Hi all,
Oh my, this week has flown by! A huge THANK YOU to all of you who provided lunch to our teachers. I can assure you it was certainly enjoyed. Again, thanks!
I also appreciate those of you who met with the Cognia Accreditation Team. Throughout Wednesday we had students, parents, teachers, leadership team, and support staff talk with the Cognia Team. The students shared that they enjoyed talking with the Team Members.
Academics continue to be our main focus as we also gear up for our next round of sports - girls’ basketball and boys’ basketball! If your student is on the team, please remind the player that grades continue to be a priority. We will review report cards after the second quarter to see if students are meeting the standard and will also check PowerSchool. If you have a question, please talk to Coach Jackson (girls) or Coach Ryan (boys).
LET'S STAY CONNECTED
Let’s stay connected! Scroll on over to our Voyager Academy website to see all the updates and additions. Be sure to follow, friend, like and subscribe to all our Social Media accounts! #GoVikingsGo #VoyagerVikings
Amazon Smile
It’s the most wonderful way to support all of the great things we are doing at Voyager and to help us expand our program offerings in academics, extracurricular activities, professional development, athletics, the arts and more!
Now, it’s easier than ever to support us just by shopping online! Whenever you make an eligible purchase from Amazon, Voyager Academy will benefit at no additional cost to you. All you have to do is select Voyager Academy Inc. as your charitable organization on Smile.Amazon.com. You shop…Amazon donates!
What is AmazonSmile?
AmazonSmile is a simple way for you to support your favorite charitable organization every time you shop, at no cost to you. AmazonSmile is available at smile.amazon.com on your web browser and can be activated in the Amazon Shopping app for iOS and Android phones. When you shop with AmazonSmile, you’ll find the exact same low prices, vast selection and convenient shopping experience as Amazon.com, with the added benefit that AmazonSmile will donate 0.5% of your eligible purchases to Voyager Academy Inc.
Lunch Program
The Linq system is updated each Friday with your Titan account balance. Accounts with a negative balance on their Titan Family Portal account will not be permitted to order lunch online in the LINQ system. Meals ordered will be cancelled, if payment or arrangements have not been made. If you need assistance with paying off your account balance, please contact the Finance Departm at ext. 107 to make arrangements. Please be sure to send your student(s) to school with lunch, if no meal was ordered. You can pay on your balance using either form of payment below:
Online at https://family.titank12.com There is a $2.80 flat fee charged by the bank per deposit online. (Example: $100 deposit + $2.80 fee = $102.80)
A check/ money order made payable to Voyager Academy. Please include your child's name and id# on the memo line. You can also use this pre-printed form.
Lunch menus are published for the month of December. Be sure to select your milk preference. Milk is included with each meal at no additional cost. The lunch ordering rule is a week in advance. If you need assistance email foodnutritionservices@voyageracademy.net.
LINQ ONLINE ORDERING - View and order student/staff meals. Website: https://family.onlineordering.linq.com
TITAN FAMILY PORTAL -Pay your school fees, manage your students accounts and apply for free and reduced meals. Website: https://family.titank12.com
Before & After Updates
There are currently no openings in after care and the waitlist is full. We will not reevaluate space availability until we are fully staffed. Your placement on the waitlist will remain the same. We will make an announcement via email once the status changes.
Patrice Johnson, Operations Manager
Before/After Care, Enrichments, & Food/Nutrition Services
Thank You!!!!
TOYS for CHILDREN at DURHAM RESCUE MISSION
We have already received toys for the children at Durham Rescue Mission. At the present time, the toys are in my office but will be in the lobby when we return from Thanksgiving as we want all to see how we are supporting the children. Below is a picture from last year.
If you are shopping over break, hopefully you will find a toy to support the drive. The Dollar General has great toys and at a reasonable price.
Toys must be new and unused. Please do not wrap the toys. The Rescue Mission will accept all toys but are in greatest need of toys for children ages 8-12. A picture of last year’s event is included.
All toys need to be dropped off in the Middle School Office from November 15-December 3.
