Over the last decade, education has undergone many major
changes: the spiraling amount of assessments given to students of all ages, the
emphasis placed on those assessments for both students and teachers, and a comprehensive
realignment of curriculum under the Common Core Learning Standards (CCLS) to
name just a few. To better put things in
perspective, the curriculum that was in place when I entered kindergarten so
many years ago our current three-year-old pre-kindergarten students are surpassing
within the first few months of school. As
such, DeSales has engaged in a wide-ranging internal and external analysis of
our curriculum and teacher strengths to determine if we are taking full
advantage of what we have to offer our families. What we discovered is that while we offer a
very strong program that helps our students to excel, with a little tweaking,
we can take our programs to a completely new level.
Simply stated, DeSales will become the premier literacy
program in Western New York with literacy defined as the braiding of reading,
writing, and technological citizenship together to nurture the development of students
that develop a lifetime love of learning, allowing them to excel in any venue. With that in mind, our early elementary
students, pre-kindergarten through second grade, will focus on the fundamentals
of reading. When a student leaves second
grade they will have a solid foundation in reading. From there, grades three through five will
progress to the next logical step, writing.
These middle/late elementary grades will help students learn to effectively
express their thoughts in a wide variety of genres. Middle school will mark the culmination of
these two fundamental curricular needs together. Students will delve into more complex fiction
and non-fiction texts, comparatively analyzing them from a variety of
viewpoints. Finally, with our
introduction of an increasing number of tablets into the classrooms will allow our
students to become comfortable in an ever-changing technological society.
With these thoughts
in mind, we have fine-tuned the placement of some of our teachers to take better
advantage of their academic strengths.
So, for the first time, I am pleased to present our 2015 ~ 2016-faculty
list.
|
Pre-Kindergarten Tues/Thurs and M/W/F
|
Mrs. Shipley
|
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Pre-Kindergarten Full-Day and 5 Day Half-Day
|
Mrs. Chase
|
|
Pre-Kindergarten Aide
|
Mrs. Klee
|
|
Kindergarten
|
Mrs. Pellicano
|
|
Kindergarten
|
Mrs. Rosenberg
|
|
1St Grade
|
Miss Agostini
|
|
1st Grade
|
Mrs. Webster
|
|
2nd Grade
|
Mrs. Robinson
|
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2nd Grade
|
Miss Trombitas
|
|
3rd Grade
|
Mrs. Gilbert
|
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3rd Grade
|
Mrs. Kraatz
|
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4th Grade
|
Mrs. Caldwell
|
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4th Grade
|
Mr. Granchelli
|
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5th Grade
|
Mrs. Sheehan
|
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5th Grade
|
Mrs. Thompson
|
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Middle School English Language Arts
|
Mrs. Merrill
|
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Middle School Math
|
Mrs. Fraass
|
|
Middle School Religion/ Director of Religious Education
|
Mr. Schuster
|
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Middle School Science
|
Mr. Welt
|
|
Middle School Social Studies
|
Mrs. Engel
|
|
Art
|
Mrs. Kruse
|
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Library/Technology
|
Mrs. Rahill
|
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Music
|
Miss Rarick
|
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Physical Education/Health
|
Mr. Wilson
|
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AIS Literacy K-4
|
Mrs. Crofts
|
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AIS Literacy 5-8
|
Mrs. MacClaren
|
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AIS Math ~ Middle School Math
|
Mrs. Kowalski
|
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Special Education
|
Mrs. Wade
|
|
School Counselor
|
Mrs. Badura
|
|
Spanish
|
TBD
|
With this exceptional line-up of very talented teachers,
please join me in registering for the 2015~2016 school year.
In His Name,
Scott
Scott
