Family Update – September 17th, 2021

Ancaster Meadow Family Update – Friday, September 16th 

Happy Friday!  

A special note of thanks to parents and guardians dropping off children at school, for remaining on the sides of the playground. We wish to emphasize the importance of this to maintain student safety and order on the playground for smooth entry and dismissal.  

We know that school supervision of all students is paramount, and over the last number of days, we’ve been carefully observing student flow and gaining a better understanding of student needs during the more unstructured times of the day, namely nutrition breaks. We’ve recognized a need to revise our approach, and we have made some adjustments to ensure full cohesion of support. We thank our parent community for feedback and adhere to a responsive model of service to our students.  

In keeping with our focus on student safety, we remind families to please refrain from driving into the parking lot between 9:00 am and 9:30 am, and from 3:15 pm – 4:00 pm. Buses and pre-arranged student arrival/dismissal are tightly scheduled. The parking lot at the side of the school is closed to all teaching staff and community members. Thank you for your understanding and cooperation. 

In accordance with the mandated Covid-19 HWDSB protocols, it is necessary to limit visitors to the school. Please ensure that your child is coming to school with all the belongings required for the day, including lunches and water bottles. We know that “life” happens, and there might be a day when a lunch or water bottle has been forgotten. We are happy to provide students with a disposable cup for the day and a nutritious snack as necessary.  

You can find all of the HWDSB Covid-19 updates on the homepage of https://www.hwdsb.on.ca/  

 Medical Information 

If your child has a prevalent medical condition (asthma, epilepsy, anaphylaxis, diabetes) or a non-prevalent medical condition that requires our explicit awareness and plan of action, and you have not already been contacted by the school or received either a form to return that indicates that there were no changes to the existing plan of care, or a new medical form to complete and return, please contact the school.  

 Wasps 

 **The wasps arrived late last week and have decided that our field is a great place to visit. This spurred on some learning on our end and we found some interesting reading. Here is an article you might like:  Why Bees and Wasps are Worse in the Fall . We are lucky to have a caretaking team that is thorough with maintaining our grounds, and we’ve already noticed a significant decline in the number of wasps, thankfully.

Stay Connected 

Be sure to subscribe to https://www.hwdsb.on.ca/ancastermeadow/ and follow us on Twitter @ancastermeadow (can also be found at the bottom of the Ancaster Meadow site).  

Parent Council and Home & School 

We invite all parents/guardians of students, current and new, to attend our first meeting of the year,
** Parent council meeting is September 21, 2021, @ 6:30 p.m. followed by Home & School meeting @ 7:30 pm. This will be virtual via MS Teams. If you wish to attend, please register by completing this Google Doc and you will receive an email with the meeting link. Both meetings are accessible with the same link. 

All parents/guardians are welcome to become a member of the School Council and/or Home and School. 

Have a wonderful weekend, 

Mrs. K. Dunford 

Principal