As a public school district, we focus on developing positive and respectful relationships with students each day. We also aim to develop positive professional relationships with our parents and the community. As I reflect on our efforts, several recent examples demonstrate our commitment to community partnerships (which, of course, includes parents!)

  • Bridgewater Elementary hosted the annual Veteran’s Day program on November 11. Principal Nancy Antoine does an Parent conferences brochureexcellent job of organizing this event that draws hundreds of parents, grandparents, and community members to celebrate the contributions of our veterans.
  • Sibley Elementary hosted its first Sibley Learning Series: The Family Connection in mid-October. Topics included growth mindset, supporting your child as a reader, and offered an opportunity for general parent feedback.
  • I had an opportunity to dialogue with parents about bullying at Greenvale Park Community School in early November. Greenvale Park Community School continues to do an amazing job in engaging families every Tuesday and Thursday evening!
  • Northfield Middle School hosted its first Parent Summit for 6th grade families on November 3rd. This session allowed 6th grade parents to attend seminars on topics known to be of interest to them.
  • Northfield High School continues to provide added value to its parent-teacher conferences. It offered several sessions for parents simultaneously with parent-teacher conferences (photo above).
  • This week, the District hosts a live stream TED MED — a partnership with Northfield Hospital & Clinics. TED MED brings health care thought leaders together to share short lectures in the famous TED format.
  • Of course, we also engaged the community during our recent strategic planning process, master facilities planning public meetings, and through our ThoughtExchange projects.

Parent and community partnerships are essential to our success. Our new vision statement explicitly highlights this:

“We will prepare every student for lifelong success within a world-class learning environment with a commitment to community partnerships and sustainability.”

I am pleased with the work done to engage our parents and community but am not satisfied yet. I look forward to more effective and innovative ways we can leverage our parents and community in pursuit of realizing our strategic vision and achieving our near-term priorities.