Category Archives: PTO Update

PTO Update 6.19.23

Hi L-E Families,

We have had a fun-filled end of the year with a successful Fun Run raising over $14k!! Thank you to all who donated, shared the link to donate, and came to cheer our kids on. This will ensure the PTO will be able to continue Creative Arts & Sciences programs, support our teachers through mini grants, show appreciation to our staff, and continue to hold community events at our school next year. Our first Family Art Night was a huge success, Celebration Day was rain-free, and we bid our 5th graders a huge congratulations at their graduation.

Our wonderful teacher representatives, Sarah Jang and Jen Terrazzino would like to share their last words of the year:

It has been an amazing year of building community at Lincoln-Eliot! Dr. Morse led us in bringing new initiatives to life this year. We started LEAP groups – cross grade level groups of students and teachers that meet monthly – which quickly became a time everyone looked forward to. Students voted on an official LEAPs song, and danced their way to their group each month. We are excited to welcome new Kindergartners to our groups next year! Another new community event we enjoyed was monthly assemblies planned by 5th Grade Student Council and Dr. Morse. They highlighted a grade level each time we met. Professionally, the staff focused on building expertise in teaching in a way that values each student’s culture and the unique experiences, strengths and learning styles they bring to the classroom. Finally, thanks to you all, we are able to enjoy rich educational programs that supplemented all of the hard work in the classroom. The staff cannot thank you enough for all you do for our Leopards! Have a wonderful summer!

PTO Update – May 26, 2023

Hello families!

We are racing toward the end of the year – it’s hard to believe there’s less than a month of school left!  There are a lot of exciting events coming up, so please read through this whole newsletter to make sure you don’t miss any of them.  In particular, please mark your calendars for our last PTO meeting on June 5th and Family Art Night on June 8th, and please sign up to volunteer for Celebration Day!

One note about upcoming events: unfortunately, this year, we are pausing Multicultural Night (also known as International Night) for the spring, with the hope of possibly bringing it back in the fall.

Multicultural Night, previously scheduled for Wednesday, May 31, has been a labor of love brought to us entirely by the Lincoln-Eliot staff for many years.  It requires a significant amount of time and resources outside of the school day in order to plan and prepare for the event, and we are so grateful to our teachers for dedicating their energy and enthusiasm to keeping it going all these years.

As you may know, Newton educators are currently in contract negotiations with the School Committee.  In an effort to have a successor contract signed before the current contract expires, Newton educators are participating in a number of actions, including one-day-per-week work-to-rule.  You may have seen Lincoln-Eliot educators walking into the school together, in their NTA t-shirts, on Wednesday mornings, right at the start of the contractual work day.  One-day-a-week work-to-rule means that, on Wednesdays, they are working only the contractual hours and not before or after those hours.

This means that a number of events scheduled in the last weeks of school were adjusted to ensure our community could still have as many of our usual end-of-year events as possible!  The staff made accommodations for our wonderful 4th and 5th grade concerts this week and will also make sure Celebration Day runs as planned, while Family Art Night was moved to a Thursday.  Multicultural Night was the only one that had to be paused altogether, due to the amount of work and outside time involved.  But it is an event beloved by the staff and community, and we look forward to holding it again as soon as possible!

For more information about the contract negotiations, please see this flyer or contact our Lincoln-Eliot Newton Teachers Association representatives, Lynn Penczar and Ariana Foster.

The PTO is also hoping to hold an end-of-year picnic on the playground in late June with a smaller version of the wonderful International Night potluck – stay tuned for more information, and if you’re interested in helping to make that happen, please reach out to us at secretary@lepto.org!

Upcoming Dates to Note:

* Monday, May 29th:  No School (Memorial Day)
* Thursday, June 1st:  Lincoln-Eliot Fun Run
* Friday, June 2nd:  5th grade field trip to the Ecotarium
* Monday, June 5th:  PTO meeting (via Zoom)
* Wednesday, June 7th:  Celebration Day!
* Thursday, June 8th:  Family Art Night!
* Friday, June 9th:  Step Up Day for 5th grade
* Thursday, June 15th:  5th grade graduation
* Monday, June 19th:  No School (Juneteenth)
* Wednesday, June 21st:  Last day of school (Half day; 12:10 dismissal)

Have a great long weekend!

Your Lincoln-Eliot PTO

PTO Update – December 12, 2022

Hello families!

Book Fair Week is here!  Hooray!  We hope you get a chance to stop by the Lincoln-Eliot library to visit our book fair — we’ll be open for shopping from 8-8:30am and for an hour after school Monday through Thursday this week.  We’re also gathering wish lists from the kids all week — you’ll see a copy coming home and we’ll have a copy of each list available in the library as well!

And of course we’ll be in full swing on Thursday night for our Books and Cookies Pajama Party!  Join us from 5-8pm for free cookies and cocoa, crafts and scavenger hunts, pizza for sale, and a chance to celebrate reading with your Lincoln-Eliot friends.  You can also buy books for your teachers’ classroom libraries from their wish lists and do some holiday shopping!

We’ll also be having a parent/principal coffee on Wednesday morning, 8-8:40am in the library and would love to see you there.  And don’t forget Wednesday is Dress Like a Book Character Day!  If you need ideas, check out https://tinyurl.com/LECharacterDay for inspiration!

