We have some wonderful additions to the West Middle Team! Here the "who's who" of our new staff members.

• Victor Impink - Long-term Substitute for Mrs. Crossley
• Emmanuelle Njiba-Kanoni - French Teacher
• Josh Shenker - Engineering Teacher
• Jiali Briggs - School Psychologist
• Kara Saranich - Special Ed Team Facilitator
• Michael Messina - Social Worker

Thank you to everyone who has reviewed and successfully implemented our drop-off and pick-up plans. If you have not had the chance to to review this process, click the link below.

This process helps us keep all of our students safe and expedite the traffic flow.

* As a reminder, no drop-offs should occur near the back courts.

This year’s Open House is scheduled to begin on Thursday, September 11th at 5:30pm in the WMS Auditorium, and should conclude at 7:15pm. While we greatly enjoy spending time with your students during the day, the Open House is geared towards adults.

During this informative event you will be introduced to some over-arching goals and themes for the school this year, hear from our multi-team teachers (World Language, IA, and PE), and then follow a schedule through your student's four on-team classes. The schedule for the four classrooms you will visit will come home with your student on Wednesday, September 10th.

In addition to meeting your student’s teachers, the true goal of the evening is to introduce you to the curriculum and skills your students will be learning this year. As we are still getting to know all our students, we ask you please follow the structure and schedule, understanding that this evening is not intended for parent-teacher conferences.

Please watch for the schedule that will be coming home with your student next Wednesday. We look forward to seeing everyone on Thursday, September 11th at 5:30pm in the WMS auditorium.

As part of the new WIN program (additional enrichments or interventions) across all three middle schools, we are collecting some feedback and input from our students on their general interests. While there is no guarantee we can address all their interests, this information may be helpful to their teachers as we rotate through four different WIN cycles this year.

Attached to this email is a list of the subjects and activities that students will rank from 1-5 on an online form, depending upon their personal interests. We just wanted to share this information with you in case this comes up in a discussion with your student over the next couple of weeks. As a part of next week’s Open House, we will be explaining our WIN block and our new Power classes. We look forward to seeing you all there.

Now that the first week of school is behind us, we want to thank all APS families who have already verified and updated their student’s information. If you haven’t done so yet, please take a moment to complete this important task through our secure online portal, Family Connection.

This information includes your child’s emergency contacts, medical information, demographics, technology usage agreement, as well as acknowledging other district policies. Using Family Connection helps streamline communication and significantly reduces the amount of paperwork for families. Most importantly, it ensures we have the most up-to-date information for your child in the event of an emergency.

This system is accessible through the Aspen Family Portal. Once you have logged into Aspen, click on the link under the Announcements on the Home page that reads ‘Family Connection – Back to School Forms’. You will be redirected to the Family Connection "Verification Form" page which contains directions on how to complete and submit the forms. If you need help, please refer to the – Aspen Family/Student Portal page on the APS website.