Dear Turner Families,
I hope this message finds you and your family well. As principal and as a parent of two children at Matthew Turner, the closing of our campus really hit hard. My heart goes out to all of you during this difficult and uncertain time. Your winning attitude, support and resilience provide me with strength and inspiration. While we all continue to absorb the challenge of the shelter in place orders and to do all we can to save lives, your wonderful teamwork and your partnership continue to allow us to move forward and evolve with this new distance learning platform. We are so grateful to you.
Last Wednesday in a concerted effort, teachers throughout the Benicia School District collaborated in creating content standards deemed essential to ensure that our students continue to be successful. Although all the California Common Core Content Standards are important, our team objective is to concentrate with a laser focus on the content/standards that will be most beneficial to students when they enter their next grade level. We have important learning ahead and we want to streamline our teaching and not overwhelm kids and parents/caregivers with countless standards and new teaching. We will be ready to go on April 14th when we log on with distant learning.
Here are Additional Resources for Home our District provided that you can choose to use with your students. Please know the activities on the additional resources document will not be assigned, collected, or graded by teachers, but are optional opportunities. We will continue to update this document as we gather more resources.
Our PTA has worked tirelessly this year. We have an exceptional team! I am so proud of the phenomenal effort they put forth in so many capacities. Our spirited, innovative, fun, and community building family events were fantastic and create lasting and sweet memories of the school year. As you know, the Auction this year will be postponed until a later date. Our talented auction team is committed to making something great happen when the time is right. Thank you for your patience as we navigate through all the rescheduling.
Normally, Spring Break comes with great joy. Being that our schools just closed and that there are so many unique challenges facing our families, finding the time to connect and to carve out quality time with family is even more precious. Children will never forget this moment of time. So let’s make the time with our kids count. I am going to try to shed the stress for a while, unplug, and just be the best dad I can be. I wish you much peace, strength and health during this time.
Warmly.
Stephen J. Slater