Dear Family and Friends of ACS,

We are still experiencing problems with our phone voice mail system. Hopefully, we will have these problems corrected by next Tuesday. If you called an ACS staff member earlier in the week and have not received a return phone call, please call again since your call might not have been recorded during this outage. I apologize for the inconvenience this has been for everyone involved.

In the unlikely event of an emergency or disaster, agencies such as National School Safety Strategy Forum have recommended that schools be prepared for 24 hours without outside intervention. This would also require that your child’s school store essential, life-sustaining medications and medical supplies for 24 hours for your student. We are endeavoring to be prepared to provide food and to be able to house students and staff for 24 hours if necessary. If your student takes essential medications, such as seizure medication or insulin, only at home, these now should be sent to school with a clearly marked pharmacy label and will be appropriately stored. Send a limited supply for 24-48 hours only.

Dates to Remember:

• Dress Down Day Tomorrow
• Monday, September 4, Labor Day, School Closed
• Tuesday, September 12, Boys Soccer Game- home -4:30
• September 12, Girls Volleyball Game- away- 5:00 & 6:00
• Thursday, September 14- Boys Soccer Game- home- 4:00
• September 14- Girls Volleyball Game- home- 4:00 & 5:00
• Tuesday, September 19- Boys Soccer Game- home- 4:00
• September 19- Girls Volleyball Game- home- 4:00 B Team Only
• Wednesday, September 20- Boys Soccer Game- away- 4:00
• September 20- Kindergarten Literacy Night- 5:30-6:30
• Thursday, September 21- Girls Volleyball Game- away- 4:00 & 5:00
• Friday, September 22- Teacher In-service Day- No school for students
• Tuesday, September 26- Boys Soccer Game- home- 4:00
• September 26- Girls Volleyball Game- away- 4:00 & 5:00
• Thursday, September 28- Boys Soccer Game- home- 4:00
• September 28- Girls Volleyball Game- home- 4:00 & 5:00
• Friday, September 29- Breakfast- PTO

Enjoy your Holiday!

Kindra Whitmyre-Nelson
Dean of Academy Charter School
email: nelsonk@academycharter.org

Dear ACS Families and Friends,

I know we have quite a few new families to ACS this year and I want to take this opportunity to review our grading scale for students in grades K-8. To begin, students in K-2 receive grades in the form of a minus (-) = below grade level, check ( ) = at grade level or plus (+) = above grade level. If you have a student in these grades, you should have received these grading guidelines from your classroom teacher. For students in grades 3-8, we use the following grading scale which is listed below for your reference:

• A+ 99.5, 100, 100+
• A 98-92
• A- 91-90
• B+ 89
• B 88-82
• B- 81-80
• C+ 79
• C 78-72
• C- 71-70
• D+ 69
• D 68-62
• D- 61-60
• F 59 and below

Again, I’d like to remind everyone that every Friday, students in grades K-5 will receive a physical folder which contains your student’s papers. Middle School students will receive a “packet” of their papers which will be distributed during homeroom at the end of the day. Please note that information from PTO, etc., which used to come home in “paper” form, will now be included in our weekly newsletter as a way of reducing our copying costs. If you do not have email, you will continue to receive a “hard” copy of these items!

I want to take this time to thank all those Middle School students who campaigned for positions for Student Council! You really had some creative campaign posters and I appreciate the fact that so many students were interested in representing their school! Finalists gave their campaign speeches yesterday, Wednesday, August 30th, during elective time. Students voted today, Thursday, August 31st, and the winners for President, Vice-President, Treasurer and Secretary will be announced during our morning pledge time as well as names being posted on the Student Council bulletin board located in the middle school wing.

As a reminder, Mrs. Sowter and Mr. Ross began after school band and orchestra for students in grades 4-5 beginning this past Monday, August 27th.

I hope you all have a wonderful and relaxing Labor Day weekend and I thank you for your support of Academy Charter School, its staff and our students!

