Peirce School Family Newsletter - October 2018

Greetings Peirce Families,

I am happy to announce that Peirce achieved Level 1+ status according to CPS' rating policy - an improvement from the Level 1 status achieved last year and we continue our "good standing" status with CPS. We just made the 96% attendance cutoff (96.1%) which is 20% of the school's rating and helped push us from level 1 to level 1+as. I will provide a state of the school presentation to the Local School Council on November 15th at 6pm, reviewing last years data, our SQRP rating and share our goals for this year, all parents are invited to attend and translation is provided. 

Budget Update
During the October LSC Meeting, the council voted to approve the opening of 2 additional teacher positions, 1 half time music position and the purchase of additional technology. The additional teacher positions will not be used to open additional classrooms (as the school is out of space) but will be used to support classrooms with high numbers of students through push in supports. 

Turf Update
Work on the turf is close to being completed (possibly this week!) - thank you for your patience as we have adjusted the use of the space for morning entry, dismissal and recess.

Unity Month
November will be noted as Unity Month at Peirce School with the tag line of "United We Stand Against Bullying". Teachers will provide instruction from the Second Step Bullying Prevention Kit along with a series of lessons and activities which focus on unity. The Positive Behavior Supports Committee has organized a student assembly on November 26th where Matt Wilhelm will be our guest speaker. Check out this site to learn more about Matt Wilhelm. Also, thank you to Friends of Peirce for funding this assembly!

Race, Culture & Equity
As CPS examines how race currently serves as a predictor of student performance across the city, racial equity has become a district-wide priority. At Peirce, we are honored to be collaborating with a community of equity experts at Chicago United for Equity (CUE). Peirce parent Megan Brand has volunteered to coordinate our Parent Resource Group on Race & Culture this year. Megan has been selected to receive a prestigious Equity Fellowship from CUE. Through this fellowship, she will be receiving 72 hours of training and support for her work on equity and inclusion in parent engagement at Peirce. If you are interested in participating in Peirce’s racial equity and inclusion efforts, please reach out to Megan at holmbergmegan@yahoo.com.

As we seek to build an authentically inclusive and equitable school community, we welcome everyone to join us on this journey. We understand that this work will be messy. Mistakes are inevitable and we are looking to learn and grow together rather than to place blame and provoke division. We hope to lean into our differences and find common ground in a way that leads to meaningful relationships throughout our diverse community and equitable outcomes for student learning and parent engagement. 

Sincerely,
Lori Zaimi
Principal

​View the complete newsletter in Spanish or English.