I would like to welcome students, staff, parents/guardians, families, volunteers, and our community partners to the 2019-2020 school year. The beginning of the school year is always an exciting time but this year certainly started like no other thanks to Hurricane Dorian! I would like to thank our Operations staff and school administrators who battened down the hatches at our school sites in advance of the storm. I would also like to thank the many crews who worked to restore power to our schools and communities in the SRCE and throughout the province. As we start the new school year, there are many opportunities to be part of meaningful improvements for our students. As always, our focus will continue to be on working together to support our students’ achievement, overall success and well-being. Please see Page 2 of this Report for more information on the details of our system improvement and educational business planning. Through my monthly reports, I will continue to share with you the many initiatives and activities that highlight and celebrate the great work of our students and staff in the Strait Region that are integral to supporting and improving student learning and achievement for all of our students. As always, I encourage you to keep an eye for some of our school and regional celebrations in print, on our website (www.srce.ca) and via the SRCE twitter (@SRCE_NS). I wish everyone a safe and successful school year. Sincerely,

Paul Landry Regional Executive Director of Education

Paul Landry Regional Executive Director

of Education

304 Pitt Street, Unit 2 Port Hawkesbury, NS B9A 2T9;

www.srce.ca; srce@srce.ca; 902-625-2191/

1-800-650-4448 (P) 902-625-2281 (F)

Follow us on Twitter @SRCE_NS

Regional Executive Director’s Report

to School Communities in the Strait Region

September 2019

Busing for Eligible Pre-primary Children at all 14 SRCE Locations and Nova Scotia Before and After Program at Five

(5) SRCE Schools

On Tuesday, August 20, 2019, the province announced that families would have more opportunities to access pre-primary in September with the expansion of the Nova Scotia Before and After Program and bus service for eligible pre-primary children. A copy of the news release may be accessed at Before and After Program, Busing Coming for Pre-primary. This was great news for families in the SRCE as both announcements are giving our families more opportunity to access pre-primary. In the SRCE, as of the first day of classes, Thursday, September 5, 2019, busing was available to all pre-primary children eligible to receive bus service to attend the program at all of our 14 school locations. Based on

our initial reports, we are seeing a large portion of pre-primary children travelling to the program by bus. In addition, as part of the orientation session for pre-primary children held on Friday, August 30, 2019, a school bus was on site at each of our locations to allow families the opportunity to become familiar with the protocol for travelling on a bus and to meet with a bus driver. For more information on the Pre-primary Program, please visit novascotia.ca/preprimary. For more information on the Pre-Primary Programs in the SRCE or to register your child, please contact Carolyn Webber, Manager of Pre-primary and Early Years Programs at carolyn.webber@srce.ca / 902-631-4617, and access www.srce.ca. The Nova Scotia Before and After Program is being offered at five SRCE school sites this year. They are Bayview Education Centre, Chedabucto Education Centre/Guysborough Academy, East Antigonish Education Centre/Academy, St. Mary’s Education Centre/Academy and Tamarac Education Centre. This program is open to pre-primary and public school

students between the ages of 4 to 12. You can sign up by contacting the service provider directly. For more information, please visit novascotia.ca/BAP/. Please also note that this is a fee-based program. The fee will be set by the provider. Depending on your household income, you may be eligible to receive subsidy to reduce the cost. For more information on Child Care Subsidy and to see if you are eligible, please visit novascotia.ca/ChildCareSubsidy. The expansion of the Before and After Program will continue in September 2020.

Contents

Busing for Pre-primary Children/

Before and After Programs 1

SRCE System Improvement and

Educational Business Plans

for 2019-2020 2

SRCE Celebrates Stand Up

Against Bullying Day 3

More Inclusive Education Supports

for Students in 2019-2020 4

New Teacher Orientation

Program 4

Black Educators Association

Celebrates 50th Anniversary 4

SRCE Stay Informed

Notification System 5

SRCE to Honour Orange Shirt

Day: Every Child Matters 5

Who Do I Contact With

Questions or Concerns? 5

Upcoming Dates/Events Tuesday, September 3, 2019 School Orientation/Organization Day Wednesday, September 4, 2019 Regional In-Service Day Thursday, September 5, 2019 First Day of Classes for Students Thursday, September 12, 2019 Stand Up Against Bullying Day

Thursday, September 26, 2019 Terry Fox National School Run Day

Friday, September 27, 2019 School-Based In-Service Day No classes for students (staff only) Monday, September 30, 2019 Orange Shirt Day: Every Child Matters

Follow us on Twitter @SRCE_NS

Welcome to the 2019-2020 School Year

2

SRCE System Improvement and Educational

Business Plans for 2019-2020

I am very pleased to share the SRCE’s System Improvement and Educational Business Plans for 2019-2020. Both of these plans focus on goals and priorities that will raise the bar and close the gap to address the needs of all learners in the SRCE. As educators, we need to be continually asking ourselves how are our students doing and how do we know. The information below outlines our top three priority areas: literacy, mathematics and student well-being.

SRCE System Improvement Plan 2019-2020

The Strait Regional Centre for Education Programs and Student Services team worked alongside school principals and vice principals, as well as teachers from across the region, who represented all grades, subject/specialty areas and years of experience, to collaboratively develop a System Improvement Plan for the 2019-2020 school year. The establishment of goals, priorities and implementation strategies evolved from a comprehensive review of evidence of student learning, as well as research and educational literature emphasizing the emotional, motivational and affective elements that need to be fostered in order to facilitate learning and develop the whole student.

