HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

Happy Holidays!
On behalf of all the staff at HBB, we would like to wish you a very Happy Holidays! We hope you all have a great break and we will see you all next year!

BOXTOPS
The following classes are the winners of the BOXTOPS competition!  They collected more BOXTOPS than any other class at their grade and each of these classes will be receiving a special trophy and their name on a plaque that will be hanging in the main office.  We will be giving out the trophy during each community meeting...... Mrs. Kaufman's class received theirs last week!

In total we raised $1667.50!  Thank you to everyone who helped collect BOXTOPS and congratulations to our winners....great job!

Grade 1 - Bartlett (overall winner!)

Grade 2 - Enos

Grade 3 - Hickie

Grade 4 - McPherson

Grade 5 - Kaufman

PARCC
The School Committee has voted  to administer the paper and pencil version of PARCC at the Elementary Schools this year to all students in grades 3-5 for ELA and Math, a move we fully support.  There is much confusion out there in regards to the state of testing in Massachusetts but I would like to take a brief moment to catch everyone up to speed, provide a few helpful links and explain the decision.

You may have heard in the news that the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education has scrapped PARCC in favor of MCAS 2.0.  While this is accurate, what is not fully understood is the fact that MCAS 2.0 has yet to be developed, thus making this year a transition year.  The State has allowed school districts to choose between traditional MCAS and PARCC for this year but they are strongly encouraging districts to choose PARCC because it is much more comparable to what we will see on MCAS 2.0 and making the change now will better prepare students over the long term.

We agree that moving to PARCC now gives our students the best chance to succeed over time.    Moving to PARCC gives our students and staff the opportunity to experience the kind of test and questions that they will have moving forward.  PARCC, and eventually MCAS 2.0 are much different than traditional MCAS and we want to ensure that our students are prepared to succeed by the time they need to pass the test in order to graduate, and we believe this is an important first step.  We also believe that our students are ready and prepared for this test and we are confident that all all go well.

As I have said in years past with MCAS, this is just one assessment.  While we certainly take it very seriously, at this grade level it is more informational for us as a school than it is for each individual student.  We know prior to taking the test how each student is doing and we do not read too much into any one student's performance on the test.  Student grades are not connected to the test results and we also do not believe it paints the whole picture of a schools' performance.  We will also continue to administer MCAS Science to grade 5 (all districts in the state have to administer MCAS Science).

You will hear much more from me moving forward about this but if you are interested in learning more information about PARCC and the chance please check out some of the following links.

http://www.parcconline.org/resources/parent-resources

http://www.doe.mass.edu/mcas/decisionfaq.html

Character Word of the Week
Congratulations to our winners this week!