Letter to Caregivers

Dear CSUS Parents and Caregivers,

We hope you and your scholars enjoyed the sunshine this weekend and are ready to embark on a week of rich learning (and warmer temperatures)! There are many updates and reminders to share this week; please see below for information regarding

• Important Community Announcement
  
• Full-Time In-Person Learning update
  
• Listening Conferences
  
• Diversity Dialogues
  

Congratulations to Mr. Fernandez
TEAM CSUS is proud to share that Mr. Fernandez has been asked to serve as Cambridge Public Schools’ interim Chief Equity Officer for the 2021-22 school year. You can read Mr Fernandez’ full letter to the community here. Cambridge Street is grateful for his nine years of dedicated, visionary leadership. We look forward to his continued support of our school and CSUS’ commitment to equity and anti-racism in this new role.

Full-Time In-Person Learning This Spring
Superintendent Salim emailed the Cambridge community on Friday regarding the new requirement that all districts in Massachusetts offer full-time, in-person learning this spring. Full-time remote learning will continue to be available for all families this school year.

In-person learning will be full days, five days a week; it is expected that Upper Schools will begin on Wednesday, April 28. All families will receive a follow up message with a form to select in-person learning for your student. Click here to read the Superintendent’s full message to the community.

Listening conferences
Last week Cobra Den Leaders began outreach to families to hear about your scholar’s transition into second semester. You are welcome to meet with your child’s Den Leader, or to reach out to another teacher if you have class-specific questions. You can contact all CSUS teachers and staff via email; most email addresses are a combination of the individual’s first initial and last name @cpsd.us. For example, you can reach Christen Sohn at [email protected]. If you need assistance finding an email address, please reach out to Ms. Sohn or Ms. Robinson.

If you would like to provide feedback via survey instead of a listening conference, you can access our survey here.

Diversity Dialogues
Last Wednesday caregivers and educators gathered for our first Diversity Dialogue Community Care Clinic event of the year! The event, designed by guest facilitator Naqibah Al-Kaleem, reflected the need we have heard from caregivers to come together and build community so we can begin to heal after experiencing the dueling pandemics, racism and COVID. One caregiver summed up the event perfectly by sharing:

"I REALLY appreciated spending time with the educators in my group... I appreciated how open they were with me. I think just being in the room with them helped me to feel that things will be okay. Sometimes the fear of how this all will affect my scholar seeps into my engagement with him. So I'm nervous and on edge. But talking to the educators in my group and connecting with them on a person to person level - it makes me feel more comfortable knowing that he is with good people who care about him."

We are looking forward to continuing these conversations and more at our next event in April, and hope that you can join us!

As always, thank you for entrusting Cambridge Street with your scholar’s learning. We understand that you have choices regarding your child’s education, and we appreciate you choosing CSUS.

Peace,
Manuel and Christen

Just Eats Grocery Boxes

Many of our families are missing our monthly school-based School Markets and so are we!! To help us out, our partners at Food For Free are offering food boxes for families at 4 of the school Market sites. We are offering these free boxes to our free lunch families and they will be available at lunch pick-up sites twice a month. We are trying to figure out our numbers for distribution, so we NEED FAMILIES TO SIGN UP! Sign up here >>

The boxes have fruits and veggies, as well as a grain (such as rice) and a protein (such as beans). They are heavy (approximately 30 pounds a piece) so you will need a car or a cart to bring them home. You can sign-up for the site closest to your house!

Note: These boxes are also distributed at Walden Square, Newtowne Court, Roosevelt Towers and 808-812 Memorial Drive. Please contact your Residential Service Provider if you would like to pick-up there.

NetPals STEM Exploration Club

Tuesdays | 3:15-4:15 PM | Register here >>
Starting March 23rd, join Ms. Montminy and Cambridge based scientists to explore science happening around you! Each week different scientists will run hands-on activity presentations and challenge the group to think about real world problems and applications. More details >>
For questions, please email Ms. Montminy.

What's Happening After School?
OST Opportunities Spring 2021 

Here's a slideshow of current and upcoming OST (Out-of-School-Time) opportunities. Here's a longer list of (newly updated) Middle School Opportunities for Spring 2021.

Cambridge Debate League

Tuesdays | 3-4PM | View Flyer >>
Interested in debate? Join the Cambridge Debate Team! *Available to any student in Grades 6-8th. Contact Megan Litten to request your virtual invitation. More details >>