Hello everyone in the wonderful CNS community,
My Name is Carl, the CNS board Participation Chair, and I'm excited to embark on my second year in this role. Taking over from my sister-in-law, Amy, who is now one of our amazing 3's teachers, has been an incredible experience. As a family, we wear many hats and, of course, parenting is a full-time job in itself.
When I first stepped into this position, I must admit, I felt a bit apprehensive. Balancing the responsibilities of parenting and work is already challenging, and taking on a board role at the school seemed like a significant commitment. However, my belief in the CNS vision and the importance of active family participation motivated me to take on this role wholeheartedly.
Throughout my first year, I engaged in meaningful conversations with parents and teachers, listening to your valuable input. I wanted to understand how our model could adapt to the changing needs of CNS families. This year, we are taking action based on your feedback.
To make participation more manageable for everyone, each family will now be required to participate in the classroom four times per year - twice between September and January, and twice between February and June. That number is the same regardless of the number of children your family has enrolled or the programs they are in; this approach ensures a more equitable experience and represents a significant decrease from the weekly in-class days some families had last year.
With the extra time, all families will sign up for a cooperative administrative job that lasts for the entire year. These roles are crucial to the school's functioning and improve the experience for all of us here at CNS. The best part is that these tasks can be easily scheduled around your availability, allowing us to make connections with other families as we work together to administer the school.
We also recognize the need for flexibility, and most families will now only be required to send one parent to The Little Folks Fair (LFF) in June unless they have signed up for a LFF job in the co-operative administrative job list. This change is meant to make childcare arrangements more straightforward, enabling you to enjoy the fair with your children fully. Similarly, the school clean-up days will only require one parent per family in attendance, further supporting your childcare needs.
To ensure accountability and foster connections, we are introducing the Community Committee. This standing committee will regularly check in on family participation to ensure we all work equitably to meet our membership requirements.
I am genuinely excited about these changes to the participation model, and I hope you will embrace them too. If you have any questions or concerns, please don't hesitate to reach out to us at theboard@guilfordcns.org.
Looking forward to an incredible year of growth and learning together!
Warm regards,
Carl Chu
CNS Participation Board Chair
P.S. For more details about the participation requirements, please read the 2023-2024 Handbook which has just been posted on the family portal (pasword loveschool). To sign up for a job using the below link, put your name in column F and your contact information in Column G.
What's New at CNS
The Family Handbook
The family handbook is now posted to the Family Portal, as is the Nature School Handbook.
Get Ready for School
The CNS director, Rachel Daniels, recently sent out a list of everything necessary for families to complete before the start of school-- including school supplies. Make sure you've checked everything off the list! New forms will be available at the end of August.
Member Spotlight, Maggie Moffett
Maggie and her husband Joe are helping to coordinate a CNS grant submission for town ARPA funds.
The goal of this grant is to enable CNS to expand our footprint to give more students the benefit of our play-based and nature inspired education.
This summer, Maggie has been calling architects and scheduling contractors, working to get schematics in advance of the grant deadline.
Maggie and Joe own a local line striping company and have also donated the labor and materials to line our parking lot-- coming soon, after we repave to fix all the potholes.
Maggie & Joe's son Hunter graduated CNS last year out of Mrs. Cruz's class and their daughter Madison starts at CNS in the fall.
Classroom Corner
The Summer Program at CNS is coming to an end! This month, the children painted rocks and worked with other materials from nature to build interesting and fun creations. What projects are your children bringing home?
What else is new? The CNS grounds are getting ready for fall. The House and Grounds board chair, Daniela Locke, is arranging mulch for the musical garden on the front playground.
The musical garden was funded in part by 2022 Giving Tuesday donations and in part by the school's capital improvement funds. Thank you to Kevin "Pop" Locke and the Locke family for their generous donation of mulch!
In the News
The Nature School program at CNS was featured in The Guilford Foundation (TGF) impact report. TGF funded the weatherproof gear closet used by our nature students last year, and the wooden bridge that leads to the CNS outdoor classroom. Both the closet and the bridge are intended to be used by future students for years to come.
This newsletter is published by the CNS board. Please send suggestions to theboard@guilfordcns.org.