New logo Bumper Stickers & T-Shirts are now available for sale at the school
&
Updates from our
Head of School
Hello Marblehead Community Charter Families,

We are now one week into this new school year and we have learned so much! This week we welcomed 60 students into the school for in-person support of their remote learning. It is amazing to have students back in the building; we missed them so much! This has allowed us to see our safety protocols in action and has provided a stress test on our technology capacity. Through this experience, we are getting better every day and with these lessons learned we will be better prepared for the next phase of reopening in mid October.

It is clear, that we do not currently have the bandwidth capacity to have all learners on a video conference at the same time. This was an unfortunate discovery, as I had hoped this would have been resolved this summer. Unfortunately, our service provider, Verizon, has been slow to get out here to help us improve our bandwidth. We will continue to put pressure on them. We also had reports across the region of slow internet speeds, so we know we are not alone. While we await a remedy and service from Verizon, we have figured out some workarounds in the school and the in-person experience has gradually improved over the course of the week. We are so appreciative of everyone's patience as we work out these technical challenges.

I am incredibly proud of our educators and their resilience during this first week of school. Not a single one of us signed up to be teachers in a remote setting. Not a single one of you signed up to supervise your child during the school day, at home. This is unprecedented and a daunting challenge that we are all facing together. Our teachers have learned new strategies and worked hard to have a smooth start to the year. Every single one of our teachers has high expectations for themselves and are feeling at times dejected about not being at their absolute best due to their learning curve with new technology and new pedagogy needed for remote teaching. Thankfully our students are so helpful and positive and just excited to have school again. We look forward to getting better every day, together. If there ever was a time to send your child's teacher a thank you note or email, this is it. The positive emails I have received have buoyed my spirits. Our teachers deserve recognition for their efforts. They are working until exhaustion and getting up and doing it all again each day. Bravo to the MCCPS faculty!

I would also ask that you allow teachers some time, at least 24 hours, to get back to you in response to email inquiries. So many of our teachers are reporting that they are constantly responding to emails and having difficulty keeping up with rapid responses. I will encourage our teachers to designate a block of time when they will catch up on emails from the day, as opposed to trying to respond in the moment. Thank you one more time for your patience.

On Monday October 19 we will have FLU SHOT DAY at MCCPS. We will host a flu vaccine clinic that is being coordinated by CVS. The state has mandated that every public school student get the influenza vaccine by December 31, 2020. We will share additional details about October 19, as we get closer to that date. We will have enough vaccines available for every student and staff member. I am not yet sure about availability for family members. We will take advantage of this date (October 19) to have a full day of professional development for our team so that we are ready to begin Phase Two of our Reopening plan on Tuesday October 20.

For those of you who have students here in Phase One, please remember that drop off is best at 7:45-8:00am. Please do not drop off earlier than 7:30am unless you have made prior arrangements for this with the school.

On Sunday, we sent an email out to Grandparents on National Grandparents Day. Please send that email to your child's grandparents, as want them to know all that we are doing to keep their grandchildren safe as we gradually reopen. When it is possible again in the future, we will have our annual grandparents day at the school.

Enjoy the September weather. Please see below for information about our Student Success Fund. We are about 1/3 of the way (38%) to meeting our goal of 100% participation.


Peter Cohen, Ed.D
Head of School
Student Success Fund
This year we face unprecedented expenses to upgrade our facility and provide PPE and other health & safety equipment to meet new standards of health and safety due to Covid-19.

Your support is more important than ever to help us support our students!

The Student Success Fund helps to sustain valuable programs and activities such as:


Assignment Books for all students
Remote student Chromebook support
Music Programs including concert band, jazz band, strings & chorus
A Variety of Enrichment Courses
A New Phone System
Books for our Library
Guest Speakers/Artists
Scholarships for Field Trips
Student Magazine Subscriptions
Free Fruit at Meals & Recess
Playground & Gym Equipment

Your Support is Appreciated
Please Pay your Student Success Fund today!
The annual investment is $150 per student or $250 per family  

(installment options available)
Or by check made payable to MCCPS
Thank you for your continued support!
Upcoming Events

Wednesday September 23 - Amy Laurent presentation for the community -
Addressing Emotional/Energy Regulation in Autism - 6:30PM
To register for this event, please send an email to abarlow@marbleheadcharter.com A zoom link will be sent to you upon registration.


Upcoming Meetings (via Zoom w/ links on our website calendar)

Friday September 18 - Development Committee Meeting - 10AM
Wednesday September 23 - Finance Committee Meeting - 7:50AM
Friday September 25 - Academic Excellence Committee Meeting - 7:30AM
Friday October 2- PTO Meeting - 7:45AM

Become a Parent Ambassador
At Marblehead Community Charter, COMMUNITY is our middle name. Everyone - teachers, parents, students, administrators, and staff need to do their part to support our school.

Please consider joining the PTO and become an ambassador for our school. We are seeking four parent ambassadors in each grade level.