Dear South School Families,
WELCOME BACK AND HAPPY ANNIVERSARY! This year, we celebrate South School’s 75th Anniversary of educating children in New Canaan! This is such a wonderful time in our “pawsome” school’s history, and we are hoping to have some very special celebrations throughout the year to celebrate this milestone!
We certainly hope that your summer was restful, relaxing, and filled with exciting and happy family memories! As we do each summer, the central offices staff, our building administrative team and assistants, our maintenance and custodial staff, and many others, have been working diligently to prepare the building for the new school year. Our dedicated teachers have started to return this week to prepare their classrooms and create a welcoming learning environment for their new class of students for the upcoming school year!
You may have mixed feelings about returning and having a new teacher, a new mix of classmates, and even meeting some very new friends. However, we are confident that it will be an excellent year! Below, we have included some important information to help you begin your transition back to a new exciting school year.
PLACEMENT
We know all of you are eager to receive placement information; placement will be sent via email this coming Tuesday, August 19th. To ensure the work that our faculty and administration engaged in to create balanced classes, changes in placement cannot be made.
ENROLLMENT UPDATE:
This year, we are starting the school year with 489 students, a dozen more than last year. This includes 99 new kindergarteners and 21 new students across grades one through four. The 489 students are broken down by grade as follows:
Kindergarten - 99 students in 5 sections,
Grade 1 - 89 students in 5 sections,
Grade 2 - 97 students in 5 sections,
Grade 3 - 109 students in 6 sections,
and Grade 4 - 95 students in 5 sections.
This enrollment represents the same number of sections, twenty-six, with a decrease of one section at grade 2 and an increase of one section at grade 3.
STAFF UPDATES:
As is the case each year, we have had some staff changes for a variety of reasons.
We welcome the following new staff to South School this year:
Ellie Leslie is our new Technology Integrator
Hannah Nichols is our long-term substitute SPED Resource Teacher (covering Danielle Oliva who is on maternity and child-rearing leave for the year).
Fiona Brady is our long-term substitute for Adrienne Woodard from August through December.
Kerry Needle (former East School teacher and current South parent) joins Jen Eldredge as a second district classroom coach, joining Jennifer Eldredge.
Rinku Ghadiyali is a new SPED teaching assistant. You will know Rinku from the Right At School Program.
Gretchen Murphy is a new SPED teaching assistant.
Maddie Bombard is our new graduate intern.
Suzanne DelCarmine is our new SPED secretary.
Courtney Caudill is returning as our building substitute.
Jacqueline Gonzales and Nancy Cartagena join our kitchen staff, replacing Mayra Garcia, the kitchen manager, until a full-time manager is hired.
We are currently in the hiring process to find a new regular education teaching assistant to replace a very recent resignation.
ELEMENTARY SCHOOL HOURS:
The instructional day for students is 8:40 a.m. to 3:10 p.m. Students can begin arriving at 8:30 a.m. and report to their classrooms. Buses will also begin arriving as early as 8:25. You will receive a letter from the transportation department about your child’s bus information soon, with the bus stop location and times for pick-up and drop-off. Every year, it takes a week or two for bus routes to settle out, and we respectfully ask for a little extra patience during this time. As a neighborhood school, we do have a lot of walkers and bikers.
Please talk to your children about using the sidewalks and crosswalks for safety. We also encourage all eligible students who are not walkers or bikers to ride the bus to help reduce the amount of traffic around and on campus at drop-off and pick-up times.
PICK UP AREA FOR KINDERGARTEN AND GRADE 1 WALKERS
To alleviate traffic on the bus platform at dismissal, the pick-up area for Kindergarten and Grade 1 Walkers is located at the double doors to the right of the original South School sign and the Be Your Best Self vinyl banner on the Gower Road side of the building. This is the area where the storage trailers used to be located. Older siblings in Grades 2 through 4 meeting younger kindergarten or Grade 1 siblings to walk home with them will be directed to exit through the bus platform doors and walk around the north wing to sign out their siblings at this new location. No parents will be allowed on the bus platform during dismissal to facilitate a safer and more efficient bus loading process.
EARLY BIRD PROGRAM
South School offers an Early Bird Program for a fee, which allows working parents to drop off their children as early as 7:30 a.m. Information about the Early Bird Program can be found on the South School website by clicking on Menu, then Parent Resources, and then Early Bird Program, or call our school administrative assistant, Ms. Traci Pascarella, at 203-594-4300.
GRADES 1-4 MEET & GREET SESSIONS:
We will host our annual Meet and Greet opportunity for all students in GRADES 1 - 4 on Monday, August 25th, from 10:30 to 11:00 a.m. in the classrooms. Adults must have a valid photo ID to enter the building for this brief visit.
KINDERGARTEN MEET & GREET SESSIONS:
A separate letter will be sent to all kindergarten parents explaining our Kindergarten Meet and Greet sessions for kindergarten students, which will be held on Tuesday, August 26th.
NEW TO SOUTH SCHOOL TOURS:
For families new to South School, our PTC will conduct tours of the building on Monday, August 25th, from 9:30 to 10:30 a.m., just prior to the Meet and Greet sessions for Grades 1-4. Please enter through the main entrance.
POPSICLE PLAYDATES FOR STUDENTS NEW TO SOUTH & ALL INCOMING KINDERGARTENERS:
All new students are welcome to come to the South playgrounds on Friday, August 22nd, from 3:00 to 4:00 p.m. This is a great opportunity for students and parents to meet other new South families, so they will know a few familiar faces on the first day of school. Kindergartners will meet on the playground in front of the school (off Farm Road), while new students in grades 1-4 will meet on the Lower Playground behind the school (off Gower Road). Families with children at both levels will have to visit both playgrounds.
FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL:
The first full day of school for all students in Grades 1 through 4 is Tuesday, August 26th. It is a full day of school for these grades from 8:40 a.m. to 3:10 p.m.
The first FULL day of school for Kindergarten students is Wednesday, August 27th - 8:40 a.m. to 3:10 p.m. (Please see the separate Kindergarten Parent Letter for the Kindergarten Meet and Greet Schedule for Tuesday, August 26th.)
PTC - PAWSOME PARTNERS IN OUR WORK:
Please read the email communication from the South School PTC that was sent out yesterday. Their mailing will have more information for all families about their work and many exciting upcoming events as we launch this new school year.
SOUTH SCHOOL STUDENT/PARENT HANDBOOK:
We will be sending home a hard copy of The South School Parent/Student Handbook - one per family with your only or oldest child during the first week of school. It can also be accessed online on the South School website by clicking on Menu, Student Resources, and then Student Handbook.
We are all so very excited to welcome our new students and families to South School, and of course, we are excited to see all of our returning scholars and their families back at school for the 2025-2026 school year! See you very soon!
Respectfully,
Matt Kascak, Principal Siobhan McCormack, Assistant Principal