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The Exploris School Newsletter
March 2nd, 2020


Message From the Executive Director

Dear Exploris Community,
 
I hope you all had a wonderful weekend and enjoyed the bonus leap day this year.  Our school community continues to grow and learn together.  Today we will be celebrating Read Across America Day and we encourage all families to continue the celebration at home.  Settle in tonight with your child and curl up with a good book together.  This magical time goes by very quickly.
 
Our students have been working hard on mid-year assessments and presenting their portfolio conferences to their parents and teachers demonstrating their accomplishments mid-way through the year. Thank you to all families for their patience as many conferences needed to be rescheduled due to the weather related school closings. Achievement reports for the second trimester will be sent home on March 20, 2020.  Please reach out to your child’s crew teacher if you have any questions regarding your child’s growth and progress.
 
Many crews are actively making final plans for field experiences including camping, DC city tour, NC beach visit, Outward Bound, an international festival, museum visits,  and a farm day at NC state just to name a few. Service learning is also active on campus with food bank deliveries, science museum docents, gardening, blessing bags for the homeless, supporting a relocating refugee family, and middle school students volunteering at elementary demonstrating how our students and teachers are living our core value of social empowerment.  We are very proud of their dedication and commitment to our community.
 
Spring elective sign-ups are underway at the middle school and explorations continue at elementary to expose our students to unique learning experiences that fuel their passions and interests.  Students at the middle school have also been actively engaged in a variety of clubs including soccer, analytics, Positive Impact, Model UN, and Science Olympiad just to highlight a few opportunities available to help your children grow.  We wish all teams the best of luck with upcoming competitions.
 
The safety of your children continues to be our top priority.  This week we will be participating in a weather related safety drill to remind all students about how we prepare in the event there is a tornado in the area.  As you know all weather related events and school closings are shared via our One-Call emergency alert system.  Please contact the main office and inform Michael at elementary or Mary Margaret at the middle school if you are not receiving the alerts so that your contact information can be added to the system.
 
Operations
 
The school is investigating visitor management systems that will perform screening of visitors using the sex offender registry list and provide visitor badges upon check in for the future.  The equipment will be paid for using the school safety grant and PTO funding.
 
We are also planning for the implementation of volunteer background checks on all volunteers for the 2020-2021 school year.  The PTO has generously agreed to fund parent /guardian background checks to support the school.  
 
Applications for 2020-2021
We’ve had over 1,000 applications for the 2020-2021 school year for 77 open seats.  The lottery will be held on March 6, 2020 and results posted for families on their School Mint account.  Good luck to all!
 
Building Update
 
TriProperties has presented an initial list of properties for consideration to the Board facilities committee.  The Board facilities team has evaluated and visited properties and the staff facilities team has identified the school priorities to consider for our future expansion.  The finance committee continues to update financial forecasts and have worked with financial agencies to provide estimates for bond financing for our future construction needs.  We will continue to explore options with TriProperties and financing agents until we find viable solutions to share with our community.  We appreciate your patience as we reset and pivot to find a new Exploris location.
 
I also want to reassure all families that capital campaign contributions that have been made to support the funding for the new school building are set aside in the School Foundation account for the future construction project.
 
Enjoy reading all the interesting grade level highlights in the newsletter to find out more about the exciting learning taking place at Exploris.  Remember to update your calendars with the upcoming important dates.  Feel free to reach out to your child’s teacher or one of the administrative support team members if you have any questions or need assistance.  
 
All the best,
 
Ellie

 
Reminders-
 
Please review the email sent on Friday about the coronavirus precautions.
 
Middle School families are reminded to drop off and pick up students in the car pool lane or off site at a safe drop off point where children can cross the street safely.  There are many who are stopping at the intersection on Hillsborough and groups of students that are lingering in front of the State of Beer after school.  Please remind your children that when school is dismissed, they should proceed either to the basement for car pool or to the designated parent pick up location and not linger unsupervised outside the building.
 


Kindergarten

Kindergarten took advantage of warmer weather and walked to the park.


First Grade

First grade doctors meticulously working on their text feature surgery!

 
Second Grade

Below you can see students sharing their partner animal research during Expedition.


 
Third Grade

Third grade have been enjoying doing 'Math Fun' on Friday afternoons. This is an opportunity to mix groups and activities up and get involved in active Math activities.




 
Fourth Grade

Students have been working on an engineering design challenge in partnership with NCSU Biomedical Engineering group and Altec. They are using principles of design, engineering, geometry, 2D, and 3D modeling. They present their final products at NC State on March 13th! 


Fifth Grade

The 5th grade and kindergarten classes spent Valentine’s Day together as a mentor/protege. It was a great day of getting to know one another and crafting bookmarks together. We hope to spend another few days with our new friends before the end of the school year



 
Sixth Grade

Sixth graders recently completed Big History Project's sixth threshold, "Early Humans." The driving question for this threshold is "What makes humans different from other species?" As a culminating activity for this threshold, students created Hunter-Gatherer menus. Students created their own restaurants and menus after researching an assigned location. 



 
Seventh Grade

The Helping Out service learning group went to the Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina to ensure that #NoOneGoesHungry. After volunteering for 3 hours, they packed 12,500 meals that went out for distribution that day. 


 
Eighth Grade

Recently 8th grade students have been taking on the task of learning deeply about biotech. Before we embarked on biotech panels the students had a practice run with a topic of choice, and they did excellent! Now that the students are more familiar with the task at hand they were asked to pick from heal, sustain, or feed under the main category of biotech. Students visited a biotech exhibit at the NCSU Gregg Museum, and are currently in the research phase. We will work in groups and create a website and prepare panels to explain to 7th grade as well as parents the future in biotechnology. We encourage you to see how well your child knows their topic, ask them about it in the car, at dinner, or even breakfast!


Global Arts

Below you can see students using Squishy Circuits to light up the STEAM Exploration!



 

Counselor Corner

Have you been wondering lately how to talk to your kids about the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19)??? 
Talking to children about the spreading coronavirus is tricky.  On the one hand, you want kids to practice good respiratory hygiene - by coughing into their sleeve, using tissues, and regular hand washing, however, on the other hand, you want to be careful not to create too much anxiety.  

Here are some great links on ways to talk to kids and one link to a fact sheet/pamphlet on it:


https://www.nbcnews.com/better/lifestyle/how-talk-your-kids-about-coronavirus-ease-their-fears-ncna1129851  


https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/caring-autism/202003/coronavirus-covid-19-what-talk-about-your-child 

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/02/well/family/coronavirus-teenagers-anxiety.html  


https://www.hemot.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Pamphlet_HEMOT_english.pdf 


Michelle Duncan

 
 

March 4 
Coding Night at E.S at 6pm

March 6
Lottery will be held at 4pm at E.S

March 9-10
Teacher Workdays – No school for students

March 20
Achievement reports will be sent out to families

 







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Copyright © 2019 The Exploris School, All rights reserved.
 

The Exploris School is a diverse learning
community that engages students in a
challenging, relevant, relationship-based
education. Through experiential, project-based
learning we empower students to
foster a just and sustainable world.



Our mailing address is:
Middle School   401 Hillsborough Street  Raleigh, NC  27603
Elementary School   17 S. Swain St.  Raleigh, NC  27601
Middle School (919)715-3690 * Elementary School (919)715-0333



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The Exploris School · 401 Hillsborough St · Raleigh, NC 27603-1792 · USA

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