Thank you so so much to everyone who has signed up to volunteer and everyone who came to help on Friday — we appreciate you very much!  There’s still time to sign up if you want to come help during your child’s library time or if you can bring cookies or do a shift during the Thursday night event.  Sign up to volunteer here!:  https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10c094caaae2ca4f4c43-2022

Finally, if you don’t have a chance to make it into the book fair, you can still support the school by shopping online until Dec. 23.  Find our online fair and more information at https://bookfairs.scholastic.com/bf/lincolneliot

Email Tui or Jenny anytime with questions!  Thank you all for supporting our school and celebrating books with us!

Upcoming Dates to Note:

* Wednesday, Dec. 14th:  Dress Like a Book Character Day
* Wednesday, Dec. 14th:  Parent/Principal Coffee 8 – 8:40am
* Thursday, Dec. 15th:  Books and Cookies Pajama Party, 5-8pm
* December 26 – January 2:  December Break, No School
* Monday, Jan. 16th:  Martin Luther King Jr. Day, No School
* Wednesday, January 25th: 4th Grade (5:45pm) and 5th Grade Concert (7:00pm)

Have a wonderful week!

Your Lincoln-Eliot PTO

PTO Update – November 13, 2022

Hi L-E families!

We have a busy week and a half coming up between now and Thanksgiving, so please read through this whole newsletter to make sure you don’t miss anything!  We’d love to see anyone who can make it to our Flannels and Fizz get-together on Tuesday, K & 1st grade families at our playground playdate on Wednesday, and everyone who can join us for our PTO meeting next Monday night over Zoom, as well as the in-person feeder pattern meeting at Lincoln-Eliot on Monday morning.

And coming up in December, mark your calendars for the return of Lincoln-Eliot Book Fair — we will be inside this year, not out in the cold, we promise!  🙂  We’ll be celebrating books and reading from Friday, Dec. 9th through Thursday, Dec. 15th, including our Books and Cookies PJ Party on Thursday night.  If you’re interested in joining the team to help make the book fair happen, please email us at secretary@lepto.org.

 

Upcoming Dates to Note:

* Tuesday, Nov. 15th:  Parents’ Night Out at Cafe Martin, 8-10pm — details below!
* Wednesday, Nov. 16th:  K & 1st grade family playdate on the L-E playground after school, 12:20pm
* Monday, Nov. 21st: Lincoln-Eliot Feeder Pattern Discussion, 8:15am, in-person
* Monday, Nov. 21st: L-E PTO Meeting over Zoom, 6:30pm
* November 24-25th:  Thanksgiving — No School
* Thursday, December 8th:  Early Release Day; students are dismissed at 12:10pm

Have a wonderful week!

Your Lincoln-Eliot PTO

PTO Update — October 30, 2022

Hello families!

It was so much fun to see so many families at our Fall Festival on Friday!  We loved having our community back together celebrating, and we hope everyone enjoyed the games, baked goods, raffles, and dancing!  An enormous special thanks to Lanni Harris for making it all happen this year; to Ms. Ramos, our amazing DJ; and to Heather Yu and our teachers for coordinating the teacher raffles.  And a really heartfelt thank you to all our volunteers (including the amazing 7th grade alums who came back to help!).  We mean it very sincerely when we say we couldn’t do this without you, and we appreciate you so much!

       

The next event we need volunteers for is our Election Day Bake Sale on Nov. 8th, which is an easy, low-time-commitment way to raise money for the school!  Sign up to donate baked goods or man the table for half an hour at this link:  https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10c094caaae2ca4f4c43-election

It was great to see people at our parent coffee this week, too, despite the misty weather.  We hope to fit in another one before the weather gets too cold — and keep an eye out for our upcoming PTO meeting and our book fair in December!

We also want to make sure that everyone at Lincoln-Eliot is aware of possible middle school feeder changes under discussion by the School Committee, as mentioned in Principal Morse’s newsletter and emails.  There were two proposals outlined at the SC meeting on Thursday:

Option #1: Starting Sept 2023, all graduating Lincoln-Eliot 5th graders will go to Day instead of Bigelow (while all Cabot students go to Bigelow)

Option #2: Starting Sept 2023, the 5th grade Cabot class will be divided between Bigelow and Day depending on where a student lives, while all L-E students continue to go to Bigelow

The School Committee is planning to vote on these options on December 5th, so there is a limited time frame for community feedback.  The meeting for Lincoln-Eliot families to hear and discuss the proposals will be on Zoom this Tuesday, Nov. 1 at 7pm:

Link to join: stream.lexikeet.com/newton

We strongly encourage families to attend this meeting to ensure that the Lincoln-Eliot  community understands and has a voice in this decision!  Parents/guardians are also welcome to attend the School Committee meeting on November 7, 2022 and share feedback.  Please reach out to us or Principal Morse if you have any questions.

Upcoming Dates to Note:

* Tuesday, Nov. 1st: Lincoln-Eliot Feeder Pattern Parent/Caregiver Discussion, 7pm
* Tuesday, Nov. 8th:  Election Day and Early Release Day; students are dismissed at 12:10pm (make sure to stop by our Election Day Bake Sale!)
* Friday, Nov. 11th:  Veterans’ Day — No School
* Tuesday, Nov. 15th:  Parents’ Night Out / Flannels & Fizz at Cafe Martin, 8-10pm — details below!
* November 24-25th:  Thanksgiving — No School

Have a wonderful week!

Your Lincoln-Eliot PTO