Sinagua Middle School Parent Teacher Organization update — Special Update from Principal Popham

Dear Sinagua Families!

I want to first thank everyone for being patient as we roll out Phase 2 of our district plan which is to create a District Learning Hub that contains all the lessons your child will need to begin their homeschool experience. Our direction is to have one lesson, per week, per content. My suggestion is to make a routine for your child that includes going through their schedule. Have your student start in their first hour, then second hour etc. They can find for example, 6th grade math in the digital hub under middle school 6th grade math and the lesson is there for this week. We will roll out a new lesson every week for the next 8 weeks. All contents have uploaded lessons for your child. If you have questions, please do not hesitate to email teachers or me at tpopham@fusd1.org.

Grading

As for grading. Students will receive for a final grade what their third quarter grade showed in their gradebook. Third quarter ended the week before spring break. However, a student can improve a grade, but can NOT decrease a grade. There are two ways they can increase their grade. One is to reach out to the teacher and ask for a redo of an assignment/assessment/project prior to spring break. The second way is to do the current work on the lessons provided in the digital hub and submit to the teacher to show continued mastery. Let me be clear, there will be no ZEROS given if a student does not do the work on the digital hub in the next 8 weeks. This is for student learning and to help with a learning lag that ultimately will happen under these trying times. AGAIN, you can improve your grade, but you can not be held accountable for work that is not done. Ultimately, do what you can to continue to learn in these trying times.

Phase 3 – End of year issues

Finally, Phase 3 we will begin to look at end of year issues such as cleaning out lockers, yearbook distribution, IPAD returns, etc. Many parents are asking us to go to school to get items. We are not allowed in the building any longer so we will be formulating a plan to do this in the next couple weeks. Please be patient as we do this.

Video from Staff

I hope this finds you all safe and healthy. We continue to worry deeply about our SMS community and wish we could be with all of our students again. Here is a staff video we put together for you all sharing our deep wish to be back at school with teachers and friends.

All the best,

Tari Popham

Thanks again to everyone for supporting Sinagua and helping make our school a better place!

If you have any more questions feel free to reply to this email and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can.

Your SMS PTO

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