August PEIRCE SCHOOL FAMILY NEWSLETTER

Greetings Peirce Families,

This newsletter is a little lengthy, but please take the time to read.

I hope that all of you have enjoyed your summer vacation, spent quality time with family and friends and are ready to begin the 2017-2018 school year. I look forward to having your children back in the building, buzzing with energy and excitement! This summer was a busy and exciting one for us at Peirce - see below for a few of our many summer highlights!

• We learned at the end of July that we are now fully authorized in the Primary Years Programme (PYP) for grades Pre-K through 5th! Students now have access to a PK-12th grade IB Education at both Peirce and Senn High School.
• Thanks to many generous donors, we received funding for the first 2 phases of our newly created "Makers Space". 
• Our school budget is about the same as it was last year, with the majority of it going towards staffing - this year we are able to expand our arts programming in 6th-8th grades and have a lead interventionist to support small group instruction. We also are very fortunate to have technology and library as resource centers and not as specials classes - teachers will be able to collaborate with tech and library to align closer with the IB units of study.
• Playworks will be joining Peirce to support recess programming. A group of volunteers from Playworks & Sales Force came out this summer to paint lines/play spaces on the recess area.
• Many dedicated teachers at Peirce spent time over the summer continuing their growth as professionals by attending workshops such as Education through Music, Lesson Study Summer Institute, Golden Apple STEM Institute and more! 

Looking forward to the beginning of the school year!

Lori Zaimi

Read the full newsletter