege of listening to at least two of our general education teachers interacting with our students during Zoom meetings, encouraging them in their schoolwork and in life, acknowledging the struggles of this time, and encouraging us to have hope for the future. This poem describes how I feel when I tune in to a Zoom meeting, looking for familiar faces, juxtaposed with the ordinary "attention-seeking" metaphor of the sharpening of a pencil. Thanks for reading. I hope you can identify with some of it.
Janice

https://bit.ly/2yJyKAJ