Dear District 39 Community,
I hope the first quarter of the school year has been fantastic for you and your family.
Now that we have successfully kicked off a wonderful start to the school year, I am excited to begin the first of what I hope to be monthly communications to you – our District 39 families and residents. Toward the beginning of each month, I look forward to sharing information with you on the progress we are making toward our strategic plan while celebrating some of the amazing work taking place within our schools every day.
Here is the first of these updates.
Illinois Report Card Designations
Last Wednesday, the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) released annual school report card data for all public schools in Illinois. The report cards contain detailed information for each school as well as summative designations designed to capture how well a school is serving its student population. The State grants school designations based on measures of school quality and student success, including academic indicators in the areas of English/Language Arts Growth and Proficiency, Math Growth and Proficiency, Science Proficiency and English Learner Progress to Proficiency. These designations also reflect school quality and student success indicators such as climate survey results and chronic absenteeism.
I am pleased to share that all Wilmette Public Schools were designated in the top two tiers of distinction, exemplary and commendable, by ISBE. I am especially proud of this achievement as the designations are heavily weighted on our students’ annual academic growth. While we recognize that these designations reflect only a small portion of all the wonderful work that occurs within our schools each and every day and offer only a slivered view into all of our successes, it is nice for our schools to be acknowledged and celebrated by the ISBE in this way nonetheless.
District 39 Launches KEEP39
Our district committee of teachers and administrators has been hard at work designing a kindergarten enrichment program. As you may recall from the October Board Meeting Highlights, the Board received an update on this work this past Monday and we formally announced the new program, called the Kindergarten Enrichment and Enhancement Program of District 39 or “KEEP39.” KEEP39 will provide kindergarten families with an optional, in-district kindergarten enrichment program designed to enhance the instruction provided to students through D39’s high-quality half-day academic kindergarten program. KEEP39 will include enrichment and exploration through a variety of activities and purposeful play designed to offer opportunities for students to enhance development as critical and creative thinkers as well as responsible and productive lifelong learners. KEEP39 will launch at Harper and Central schools next year with the hopeful expansion to McKenzie and Romona in the following school year, pending program evaluation and success. We look forward to providing families with additional details on KEEP39 and registration information in the coming weeks.
School Culture & Connectedness Efforts Continue
Our strategic plan includes an initiative focused on enhancing school culture and connectedness at each of our schools. Both students and faculty have wholeheartedly embraced this initiative and we have accomplished so much to this point in the year! Over the past several weeks, we have:
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Hosted school-based celebrations and community-building activities to kick off the school year
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Provided all staff with anti-bias/inclusion training led by the Anti-Defamation League
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Led Social-Emotional Learning lessons and classroom community-building lessons within classrooms and homerooms across our District
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Participated in a district-wide Unity Day celebration of kindness and inclusion
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Continued to teach and celebrate kindness, empathy and inclusion through various ongoing efforts in our elementary buildings
We are in the process of planning several parent education events focused on supporting students and staff in building strong school communities and combating hate of all kinds. The first of these sessions is coming up this winter. I look forward to sharing information and resources with you on this subject later this month.
Thank you for taking the time to read and learn about your school district. As always, please feel free to contact me through our [email protected] email address with any questions or feedback you have. I am always eager to hear from you!
Your partner in education,
Kari Cremascoli, Ph.D.
Superintendent
Wilmette Public Schools District 39
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