Dear Harbor Families,

For every teacher and student I have ever known (and in 22 years in the profession of education, I have known many), this moment just before the beginning of the school year is one of great anticipation - a feeling of both excitement and nervousness. This week, one of our teachers described feeling a bit like “the energizer bunny”. We have all been working hard to prepare for a great year ahead, while engaging in trainings, professional development, and building community as a faculty.

At Harbor, it is our job to ensure that every single day, your child feels safe and included in school, and is learning the important skills and dispositions for their future - not just in the next grade level or when they leave Harbor for third grade - but for a lifetime. We take this responsibility very seriously. Since last week, the faculty and staff have engaged in:

• CPR and first aid training
  
• Health and child protection trainings
• Detailed review of our emergency preparedness procedures
• Technology trainings
• Professional development on literacy and phonics instruction
• Professional development on design thinking at the KID Museum
• Reflection and forward-looking planning based on spring parent survey results
• Review of our faculty handbook, protocols, and procedures
• Classroom set-up, finalizing schedules, and preparing for the first weeks
• Sharing meals and conversation

As you can see, we’ve been busy!

Please share with your children that as I write this letter, I have that nervous/excited feeling in my own tummy, so if they do too, that’s okay! As you are making your final preparations for Tuesday morning, please refer to this Beginning of the Year Announcements and Logistics document for information, forms, and more. We look forward to greeting many of you tomorrow morning at 10:00 AM for our classroom visits followed by popsicles on the playground!

Warm regards,

Leah