Welcome to the 2014-2015 School Year

Sneak-a-Peek

Sneak-a-Peek will be Tuesday, August 12^th from 5:30-6:30.  Please come and meet your teacher, drop off supplies, and visit with friends.  Our PTO will be providing treats in the Multipurpose Room!

Construction Update

We just found out today (August 6^th) the city inspector will be coming to look at all the new construction on Monday, August 11^th.  If all goes well, we will be able to take occupancy that day.  Our building will not be completely done for a few more weeks after that.  With the time crunch, the flooring will not be done this summer, but should be completed over winter break. 

Drop-off/Pick Up

We will continue to use our number system for picking up students.  For those of you who are new, we ask our parents/caretakers to hang a number (the school provides to you) on your rearview mirror when picking up at the end of the day.  We radio that number in to the gym informing students they are ready to be picked up.  We began this process with the new construction, but quickly discovered that the increase in safety this provided our students far outweighed any inconvenience.  If you are new and didn’t get a number at enrollment, please call the office at 780-7490.  If you had a number, but have no idea where it went over the summer, please call the office at 780-7490 for a new number.  We will hand those out at Sneak-a-Peek on Tuesday evening so you will be ready to go the first day of school.

The good news for all of us is the fence out front is gone and we have our front entrance back so we should have plenty of curb space for pick up and drop off! 

Back to School Night

Back to School Night will be held on August 28^th.  For Grades PK through 2^nd, your session will go from 6:30 to 7:00.  For Grades 3 through 5, your session will be from 7:15 to 7:45.  This will be a chance for parents to hear from their children’s classroom teachers what will be taking place throughout the year.  We are asking for this to be adults only.

I look forward to a wonderful new school year and want to welcome many new kindergarten students and our new ELL students to Heritage.  There are a lot of exciting new changes taking place, and there may be some bumps in how these changes are implemented.  We will do our best to provide communication to parents as we go through this journey together.  Please let me know if there is anything I can do to help make this a great year for our students and their families!

Sincerely,

Scott McFarland
Heritage Principal

Registration Day

2014 School Registration

Welcome to the 2014-2015 school year!  We look forward to seeing all of our students and families at the upcoming enrollment day.  Heritage registration will be next Thursday, July 24^th from 11:00 am to 7:00 pm in the Heritage library.  With construction still going on, we will be using the temporary entrance on the west side of the building.

A major change this year for the Olathe Public Schools is our student information system.  Parents will have access through ParentVue to grades and other general information.  For security reasons, each parent (one for mom and one for dad) will receive a form with his/her individual access code to access this information in the enrollment packet.  This security code will need to be activated within 60 days of enrollment.  If there are extenuating circumstances in your family that you feel we should know about (i.e. parents are divorced and only one parent has custody) please contact Cindy Blachly at cjblachlyht@olatheschools.org so that we can make adjustments prior to registration day.  If you have questions regarding who should have access and who shouldn’t, please see myself, Kelly McGonegle (our counselor) or Cindy Blachly on the day of registration.  With this being a new process, we will need to work through some logistics that come with any new procedure.  We are excited about having a new information system with many new options available to parents.

Construction is moving along nicely, however there will be parts of the building that may not be complete until right before school begins.  I know our students will be excited about the new lockers that are already in!  We will update parents on the status of our building as we get closer to the start of school.

Important Dates:
Thursday, July 24^th 11:00-7:00 – Enrollment in Library
Tuesday, August 12^th 5:30-6:30 – Sneak-A-Peek
Wednesday, August 13^th – First ½ day of school for grades 1-5 (11:40 dismissal)
Thursday, August 14^th – First full day of school for all grades
Thursday, August 28^th – Back to School Night: PK – Grade 2 (6:30-7:00) and Grades 3- 5 (7:15-7:45)

Staffing Updates:
Breanna Jesseph will be replacing Jessica Freund in First Grade,
Katy Streeter is replacing Deann Lovell as our half-time resource teacher,
Heather Moss will be our half-day kindergarten teacher,
Keri Hicks will be replacing Joy Wray as School Nurse

I look forward to seeing all the returning Hound Dogs to HT as well as welcoming many new students and their families to Heritage.  The 2014-2015 school year will be a great one as we work together to create a wonderful culture of learning for our kids!