Kendra Peters
Assistant Dean of Academy Charter School
email: petersk@academycharter.org

The volunteer team is really up and running! I am still trying to get Classroom Coordinators set up for some classes. Volunteers are needed for Mrs. Johnson’s 4th grade classroom, 5th grade classrooms, 6th grade and 7th grade. Certainly there are folks out there who can serve in this very important position. It really doesn’t involve a lot of in-class time; you would be arranging volunteer schedules and working with the teacher. Please let me know if you can help in any of these areas. The middle school coordinator (6th -8th grades) is just needed once in a while to facilitate certain programs. Hopefully, all of these positions will be filled before I send out another newsletter!

We will be scheduling Classroom Coordinator training in the very near future so everyone is aware of the responsibilities of these volunteers. I will notify all classroom coordinators of this training time.

We now have new name badges made for all of our wonderful parent volunteers. You can find your name badge in the small file box on the volunteer table in the lobby. Please take your name badge out and grab a lanyard to attach it. We ask that you put your name badge on anytime you are in the building volunteering. If you can’t find your name badge, please let me know and I will make you one right away. Remember to log in those volunteer hours.

Have a wonderful, long weekend!

Anne Belfrage
Volunteer Coordinator
belfragea@academycharter.org

ATTENTION ALL 8th GRADE PARENTS!!!!

There will be a meeting on Monday, September 11, at 5:30 p.m. in the library to start planning the annual Washington D.C. trip. Trish Kakenmaster, who has helped previous classes plan their trip, will be there with information and to answer questions. If your child is interested, please plan to attend.

TEACHER/STAFF BREAKFASTS

Many thanks to the following people who made the first PTO sponsored Teacher/Staff Breakfast of the year, such a hit:

• Debbie Davis Jan Cline
• Debbie Colgin Renee Helvey
• Shel Dammann Melea Benzel
• Katie Swenson Robin Grue
• Jessica Herbert Kim Gentry

The next breakfast is scheduled for September 29th. If you’ve already signed up to help with breakfasts for the year, Allyson Ford, our new VP of Social for the PTO will be calling or emailing you soon.

Thank you again for making our teachers and staff feel special!

EBOOKS

We apologize for any problems you may be having logging on to the site to register your out of town buyers. We are working with eBooks to get this rectified as quickly as possible. Please try using our account no. 229026 to help you with this process in the interim.

Thank you for your patience.

Misty O’Leary
303-688-6631

Attention 6th Graders....

Tired of sweltering in the summer heat? Sick of the sunburn and burnt out on boiling outside games? Start thinking snow like the rest of us at Colorado Ski Country USA! Applications for the 6th Grade Graduate Pass are available on our website NOW: www.coloradoski.com/gradpass!

The 6th Grade Graduate Pass is very similar to the 5th Grade Passport you had last year. The Graduate Pass consists of three lift ticket coupons to each of our 25 participating member resorts. You will also receive discounts on other services such as lessons, equipment rentals and more. As a previous 5th Grade Passport holder, the Graduate Pass is available to you for ONLY $59 now through November 5th, 2006! That's less then 80 cents per lift ticket!

Don't wait till the snow falls, be ready and buy today! Applying is a cinch! Go to www.coloradoski.com/gradpass

Deadlines:

• November 5: $59.00
• November 6- January 31: $79.00
• January 31: $99.00

Questions: call 303-866-9707 or email passport@coloradoski.com.

Part-time Instructional Assistant

Academy Charter School is now hiring for an instructional assistant who will help in the library Monday-Thursday afternoons and all day on Fridays. We are looking for someone who is detailed oriented, has good typing skills, has workable computer knowledge, and is able to follow precise procedures in cataloging and processing books using a library program. Duties would also include lunch/recess and carpool duties, cataloging and processing books in the library, coordinating volunteers for the library, and running open library as well as teaching one sixth grade class on Fridays. Training will be provided for all duties. Please send your resume and a cover letter to Brenda Knight at Academy Charter School, 1551 Prairie Hawk Drive, Castle Rock, CO 80109 or email them to the following address: irelandb@academycharter.org. We will be accepting resumes through Friday, September 1.