Dear VAES Families,
Don’t forget that next Friday, May 24th is our last day of school and we dismiss at 11:15. Carline will end at 11:45 and all elementary staff will be able to head home for the day. Please be sure that you pick up your elementary student by 11:45.
WOW!!! Our Kindergarten students and elementary staff truly outdid themselves with their final Kindergarten Project Celebration!!! Not only did they display their beautiful work and all they had learned about weather, the seasons, and changes over time, they performed a fabulous weather show for their families and friends!! Bravo, Kindergarten!!
A BIG Thank You to Mrs. Morgan’s class for our beautiful Empathy canvas and our newest addition to our elementary lobby!!
Our third graders will have their final Project celebration on Tuesday, May 21st at 11:30. I know it is going to be fantastic! You won’t want to miss it!!
A Message from our PTO Hospitality Committee:
Thanks you so much for your help and dedication throughout the year for our monthly VAES Staff luncheons. We certainly could not provide such yummy food and fun for our teachers without you!!! Our last luncheon of the 2018-2019 school year is here! I am amazed at how this year has flown by! Please join us Wednesday, May 22, 2019 as we celebrate our teachers and staff with a "Kick Off to Summer/Memorial Day Picnic!" We will provide our teachers and staff with sub sandwiches with all the fixings! Any and all help as always is definitely appreciated!!
***The teachers also love to have lunch coverage!*** Please check in with your child's teacher to make sure they have lunch coverage for that day (Wed., May 22nd) so he or she may come down to enjoy the spread we have prepared for them!!!
The Durham County Library has a multitude of resources and activities planned for the summer!! From June 15th to August 3rd, they will host a summer reading school competition. When a student signs up for the Durham County Library’s summer reading program, they will select their school (Voyager Academy) and log their reading points online or at their nearest library location. The schools that improve the most compared with their minutes read last summer (2018) could win a STEAM kit. Also, students will win prizes when they reach different reading goals (points). Click here to see several brochures with all of the activities that are happening at the North Regional branch, but also at other branches in Durham County.
Please check to see if your child is missing a coat, jacket, lunch box, water bottle, etc. located in our Lost and Found! ALL items that are not claimed by Friday, May 24th by 12:00 PM will be donated to charity.
Last, but not least, for third grade families, the new mathematics North Carolina Standard Course of Study and Extended Content Standards adopted by the State Board of Education (SBE) in 2016 and 2017 are being taught for the first time this year in classrooms throughout North Carolina. As such, new Mathematics (End-of-Grade (EOG)/NCEXTEND1) tests aligned to these standards will be administered for
the first time in spring 2019. The first priority when implementing new tests is to ensure the results of the test scores are valid and reliable. When new tests are administered for the first time, student scores are delayed while the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction (NCDPI) processes the test data and completes all necessary analyses. These processes and analyses will take place during summer 2019. Due to the necessity of this critical process, in 2018–19 students will not receive their test scores at the completion of the test administration. Instead, the scores for these tests will be delayed until August 2019.
For Rising Kindergarten Parents/Guardians ONLY:
Hello New Kindergarten Parents!
We are excited about the upcoming school year with our newest Vikings! We will be offering a “Getting Ready for K” informational session to parents on Tuesday, May 21st from 5:30-6:00 pm at Voyager Elementary School. This is a “Parents/Guardians ONLY” session led by our Kindergarten team of teachers. We will share activities, apps, and routines that will prepare you and your child for what to expect in kindergarten. We hope to see you there!
Just a reminder… Please continue to display your ES RED (& MS BLUE) signs for AM & PM carline ALL YEAR.
Best,
Leslie Paynter
VAES Principal
Be sure to read IMPORTANT DATES and MORE VAES INFORMATION where you will find previous information covered in the weekly news, information about Remind text sign-up, fundraising, important dates, carline guidelines and rules, etc.
Important Dates for VAES Families:
** Please note that the elementary (K- 3) operates on trimesters (and not quarters or semesters) to better align with the mClass Reading assessments and the state math assessments. This means report cards will go home every 12 weeks and progress reports every 6 weeks.**
3rd Trimester Project Celebration Dates:
3rd Grade: May 21st at 11:30
PTO Hospitality Luncheon: Wednesday, May 22
3rd Trimester Ends: Friday, May 24
Last Day of School – Early Release at 11:15 & Report Cards Go Home: Friday, May 24
MORE INFORMATION:
Please continue to display your ES RED (& MS BLUE) signs for AM & PM carline ALL YEAR. If you have an ES student, you should arrive on our campus BEFORE 3:15 (1:15 on Mondays). Our carline should be complete by 3:20 (1:20 on Mondays). Staff will walk students to the front lobby at 3:20 (1:20 on Mondays) and your child will be sent to after school care if you have not arrived by 3:25 (1:25 on Mondays). If you have an ELEMENTARY ONLY student, please try to arrive for afternoon carline on the front end from 2:45 – 3:00 (12:45 – 1:00 on Mondays). Also, don’t forget that ALL Mondays are Early Release Days and school dismisses at 12:45.
