Dear Families,

In the VPK Program, our goal is to help develop and nurture students’ early literacy and numeracy skills. This year, your child will be taking Renaissance Star Early Literacy® to gauge their performance on early literacy and numeracy skills as part of Florida’s Assessment of Student Thinking (FAST) using Star Early Literacy. At minimum, the assessment will be administered at the beginning, middle and end of the program year to monitor your child’s progress. Your child’s teacher will determine if additional progress monitoring is needed.

Star Early Literacy® is a computer-adaptive assessment that uses audio in which a narrator reads the questions to students. The questions get easier or more difficult depending on how the student responds. The assessment typically takes less than 15 minutes to complete. Star Early Literacy® will provide important information for your child’s teacher to plan instruction to meet your child’s educational needs. You will receive timely information about your child’s progress.

The Star Early Literacy® assessment is aligned with the Florida Early Learning and Developmental Standards for 4-year olds. To learn more about age-appropriate activities to support your child’s learning at home, use the First Teacher: A Parent’s Guide to Growing and Learning 4-Year-Olds, also available in Spanish and Haitian Creole.
Do not hesitate to contact your child’s teacher with any questions regarding the implementation and progress monitoring of Star Early Literacy®. 

Thank you for partnering with us and supporting your child’s learning.
 
Sincerely,
 
Barbara Soto Pujadas

Principal

Dear Families,

The Florida Assessment of Student Thinking (FAST) is a progress monitoring tool that will be administered three times per year to track your student’s progress in learning the Benchmarks of Excellent Student Thinking (B.E.S.T.) Standards throughout this school year. The purpose of this letter is to inform you that your student will take the Kindergarten through Second Grade Renaissance Star Early Literacy and Star Math assessments during the month of December before Winter Recess. Your student’s results from PM2 are for informational purposes only, and your student’s school will provide you with information about how to access the results after testing is completed. 
 
FAST assessments are computer-adaptive tests taken on a computer or tablet. The questions get easier or more difficult depending on how the student responds, and each student will see different questions. If you or your student would like to review Star Early Literacy and/or Star Math sample items at home, sample test items are available at https://flfast.org/resources/renaissance-star/renaissance-star.  
 
The Star Early Literacy assessment typically takes less than 15 minutes to complete. The Star Reading assessment is usually completed in less than 20 minutes, and the Star Math assessment typically takes less than 30 minutes to complete.
 
If you have any questions related to this test administration, you may contact Ms. Gigi Morera at (305) 995-1929.
For more information about the Florida Statewide Assessments program, please visit the portal at FLFAST.org. 
 
Thank you for supporting your student and encouraging him or her to do his or her best during this test administration. 
 
Sincerely,
 

Barbara Soto Pujadas
Principal
 
 

Happy Holidays iPrep Middle School and High School Parents!
 
As another year draws to a close, we hope you are staying well and healthy, and we’d like to enlist your help to provide a Holiday gift for iPrep teachers and staff. Your participation is voluntary and optional. We suggest $25 for each child, but will gladly accept as little and as much as you can afford to give. As is our custom, we will pool all contributions from Upper Academy and distribute the gifts a few days before the Winter Break.
 
Please send your money by Friday, December 16th. You can contribute through Venmo, CashApp and Zelle; all are user-friendly and easy to create an account on. Please add your child’s name and grade and your email and send to:  
 
· Natasha Duwin 
           Venmo: @natduwin
           Zelle: 305-979-5170
           CashApp: $NatashaDuwin

· Ana Monteiro  
           Venmo: @bobanarama
           Zelle: 305-342-1442
           CashApp: $AnaClark

We appreciate your generosity! 

Gratitude, Love, and Blessings,
Holiday Gift-Giving Committee