Student Assignment Plan 2013-2014

Families may now enter their addresses to see their proposed 2013-14 base school assignments under a draft assignment plan presented September 18 to the Wake County Board of Education.

These base assignments are in draft form, and are subject to change as the board reviews and takes action on the draft plan.
Staff in the Office of Student Assignment drafted the proposal in response to a June directive from the Board of Education, which requested that the district’s current assignment plan be revised for 2013-14 to include address-based school assignments. These draft base assignments were proposed based on several criteria, including student achievement, stability and proximity, real estate data and growth projections.

School Spirit now and coming soon... a School Song!

Ms. Loftin has chorus underway. Almost one hundred students show up each Tuesday to participate in our Trailblazer Chorus! Under the direction of Ms. Loftin, these students are preparing for our Piece of Gold audition in November and our Winter Program in December.

On top of the work she is doing with our students in chorus, Ms. Loftin will soon be working on creating our school song. She will seeking input from the students on what should be included in the song. Students will have an opportunity to submit their ideas for consideration and will be able to give input on the actual creation of the song. Our goal is to release our school song in the Spring! We will keep you updated on the progress of the school song.

School Spirit Update

School Spirit on a roll at BRES! Today we kicked off the week with Crazy Hat day. We had a myriad of different hats show up on campus. Thank you for supporting your child in participating in events this week.

The PTA sent out a message earlier about the change in spirit events for tomorrow, but I wanted to reach those of you who regularly receive the blog updates or visit the site. Tomorrow, in order to respect our history we have changed our spirit activity from "backwards day" to "wear red, white and blue day."

All other events will remain the same. See below for the events of the remainder of the week.
9/11 Wear red, white and blue
9/12 Backwards Day: Wear red, white and blue
9/13 Crazy Hair Day: A teacher favorite...what can you do with your hair?
9/14 School Colors: Same as usual, blue and green or official BRES t-shirts

Spirit Night will be September 11th from 5-8 p.m. at McDonald's in Fuquay Varina (this is a change from the date that went out in the PTA Newsletter.)

Additionally, the PTA Board will meet at 5:00 p.m. this Thursday in the Media Center for our monthly meeting. You are always welcome to join us.

Blazing Academic Trails

In a July post I shared that our preliminary academic acheivement data was positive and promising. Today, I can officially announce (or should I say officially type) that we made good gains in our data for all subgroups of students served here at Banks. The main WCPSS website has been updated with specific school data for you. The academic gains we made afforded us to move from a School of Progress (60-79 percent of students' scores are at or above achievement Level III and school makes or exceeds its expected growth goal) designation to a School of Distinction (80-89 percent of students' scores are at or above achievement Level III and school makes or exceeds its expected growth goal.) That is definitely something to celebrate!

While we celebrate the academic gains made last school year, we are blazing down the path of this school year. We are critically looking at our areas of instructional need and with a laser-like focus, planning and taking action to support those needs, such as our Tier II Invention groups and our AIG instructional groups. Those are two examples of how the staff at Banks Road Elementary enhances and supports learning for all!

Blazing Trails...on the Horizon...

Did you know that BRES will soon offer our very first Student Council? A committee has been meeting and actively planning the details to be able to offer this great leadership opportunity to our students. Be on the look out for more information about BRES Student Council.

School Spirit is HERE!

The time has come... it is SCHOOL SPIRIT WEEK! Fridays are usually a sea of blue and green here at BRES, but for the next week you are going to see some funny things going on here all in the name of school spirit. Our students are excited to participate in these activities. Please mark your calendars, set your alarms in your Smart-phones and be sure to check the blog and website for great photos of our students showing off their school spirit beginning Friday, September 7th.

Here is a list school spirit activities for next week:

• 9/7 School Colors: Same as usual, blue and green or official BRES t-shirts & Penny Drive begins (send in your pennies all week)
• 9/10 Hat Day: Wear your favorite hat
• 9/11 Backwards Day: What can you wear backwards?
• 9/12 Olympics Day: Wear red, white and blue
• 9/13 Crazy Hair Day: A teacher favorite...what can you do with your hair?
• 9/14 School Colors: Same as usual, blue and green or official BRES t-shirts
• Spirit Night will be September 11th from 5-8 p.m. at McDonald's in Fuquay Varina (this is a change from the date that went out in the PTA Newsletter)

Our PTA has provided us with a beautiful trophy that will be passed to each classroom showing the highest participation in our school spirit week activities.

Transportation Update

We have had a great week with our transportation for students. All of our buses are arriving on campus each morning. In the afternoons the buses are arriving and leaving campus with in the 3:45-4:15 time frame. This is great news for your after school activities and evening family time!

Carpool is getting better each day. On Friday, we moved numerous cars and still were completely finished by 4:10. This week we continuously improved our loading time. The Fuquay Police Department has also been supporting us at the turn in from Banks Road onto Chambers. We appreciate their support with monitoring traffic and helping many of you be able to turn left from the school!

I have received many positive comments about the changes in carpool and our bus departure times. Thank you for your positive feedback. And thank you for all that you do to support Banks Road Elementary School!