Dear Families,

The Wynantskill UFSD learned this week of 3 positive Covid-19 cases, all elementary students. Please monitor your children for any symptoms of COVID-19 and report any absences and positive COVID-19 test results to our school nurse Tricia Gibbs at 518-283-4600.

As a reminder, the school district has moved to a weekly notification email to parents and guardians (rather than sending emails as cases happen. Families of children identified as a close contact at school will continue to receive a phone call from school personnel, consistent with what we have done throughout the pandemic.

Thank you all for your continued support and ongoing efforts to keep Wynantskill UFSD safe and healthy. Please do not hesitate to reach out to me directly with any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,

Dr. Mary Yodis
Wynantskill UFSD Superintendent

This report highlights some of the amazing things happening in our library.

On Wednesday, we will be celebrating February 2, 2022. This is known as “Two’s Day” (2-2-22). This is the only year this will happen “two” times – Wednesday, 2-2-22 and Tuesday, 2-22-22 during Winter Break. We will be participating in a few fun activities as a school community during the day. We hope your child(ren) can participate in “Twin Day” on Wednesday. Each class will be assigned a color to wear (shirt, pants, hair bow, sneakers, socks…anything you have). See who your Grade level twin will be!

• Pre-K/4th Grade: Red
• Kindergarten/5th Grade: Orange
• 1st Grade/6th Grade: Yellow
• 2nd Grade/7th Grade: Green
• 3rd Grade/ 8th Grade: Blue

[embeddoc url=”https://www.wynantskillufsd.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Twos-Day.pdf”]

Today is National Fun at Work Day. At Gardner-Dickinson, it was known as “GD Game Day.” Students and staff enjoyed trivia and bingo games over the intercom, which included some great prizes from our PTA. The school was also treated to a lunchtime concert by Technology Specialist Anthony Vescio and donated ice cream soda floats from Hannaford, homemade ice cream cookie sandwiches, pretzels, and popcorn. Thank you to our students and staff for coming together to build community and end the week for some fun activities.

Middle School Rocks pic.twitter.com/48UIp9xcv6

— Mary Yodis (@GDSuper_Yodis) January 28, 2022

Trivia winners! pic.twitter.com/64iGGOBWGD

— Mary Yodis (@GDSuper_Yodis) January 28, 2022

Dear Families,

The Wynantskill UFSD learned this week of 8 positive Covid-19 cases, including 5 elementary students and 3 middle school students. Please monitor your child(ren) for any symptoms of COVID-19 and report any absences and positive COVID-19 test results to our school nurse Tricia Gibbs at 518-283-4600.

As a reminder, the school district has moved to a weekly notification email to parents and guardians (rather than sending emails as cases happen. Families of children identified as a close contact at school will continue to receive a phone call from school personnel, consistent with what we have done throughout the pandemic.

Thank you all for your continued support and ongoing efforts to keep Wynantskill UFSD safe and healthy. Please do not hesitate to reach out to me directly with any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,

Dr. Mary Yodis
Wynantskill UFSD Superintendent

Please note the following test schedule at Gardner-Dickinson:

• January 11th NYS MathTest Simulation – Third through Eighth Grade
• January 12th NWEA ELA – Kindergarten through Eighth grade
• January 13th NWEA Math – Kindergarten through Eighth grade
• January 14th NWEA make ups
• February 2nd NAEP Reading and Math – Eighth grade

October is National Principals Month – we want to take this opportunity to thank Principal Cornell for her tireless efforts to create an enriched and engaging educational experience for all students at Gardner-Dickinson School.

Fun fact: Mrs. Cornell is an avid bird enthusiast with seven bird feeders at home. Her favorites are cardinals and yellow finches.

Our entire faculty and staff including bus drivers and teacher’s aides met yesterday to discuss this year’s safety procedures and policies surrounding COVID-19, participate in safety trainings from Questar III BOCES and technology training on the new devices for students.

Today, we met to talk about teaching all students. We had a three-hour presentation on response to intervention services and special education from Jennifer Elliott, a special education training specialist at the Capital District Regional Partnership Center. We also received technology training on new IXL software for students in math, ELA and science. This software program can provide remediation and enrichment to all students Grades Pre-K through 8 at school and/or home.

Our teachers are coming back for one more day of training next week before our students arrive. Next week we will focus on social emotional learning and supports for students as well as more technology training and discussion about any updated COVID-19 protocols.