Dear VCS Community,
Welcome back from the summer and to the 2024-2025 school year!
Our staff is working hard to prepare for the upcoming school year and we look forward to welcoming our students back to the first day of school on Wednesday, August 14th. This day will follow a minimum day schedule.
Please visit our website to view the “bell schedule” for each school.
Please visit our website to view the calendar for the 2024-2025 school year.
Read below for important information, updates, and reflections on our collective work.
Back to school events
We are excited to see all of our VCS families at our upcoming back to school events!
VCES will be holding our meet the teachers event on Monday, August 12th from 3:30pm-5:00pm.
VCMS will be holding our student and parent orientation on August 13th. Please see below for your student’s grade level time and location. ALL parents and students should attend orientation, which will be full of required information about the 2024-2025 school year. Please note that 6th graders will take a short math assessment during orientation to support math programming.
- 6th grade orientation: 9:30-11:00am on the Sherman Way campus (14646 Sherman Way)
- 7th grade orientation: 9:30-10:30am on the Van Nuys Blvd campus (6952 Van Nuys Blvd)
- 8th grade orientation:11:00am-12:00pm on the Van Nuys Blvd campus (6952 Van Nuys Blvd)
If you cannot attend your grade level orientation, please call the office to set up a time to come in and pick up your child’s information and have your child take the 6th grade math assessment, if applicable . All completed paperwork and/or enrollment documentation must be turned in on or before orientation. Students who do not have completed documentation will not receive their schedule.
Driving and parking: For the 7th/8th grade orientation, please enter the school site from the gate on Van Nuys Boulevard (the regular carpool lane) to park. However parking will be extremely limited so please plan accordingly: use ride shares, carpool with other families, or park within the neighboring community.
You can also visit our website for the above information in the school website calendar.
Please note VCMS bell schedule and after-school program changes!
SY 24-25 Bell Schedule: Please note that dismissal times have changed in the 24-25 Bell Schedule.
- For 6th graders, regular day dismissal will now be 3:00pm and shortened day dismissal will be at 1:25pm. The start time is 8:30am every morning.
- For 7th and 8th graders, regular day dismissal will now be 2:55pm and shortened day dismissal will be at 1:20pm. The start time is 8:25am each morning.
Please visit here to learn about the after school program changes at VCMS.
Staffing updates
We are pleased to announce talented new staff members who are invested in our mission, vision, and practices as an organization, as well as staff members who are transitioning into new roles this fall.
VCES (you can find VCES staff biographies here)
- Monique Teague, 4th grade teacher
- Kelsey Raunsbak, 4th grade teacher
- Krysta Henriquez, 5th grade teacher (transitioning from a role at VCMS)
- Abigail Pech, VCES office assistant
- We are excited to announce that Alejandra Torres has transitioned into the VCES office manager role!
VCMS (you can find VCMS staff biographies here)
- Michelle Shirtcliff, 7th and 8th grade science teacher
- David Betshmuel , co-teacher in 7th/8th grade history teacher
- Samantha Cerda, ELA teacher
- Randy Cseh, 7th and 8th grade physical education teacher
- Joshua Heffner, 6th grade physical education teacher
- Rory Kelly, 7th and 8th grade English
- Meredith Moores, 7th/8th grade resource specialist teacher
- Eduardo Reynoso, 6th grade math
Reflections and goal setting for the 24-25 school year
This will be my 5th year serving in the Executive Director role at VCS. When I stepped into the role, it was the beginning of the pandemic; during that time, our leadership team established a motto: we are not merely going to survive this pandemic. In saying this to ourselves and to our team, we meant we were going to continue to strive to evolve and elevate practice and impact, despite the many challenges. I am proud to say that this is the case. In the last five years, we have many accomplishments to highlight. To name just a few, we have increased enrollment at both schools at a time that LAUSD and many other charter schools have seen a decline, we have added TK, VCMS has strengthened its academic program and shed its designation as a comprehensive support and improvement school, VCES has restored ELA standardized test performance to pre-pandemic levels, we have launched a new website and elevated our communication protocols, and we have organized our resources at each school to better meet our student needs by adding school psychologists, an ELD teacher at VCMS, a reading intervention teacher and full-time resource specialist teacher at VCES, and additional student support staff. As I said, these are just a few of the more visible accomplishments but the real work of our organization is in the day-to-day classroom experiences between teachers and students.
Something I love about Valley Charter Schools and keeps me grounded as we engage in this work is that at VCS we have a clear vision for how students learn best and we have a group of educators here who have the passion, dedication, talent, and creativity to bring this vision to life. We work backwards from developing a passion for lifelong learning in our students, and we are passionate learners ourselves.
As we continue to advance our mission and vision, and refine our work as an organization, VCS organizational goals for the 24-25 school year are:
1 . We will increase engagement and promote equity of growth and outcomes for our diverse student body by providing a vision-aligned instructional program and ensuring that each of our students makes a year’s worth of academic growth in ELA and math. We will measure the impact of this work through student engagement surveys and our internal iReady assessment and end of year standardized testing data.
2. We will advance our family engagement and anti-bias work, so that students and families experience a sense of community and belonging. We will measure the impact of this work through observations, student discipline data, and the annual staff, student, and family surveys.
3. We will promote sustainability as a small charter school organization in key fiscal and operational areas: facilities, finances, enrollment, and attendance. We will measure the impact of this work through scores on annual audit reports, advancement of facilities planning, maintaining stable enrollment, reduction of chronic absenteeism, and a sustainable budget plan.