This System Improvement Plan is responsive to recent results in student achievement, as well as trends over time. It also represents an understanding of the link between true achievement and authentic well-being, and the critical need to provide students with the conditions in which they can achieve their full potential. All priorities and implementation strategies have been developed through an inclusive, equitable and culturally responsive lens to ensure that all students, including those students who are not represented in the success criteria, have access to a continuum of supports and services to facilitate greater success.

For more information, please access the complete plan at SRCE System Improvement Plan for 2019-2020, and access the infographic below or online at SRCE System Improvement Plan 2019-2020 Infographic.

The Strait Regional Centre for Education's Educational Business Plan for 2019-2020 may be accessed at the following

link:

SRCE Educational Business Plan 2019-2020

This Plan provides an overview of our planning context including organizational structure, annual report of achievements and further elaborates on the goals and priorities for the year.

3 SRCE Celebrates Stand Up Against Bullying Day

on Thursday, September 12, 2019, and Every Day

Students, staff, families, volunteers and community partners were encouraged to show their support of safe school communities by wearing pink on Thursday, September 12, 2019. Stand Up Against Bullying Day is a time to celebrate and recognize the importance of positive, safe, inclusive and healthy learning environments and relationships as well as kindness, respect and diversity, in and out of the classroom, at home and in our communities on this day, and throughout the school year.

4 More Inclusive Education Supports for Students in

2019-2020

Further to the information I shared in my May and June 2019 Reports, the SRCE has received additional inclusive education supports of 13.5 full-time equivalent (FTE) positions, both teaching and non-teaching, for the 2019-2020 school year. These 13.5 positions are in addition to the 18 new positions added in 2018-2019 that we know are making a difference in students’ lives. To recap, the new positons for 2019-2020 are:

o Teacher Assistants (2 FTEs) o Child and Youth Care Practitioners (3 FTEs) o Mi’kmaq Student Support Worker (1 FTE) o Pre-Primary Inclusion Coach (1 FTE) o Guidance Counsellors (2 FTEs) o Autism Teacher Specialist (1 FTE) o Resource Teacher (1 FTE) o Community Outreach Worker (1 FTE) o School Psychology/Speech Language Pathologist (1 FTE) o Student Health Partnership Nurse (0.5 FTE)

Staff in these new positions are working in partnership with teachers and administrators to enhance supports for students throughout the SRCE to support student achievement, success and overall well-being. Background

On May 2, 2019, the Honourable Zach Churchill, Minister of Education and Early Childhood Development, announced another expansion of supports for students to ensure they have the help they need to be more successful in school. This announcement is part of the provincial response to the Commission on Inclusive Education’s Report, Students First: Inclusive Education that Supports Teaching, Learning, and the Success of all Nova Scotia Students that was released in March 2018. For more information on this announcement and to access a copy of the Report, please visit: https://www.ednet.ns.ca/inclusiveeducation and https://inclusiveedns.ca/.

Did You Know?

There is a new provincial policy that is supporting extracurricular activities in schools. Access a copy of the policy at: Extracurricular Activity Supervision Policy

New Teacher Orientation Program

Approximately 30 new teachers in the SRCE had the opportunity to attend a professional development opportunity on Thursday, August 29, 2019. This is the first in a series of three sessions with our new teachers. I extend a sincere welcome to them as new members of the SRCE team! The agenda included information on a number of topics including:

Growth mindset

Student success planning

Classroom management

Strategies, policies and communications protocol

Collective agreements

Changes in education

Teacher evaluation and professional growth Thank you to all those involved in making this session an informative and successful event for our new teachers. A special thank you to Human Resources staff Janice Gough and Darrell LeBlanc for organizing and facilitating the session, and Family of Schools Coordinator, Tanya Carter, for facilitating the session on student success planning and classroom management.

Black Educators Association (BEA)

Celebrates 50th Anniversary

On behalf of the SRCE, I extend sincere congratulations to the Black Educators Association on their 50th anniversary. Thank you to the BEA for their continued partnership in supporting the achievement and success of SRCE students and school communities.

For your information, effective September 2019 subscribers to the SRCE Stay Informed Notification System (Bus Route and Class Announcements) must now re-subscribe annually to continue to receive notifications by email and/or text.

Over the summer, changes were required to the operation of the system to enhance the efficiency and timely delivery of the notifications. Annual subscription to this service will also ensure that the system contains the most up-to-date subscriber contact information (i.e., email address, cell phone number(s) and service provider).

Subscribers to the SRCE Stay Informed Notification System are asked to please re-subscribe, if interested, to continue to receive bus route and/or class announcement notices by email and/or text.

At the end of each school year, subscriber contact information will be deleted. You may re-subscribe after August 1 of each year.

To renew your subscription or to subscribe for the first time, please look for the SRCE Stay Informed graphic image (included above) on the SRCE website, www.srce.ca, and follow the steps outlined to subscribe or re-subscribe to this service; or click here to access the SRCE Stay Informed By Email and/or Text page directly.

SRCE Stay Informed Notification System: Annual Subscription to the Service Required

5

Did You Know?

Orange Shirt Day in the SRCE is Monday, September 30, 2019.

October 1, 2019, is Treaty Day. Miranda Gould is Coordinator of Mi’kmaq Services for the

SRCE. Miranda may be contacted at miranda.gould@srce.ca.

SRCE to Honour Orange Shirt Day: Every Child Matters on Monday, September 30, 2019, and Every Day

The Strait Regional Centre for Education invites students, parents/guardians, staff, volunteers and community partners to honour Orange Shirt Day: Every Child Matters on Monday, September 30, 2019, and every day. Let’s all come

together in the spirit of reconciliation and hope by wearing orange. For more information, please access the SRCE website story at: SRCE to Honour Orange Shirt Day: Every Child Matters on Monday, September 30, 2019, and Every Day