Lea Express for Friday, April 5

Posted on April 15, 2019
Categories: Lea Express

IMPORTANT DATES

Monday, April 8
PBIS Movie Trips for Grades 7-8 (TBD) and Grades K-2 (Monday, April 8)

Monday, April 8
HSA Fundraiser at Chipotle at 3925 Walnut Street from 4-8 PM

Friday, April 12
Half Day Early Dismissal, 12:09 pm
PSSA Pep Rally, 11:00 am – 12:00 pm
Spring Concert, 4:00 – 5:30 pm, Philadelphia Episcopal Cathedral (23 S. 38th St.)

April 18, 19 and 22
Spring Recess: Schools Closed

SCHOOL EVENTS & ACTIVITIES

Lea Book Fair!
Thank you for a successful Book Fair, and to our HSA for running it!  Our students enjoyed the opportunity to peruse and purchase books!

Academic Parent Teacher Teams (APTT)
Thank you to all of the families that came out for our finally APTT meeting of the year!  This has been a fantastic year for our Academic Parent Teacher Teams.  We look forward to continuing this initiative into the 2019-2020 School Year!

PBIS Field Trips
We had an overwhelming number of students that wanted to attend so we’ve scheduled a separate trip for our 7-8 grade students.  We are currently planning their trip and will keep families and students posted.

On Monday, April 8th, our Grades K-2 students will have their PBIS trip. The cost for the field trip is 150 Lea bucks and there are only 100 spots available for each trip.  Please make sure your student has communicated with their teacher if they meet the criteria and would like to go.

Testing Reminder
The Pennsylvania State Standardized Assessment (PSSA) for 3rd through 8th grades is as follows:

  • English Language Arts:  Monday, April 15th through Wednesdays, April 18th
  • Math:  Monday, April 29th and Tuesday, April 30th
  • Science (4th and 8th grades only): Wednesday, May 1st and Thursday, May 2nd

We will have our PSSA Pep Rally on Friday, April 12th during the half day.  Please encourage all of students to try their best!

AFTER-SCHOOL PROGRAM INFORMATION

Lea After-School Program

  • The last day for Robotics will be April 24th.
  • The last day for all other after school programs will be May 31st.

FAMI-LEA INFORMATION

School Advisory Council (SAC)
Our Lea SAC met on Wednesday, April 3rd from 4:30-6:00 pm in the Lea Library. The SAC meet to discuss the finalized budget, facilities, registration, and to update the parent compact and goals for next year.  We learned that Lea is indeed losing funding for next year and we intend to ask for help from our community partners to supplement some of the supports that we are using this year and losing next year.  The reason we have lost this funding is because we moved up in our School Progress Report ranking with the District and the Pennsylvania Department of Education, and because our teachers and students have made such strong progress over the past two years.  Congratulations students, teachers, and staff!!!

We also learned that the L wing will be torn down this summer and all classes taking place there will be moved into the main building.  We are not sure if there will be a replacement but there will be additional work to clean up our school facilities over the summer. The Lea SAC is also concerned about the poor conditions in our cafeteria as well as the poor quality of the food that our students are served.

We also discussed the kindergarten enrollment: we have approximately 50 Kindergarten students registered so far from the Lea and Penn Alexander Catchment, and School Selection. Lea continues to be a popular transfer school.

We also heard about the success of the student council and parent events that have occurred in addition to the ongoing study about how our many partners are integrated into our school community.

Finally, we discussed the parent compact and made suggestions for how to spend the parent portion of our Title 1 funding.

The parents and guardians of the Lea SAC are pledging to ask difficult questions of our district and our City Council to make them explain why we were penalized financially for our academic success and why our cafeteria and school building remain in such poor shape.  If you’d like to join our fight, please email Molly McGlone, mcglone.molly@gmail.com.

Upcoming SAC meeting dates: 5/8/19

Home & School Association (HSA)
HSA meetings will be held on the third Wednesday of each month during the rest of the school year. The next HSA meeting is on Wednesday, April 10th at 3:30 pm in Room 106.

The HSA has a fundraiser planned on Monday, April 8th, from 4:00-8:00 pm at the Chipotle restaurant at 3925 Walnut Street. Bring the attached flyer with you OR tell the cashier that you’re supporting Lea Elementary School so that Lea can receive 33% of the sales between 4:00-8:00 pm!

The HSA is selling Lea swag as a fundraiser! We have “be-LEA-ve” t-shirts as well as Lea pop sockets and stickers! Ask an HSA officer or email us at leahomeandschool@gmail.com. Baseball T’s are $15, regular T’s are $10, and pop sockets are $3.

Upcoming HSA meeting dates: 4/10/19, 5/15/19

Updated SDP Volunteer Policy
The clearance requirement for chaperones attending trips was recently updated by the Board of Education.

All field trip and chaperone activities require Volunteer Paperwork to be on file in the school’s Main Office.  That means you’ll need clearances to be a chaperone.

If you have additional questions or concerns regarding the volunteer clearance process, please reach out to the District’s Family and Community Engagement Office at volunteer@philasd.org or (215) 400-4180.

You can also speak with Mr. Brown (antbrown001@gmail.com) or Mr. Rich (rjliuzzi@gse.upenn.edu).