Scott McFarland
Principal

Online Advance Fee Payment

Online Advance Fee Payment

The opportunity to pay fees in advance for next school year will again be available this summer.  Information concerning this early fee payment option will be sent home with your elementary student on the last day of school in the report card envelope along with a school supply list.  Fees for next year may be paid online starting Monday, July 14 or in person at Registration Day on July 24.

Class Placement for Next Year

Class Placement

A great deal of time and effort goes into making class placements for the following school year.  Many factors are considered and the process is both lengthy and challenging at times.  In order to make the best placement for all Heritage students in a fair and consistent manner we have developed a process through which you will have the opportunity to give us important information about your child if you would like to provide input for the following year.  Because of the increased number of teacher specific requests it has become necessary to develop a different system that is fair and equitable to all students.  We no longer accept requests for specific teachers.  We know that as your child’s first teacher you have valuable input when it comes to your child’s education.  Therefore, we have developed a method for you to provide us with that information without naming a specific teacher. 

 

Each spring an article and the request form (see below) will be on this Heritage website notifying all parents of the opportunity to provide this input.  This information will be considered when making placements for the next school year.  All requests for specific teachers or information containing the name of a specific teacher will not be honored.  All information submitted to the school office by the deadline on the form (May 9th) will be taken into consideration.  Thank you.

 http://teachers.olatheschools.com/smcfarland/document/

Olathe Public Library Summer Programs

Olathe Public Library Summer Reading Programs

Be sure to go to the link and see what's available at the libraries this summer!http://olathelibrary.org/kids

Math Wings

Math Wings

 

Students in fourth and fifth grade have the opportunity to practice and compete in Math Wings after school during the year. 

Kimberlynne, Allie, Connor, Raymond, and Julianna placed in the regional competition at Havencroft Elementary on April 8th.  They represented Heritage well at the Olathe District Competition at Olathe North High School on Tuesday, April 15^th.  Way to go!

Message from the Principal

Change

Construction: I want to send out a big THANK YOU to our community for your flexibility and patience with the construction taking place at Heritage.  Welcoming 318 students to our building each day and making sure 318 students get home safely is our priority.  Your understanding as we iron out some wrinkles is greatly appreciated.   Construction crews finished up most of the demolition this weekend and are now ready to start the building process.  Our students did a great job of tuning out the noise from the jackhammers and staying focused on learning. 

Staffing: We have a few staffing changes for the 2014-2015 school year.  Jessica Freund, first grade teacher, will be moving on to another role in education.  Due to a reduction in numbers for 5^th grade next year, and a need for an additional 3^rd grade, Jay Parsons will be moving to 3^rd grade.  With the number of incoming kindergarten students, Heritage will have 2 full day kindergarten classes and one half day class.

ELL: Heritage will be the new home for an English Language Learner (ELL) classroom.  Regency Place Elementary is currently the ELL site for approximately 90 students from 15 different schools, bussing children from as far away as Madison Place Elementary.  Heritage will welcome 25-30 of those 90 students from 8 different schools.  We will serve our own students who currently go to Regency Place (8 students), plus the ELL students from Arbor Creek, Black Bob, Briarwood, Brougham, Green Springs, Madison Place, Scarborough and Sunnyside.  Patrice Miller, who is currently an ELL teacher at Regency Place, will be our new ELL teacher.  We are excited to have her, along with her experience and expertise, join us next year.

As you can tell, we have many changes happening at Heritage.  Please let me know if you have questions regarding those or anything else.  Thanks again for your understanding throughout our construction process.