PTO FUNDRAISER:
If you mention the Menchie’s flyer, every Friday from 12:00 PM to close for the entire school year, Menchie’s Frozen Yogurt Patterson Place located at 3604 Witherspoon Blvd. #109, Durham will donate 20% of your purchase to Voyager Academy!!
My Hot Lunchbox & Ordering School Lunches:
My Hot Lunchbox is excited for another great year of delivering school lunches! Due to major improvements we have made this summer, families will need to create a new account. Please note that whichever email address you use for account creation will be the email that receives ALL communications from My Hot Lunchbox. ALL credits will roll over from last year after you create your account. See the attached flyer.
888-894-8295
College Day & Voyager Spirit Day:
One of our K – 12 School Improvement Team goals is to increase our school spirit school wide. Last year, we had College Day on Thursday and Voyager Day on Friday. We will continue this tradition. The College Day Thursdays are days that all staff, students, and parents can wear their favorite college apparel. Also, some of you may have noticed that beside classroom and office doors, we display small signs stating where our staff attended college/university. We hope these activities will promote great conversations about different colleges and college attendance, especially with our middle school and high school students. Last, but not least, every Friday is Voyager Spirit Day! Wear your Voyager apparel and/or your school colors (red, white, and blue) to show school spirit and pride!!
IMPORTANT Carline Reminders:
ALL families MUST go through morning and afternoon carline, even if you think you might be tardy in the morning. Only staff and families with a walking waiver (families living or working within walking distance of the school) should be parking and walking their children to the school buildings. The exception to this rule is if you have a meeting at the school or if you are bringing something to school that your child cannot carry or get out of the car during the carline.
If you are bringing car seats for a field trip, please drop off your child in the carline and then pull around to the front office to drop off the car seat.
Students need to be ready to pop right out of the car in morning carline with backpacks already on their shoulders and lunch boxes, etc. in their hands.
As you are pulling into your unloading zone in the AM, teach your child to unbuckle quickly so they are ready to get out of the car once it stops.
Parents are not to get out of their car to unload their child. Parents may pull up and over to the side and assist their child, if needed.
When there are other children in the car who are not unloading at the elementary, the student's car seat needs to be behind the passenger seat so that the child can unload quickly and doesn't have to climb over the other children in the car.
ALL Kindergarten - Third Grade students MUST be dropped off in the morning carline from 7:15 - 7:45, unless you have a walking waiver stating that you live and/or work within walking distance of the school.
Do not block the crosswalks or the entrances to the elementary in AM and PM carline. We need to keep the crosswalks open so students and staff can cross safely and the entrances open so cars or emergency vehicles can enter and exit.
DO NOT use your cell phones during carline. This means no talking, texting, or checking emails/Facebook. Given the large number of cars on campus during the AM and PM carline, every adult needs to be focused and vigilant while driving on the Voyager campus. We have ES staff positioned at various locations throughout the carline, in addition to MS staff, HS students, sports teams, etc. walking between buildings. Keeping all students, staff, and parents safe is a priority! If one of our carline staff see you on your cell phone, they will ask you to put up your phone, or to pull around to the front office to drop off or pick up your student.
We have families (many of them new Kindergarten parents) and staff new to Voyager and they may not understand all of the traffic logistics. We do not want their first experience at Voyager to be an unpleasant one. So, please be kind!!!
For AM and PM Carline, you MUST have a RED ES sign in your car window/windshield that lists the names of each student you are dropping off and picking up. Place the card/s on your dashboard as you are coming down Ben Franklin Blvd. and entering the Voyager campus. We are still learning names so; this also assists the staff as they call names and load students into their cars.
For PM carline, if you do not have a RED sign in your window with the student names, you will be asked to pull around to the front office to pick up your children. Having a sign with the names of the students riding in your car will make carline run more quickly and effectively.
The safety of our students is our number one concern. If a student is to ride home with someone other than their regular caregiver, the teacher must have had written or verbal confirmation from the parent or guardian. Those carline changes will be on a daily grade level list which will be given to each grade level teacher that is on duty in the gym during PM carline. If your child’s name isn’t on this list with a carline change, the child WILL NOT be placed in the person’s car. The person picking up will be asked to pull around to the front office and the office will call the parent/guardian to confirm this person has permission to pick up your child. If you know that your child will have a PM carline change, I would advise you to write a note, send an email, or call the teacher the day before. Often it is difficult for teachers to check their email or voicemail during the day when they are teaching. If it is an emergency or last minute change, please call the front office and the front office staff will let the teacher know so that the student is added to the grade level list. We appreciate your help and support implementing this new procedure so that all students are safe!
Do not cut in front of someone to avoid having to wait in the carline. This includes NOT making a U-turn in front of the middle school. First, you could potentially cause an accident and this is inconsiderate and often makes the driver that has been following the rules and waiting for their turn very angry.
Remember to be kind to your fellow drivers, staff, students, and volunteers during carline! We are all trying to work together to make carline efficient and safe!!
Please be understanding and respectful to our carline staff if they notice that a driver is breaking one of the rules. They are doing this to ensure that our students and drivers are safe!! Our goals are to make carline safe, quick, and efficient!