Last Year’s Toy Drive
School Store Envelopes
Wow, what great participation in the School Store. Students who returned their envelope with the added information will receive their prize today (Friday). It is not too late to complete the envelope with the needed info and return to your child’s teacher. We will pass out prizes again after Thanksgiving Break so return your envelope the Monday after Thanksgiving! The stuffed animals are really cute! Thanks for supporting the Middle School on the School Store project.
PTO Meeting Information
The New Cheddar Up Link is now Open- Streamlining the staff gift process- One of the PTOs goals is to streamline the teacher gift collection process to make sure all staff receive a token of our appreciation during the upcoming season (and end of year). Parent donations are completely voluntary. This Cheddar Up will make it easy to give a gift and divide it among your child's teachers! Check it out:
https://voyager-staff-holiday-gift.cheddarup.com
If you are a room parent, please reach out to PTO Board member Tiffany Henrikson at tiffie130@yahoo.com and she will outline how she will work with you with regard to collection for your room and disbursement. What a great way to honor our staff during this special time of the year.
MASK HELP
Please make sure our students are wearing their masks as they get out of the car/truck in the morning. It would also be helpful if each student has an extra mask in their bookbag. We have lots of students asking for a second mask but they prefer the blue masks. We have no problem giving them a mask but we only have the white cloth masks provided by the state. We are happy to give them a white cloth mask.
Tardies
This week has not been our best week of getting our students to school on time. We have at least 10-12 students who are tardy each morning. Please leave home a couple of minutes earlier so you student can be on time and be in class when class begins
Duke Children’s Hospital
A huge thank you to those of you who have supported and provided supplies for the children at Duke Children’s Hospital. We were able to send quite a few supplies to the Children at Duke Children’s Hospital! Thank You!
Substitutes and Bus Drivers
If you are interested in being a substitute, we need you! In order to be able to sub, we would need you to complete a background check and have a Drug Screening. Information is located on the Voyager website. We also will have a small training to give you some additional information. All 3 schools need substitutes as we pull subs from the same list. If you enjoy working with children/students, we need YOU!
If you are interested in Driving a Bus, we need you! We need drivers for our Activity Buses so we can use the buses for a field trip or our athletes may possibly use to travel to away games. In order to drive you would need a CDL license along with completing a Background Check and completing a Drug Screening. If you are interested, information is on our Voyager website.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS Regarding COVID
Our School Nurse, Chelsea Skoff, created a document that has been added to our website. I’m including this document as I found it to be very informative and helpful!
Here is the link: COVID-19 Guidelines FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)
If your child needs to quarantine, teachers will provide assignments for your student. When quarantining, if the student is doing some work at home and you complete the attendance link provided below students will be counted present. The link to complete your child’s attendance is HERE
If your student has been directly exposed to someone, outside of school, who has tested positive for COVID, your student needs to quarantine for 10 days. They may return to school after the 10 days of quarantine have been completed AND have no symptoms from the time of exposure.
The 10 day quarantine protocol is not school days, it also includes the weekend. For example, if your child was exposed on Aug. 9, they can return to school on Aug. 20 (10 days).
Please keep me, your child’s teacher, and our school nurse, Mrs. Skoff updated on your child’s symptoms and/or test results.
Please do not send your child to school if your child is not feeling well, has a fever, has a sore throat, or if you know he/she is sick. That puts our students who are at school at risk of getting germs and becoming sick. We are doing our part to stay healthy and well and need all of you to do the same. THANKS TO THOSE OF YOU WHO ARE KEEPING THEM HOME!
We had several students come to school this week and they were sick when they arrived. We immediately called parents to come pick up the child/children as we do not need extra germs in our building. Please do not send your child to school when they are not feeling well!!!!!
As always if you have questions or have concerns or have suggestions feel free to contact me at gjohnson@voyageracademy.net. I am happy to help you or if I don’t know the answer, I will find out for you!
Thanks for your continued support in so many ways,
Gwen Johnson
Middle School Principal
gjohnson@voyageracademy.net