Parents, this past week we had several delays due to weather. This is typical for this time of year in Florida, however, as we have all noticed, it’s been a daily occurrence at this point. Hopefully we will start to dry out a little (and maybe cool off, too). I do want to thank all of you for your patience, and just review our procedures for a delayed dismissal. We utilize a weather application provided by the district to determine if we can dismiss students. When we have severe weather within the last hour of school, I will send out a message via our school messaging system. The purpose of this is to notify you in case you need to pick up your student. We are not asking you to pick your student up early. Our students are still working in classes. If you do choose to pick up your student from the office, the process is as follows:

Please understand that we must adhere to safety protocols when it comes to dismissing students. It is not the office staff that determines these protocols, so please do not get frustrated with them. We are averaging about 250 parents that are coming through the office at the end of the day. When we do get the all clear to dismiss, we ask that you return to your vehicle so traffic in the car loop does not back up. The exception to that would be parents that are picking up students that normally ride a bus and have no way of communicating with their child. We would like you to stay in line and notify the front office staff so we can connect you to your student. Again, Thank you for your understanding.  

We have a busy week ahead. We have two scheduled soccer games if the weather permits — Monday at Audubon Park and Wednesday at home against Union Park. Please come out and support our teams. Remember — Adults are $3 and students are $2. (Children 10 and under are free of charge). I also hope that we can have a good turnout for our first PTSA meeting on Thursday. As an added bonus, our counselors have coordinated a safety session for social media platforms that will start at 6PM on Thursday. We want our families to know the potential dangers of these platforms, especially as your students seek more and more independence. This session will provide you with some helpful information to keep your students safe.  

Finally, I want to end with a shout out to our Teacher of the Year and our Support Person of the Year. We had several great candidates that were nominated for this honor, but in the end, our staff chose Ms. Hodges as our Teacher of the year and Ms. Perez as our Support Person of the Year. Ms. Hodges is in her 3rd year as the theater teacher at Glenridge and she continues to grow the program and raise the bar on our performances. We are extremely lucky to have such a dedicated and talented teacher leading our thespians. If you want evidence of her impact, please come and see one of our productions this year. The talent rivals any school in the district and beyond.  

Our Support person of the year, Ms. Perez, is officially an Office Clerk and her responsibilities are lengthy, but she goes above and beyond to help everyone on campus. She is always lending a hand and her positivity is infectious. She goes out of her way to brighten peoples’ day! We are lucky to have such great people working in the Lion’s Den. These two members will now compete for the district TOY and SPOY later in the year. Good luck, ladies!

Thank you for reading.

Pictured very top: Some of our Glenridge support team pose for a picture in the main office. We are lucky to have such a great team here! Ms. Tyree (School Secretary) , Ms. Perez (Discipline Clerk), Ms. Thomas (Attendance Clerk), Ms. Dennis (Media Clerk), Mr. Stewart (Bookkeeper), Ms. Gonzalez (Front Desk Receptionist), and Ms. Reyes (ESOL Para)