4. We will increase our ability to attract and retain high quality teachers through teacher leadership opportunities, high quality professional development, teacher-friendly practices and policies, and attractive compensation packages. We will measure the impact of this work through teacher retention, the annual staff survey, and teacher participation in leadership opportunities.
5. We will continue to be the TK-8 school of choice in the Valley by engaging in robust and strategic branding, messaging, and recruitment strategies and maintaining the satisfaction of our current families. We will measure the impact of this work through student recruitment numbers, family participation in community events, and our digital media data.
To learn more about these goals and engage in Q&A about them, please join the Parent Faculty Council meetings at each school at the beginning of the year.
OPPORTUNITY FOR FAMILIES TO BE INVOLVED IN SCHOOL GOVERNANCE
Each school has three formal governance roles for parents/guardians that are determined through an election process with current families. Serving in one of these roles is a great way to get involved in your child’s education and support the school.
Parent/Guardian Governance Roles:
- Parent Board Representative: Responsibilities include participating in board training, regular monthly meetings, serving on a board committee.
- Parent Faculty Council representative: Responsibilities include attending monthly PFC meetings and advising on key school planning documents.
- English Learner Advisory Committee Representative Responsibilities include attending monthly ELAC meetings and advising on key school planning documents in relation to EL support and progress. You must be the parent of an English learner to serve in this role.
For the 24-25 school year, each school is seeking two parent faculty council representatives and one English Learner Advisory Committee Representative.
In addition, the VCES parent board representative role is due for an election as our current representative is nearing the completion of her two year term.
If you are interested in nominating yourself or someone else, please use this survey. All nominations are due by Friday, September 13th, 2024. Election surveys will be distributed to families the week of September 16th, 2024.
Meet Valley Charter Schools’ Board Members!
Valley Charter’s board members are volunteers who are committed to providing appropriate oversight and support to our organization. The VCS board meets in person at 14646 Sherman Way (VCMS 6th grade site). You can find the board calendar and board member biographies here. VCS current board members (in alphabetical order) include:
- Joni Angel, Board Chair
- Jennifer Bennett, VCES Parent Board Representative
- Haleigh Ike, Board Treasurer
- Marianna Pinerua, VCMS Parent Board Representative
- Angela Saldivar, Board Secretary
Valley Charter Schools’ Family and Student Handbooks
Each school’s handbook is updated each year to include any new required annual notices, as well as include any revisions or updates to school policies. Each school’s handbook will be live at this link by August 9th, 2024 and will be sent via each principal’s weekly email on Monday, August 12th. Please review carefully to understand expectations and guidelines for each school.
Family Engagement at Valley Charter
Our students thrive when our families are engaged with their schooling. We are grateful for our incredibly committed families at VCS and also know that engagement looks different for each family, based on their circumstances.
To better understand how we approach family engagement at Valley Charter, please review our VCS Family Engagement Framework; this provides the why, what, and how of family engagement at VCS. Please review!
Let us know how you’d like to be involved this year by filling out the parent engagement form for your student’s school (links below)!
Important information about attendance, student learning, and charter school funding
While we know that sometimes absences are unavoidable due to illness or a family obligation, daily attendance is crucial to your child’s success in school. In addition to the direct connection between daily attendance and academic success, attendance is the main driver of funding to our schools. Valley Charter Schools is an independent, public charter school. This means that like all public schools in the state of California, we are funded based on “average daily attendance” (ADA). For every day that your child attends school, VCS receives a prescribed amount of money (it varies based on grade level) and that money is used to fund everything at the school from facilities to staff members to supplies. When your child is absent, the school does not receive funding for that day. Collectively, each absence has a great impact on our school budgets, close to $100,000 a year between our two schools. Simply put, if we increase attendance, we increase opportunities for all our students.
With this in mind and because daily attendance is crucial to your child’s success in school, we want each family to be aware of the following:
- Please avoid scheduling family vacations or excursions during school days.
- If you need to schedule a doctor or dentist appointment, please try to schedule it in the morning or afternoon so that your child does not miss the entire day.
- We want your child to be in school if they are healthy. Please continue to keep your child home if they are ill or recovering from illness (e.g., you must wait 24 hours after your child has had a fever or vomited and must follow any additional guidelines for illnesses such as COVID-19).
- Please note that if a student is absent from school, they cannot attend a school-sponsored event on that given day.
VCS COVID-19 Guidelines for the 24-25 school year
As you are probably aware, LA County is in the midst of a summer COVID surge. If your child is ill or exhibiting symptoms, please be vigilant about testing and do not send them to school.
In the event of a positive case on campus: VCS will continue to use the group contact tracing protocol and send out group notifications in the event that a student or staff member tests positive for COVID-19 and has exposed other community members.
Masking: VCS follows the LAC DPH guidelines for masking. Based on these guidelines, masking is currently strongly recommended but not required for students exposed to COVID-19 in a school setting. Masking is required for students who have been exposed in their household or who are returning from isolation.
Independent Study: Please note that VCS will not be offering independent study during isolation periods in SY 24/25. Because of the shortened duration of required isolation, absences for COVID-19 will be treated like any other illness.
Please visit this webpage for our comprehensive COVID-19 guidelines.
If your child tests positive for COVID-19 at any point during the school year, please complete the appropriate survey (survey link below).
If anyone in your household tests positive for COVID-19 at any point during the school year, please complete the appropriate survey (survey links below).
We are looking forward to a fantastic school year ahead!
All my best,
Carolyn
Valley Charter Schools 