Message from the Principal
 

Today our school participated in a drill to secure our building.  As much as it pains me to think that part of school is preparing for horrible events like an active shooter, it is comforting at some level to know that we have a plan and that we are able to successfully practice our plan.  Our drill today went well.  It was evident that many, many families had conversations with their children about safety and safety drills - thank you.  During a typical school year, we conduct fire drills, secure the school drills, and clear the halls drills. 

On a much happier note, we have a number of celebrations and trips planned between now and the close of the school year.  Most all classrooms have PBIS celebrations planned.  Just today, Mr. Petrone’s class celebrated their positive behaviors by camping on the Norwich Green!  MCS teachers are great about communicating these smaller classroom celebrations and trips to families.

As a school there are some larger celebrations planned.  Of most excitement is The Day of Play, which will occur on June 15th.  This is a school-wide celebration to recognize that our pellet container is full and our end of the year behaviors are stellar!  On this day, we will basically spend the day playing. 

On June 13th at 5 PM we will celebrate our departing 6th graders and recognize them for being a wonderful part of the Marion Cross School for so many years.  This event will occur on the Norwich Green and involve recognition of students, a couple of dances performed by the sixth graders, and some time for families to mingle afterward. 

On the afternoon of June 15th, the PTO is hosting a retirement gathering to celebrate Ginny Moore, Fran Walz, Rick Newton, and Lindsay Putnam for their service to our school.  Each has made a difference in the lives of students and families.  Please come and wish them well in their retirement.

June 16th will be the last day of school for students, with a 12:00 dismissal time. 

I would like to thank each of you for all of your flexibility, patience, and kindness this school year.  In all of my years in education, this has been the hardest.  Daily, there are multiple adults and children absent from our school.  People, myself included, are tired of covid, school violence, and the general state of the world.  However, I am endlessly thankful to work with students who are amazing, teachers who are talented and collaborative, and families who are nothing less that fantastic.  The willingness to work together and treat each other with kindness has allowed us to persevere through a difficult school year.

Have a restful weekend,

Shawn

Message from Student Services
 

Happy Friday! 

I hope you all had a peaceful and relaxing Memorial Day Weekend. 

This week Shawn and I had two opportunities to share the work of the MCS Schedule and Programming Committee.  The MCS Coffee Talk and the Norwich School Board meeting on Wednesday were both well attended.  For those of you unable to attend, I wanted to summarize the work of the committee in this newsletter.

The MCS Schedule and Programming Committee has been meeting since January.   Individuals on the committee have met for many hours together and, on their own, reaching out to their constituents.  The scope of this work was:

1.   To work together to identify goals for the master schedule and discuss best practices for elementary school scheduling.  

2.   To research best practices and identify instructional times for different subjects.

3.   To discuss different schedules and eventually select the one that we felt best fulfilled our goals.

a.   Link to document that summarizes the committee work that all members reviewed and was submitted to the board meeting.

This was incredibly hard work because we have many things that are really important to our school and community (morning meetings, community times, two recesses, chorus, instrumental music, Rep, outdoor learning opportunities, French, and much more).  I believe everyone on the committee appreciates everything that we do in our school. 

We are going to continue to meet and discuss the feedback we heard this past Wednesday.

Thank you,

Greg