Office
Forms
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McCarthy-Towne Handbook
Emergency Cards
Dismissal Cards
Other Office Forms
Attendance
Truancy and Attendance
Early Student
Attendance/Safe Arrival
Tardiness
Dismissal
Request To Leave School
Early
General Dismissal
Procedure
Students Remaining After
School
Walkers
Bicycles
Elementary Bus Pass
Procedure
School Cancellation
Emergency Dismissal
School
Visitors and Volunteers
The Main Office serves as the center for a wide range of important activities. It is the communication link between home and school. If you need to leave a message for any member of the staff, we will connect you to his or her voice mail. The main office number is 978-264-4700 ext. 3701.
Emergency Cards
Two Emergency Cards must be completed for every student at
McCarthy-Towne: one for the office and one for the Health Office.
Up-to-date information allows the office to contact parents in case
of an emergency. Therefore, it is extremely important to notify the
school immediately if there is a change in address or telephone
number(s) at home and/or at work. For similar reasons, we also need
current addresses and home numbers of child-care providers and the
people to contact in case of an emergency. Please notify the school
office whenever there is change in your home, work, or cell phone
number.
Dismissal
Cards
The student dismissal card, which is distributed at the start of the
school year, will allow us to have quick and accurate reference to
where your child is going after school each day. During the course of
the year, if there are permanent changes to these arrangements,
please let the school office know in writing.
Other Office
Forms
At the start of the school year, the following forms are sent
home:
Information release
Behavior
Contract
CORI
(Criminal Offender Release Information) form
Free
and Reduced Lunch
Volunteer
forms
The following forms are available in the school office as well as the school website (http://mct.ab.mec.edu):
Lunch Ticket Order
forms
Bus
and Dismissal passes
Truancy and
Attendance
In order for children to have a successful learning experience and
feel that they are an integral member of the class, it is important
that they be present when school is in session. Massachusetts General
Law, Chapter 76l, Section 1 states a student "may be excused up to
seven day sessions or fourteen half day sessions in any period of six
months." One of the keys to academic improvement is good attendance
with consistent participation in school.
Parents, as well as students, have the responsibility to ensure that attendance at school is regular and timely. Schools are required by law to keep track of attendance and are also required by law to address any problems. This can be simply to notify the parent of the issue and work together to improve the student's attendance. In extreme instances, it may require the assistance of the Court of Department of Social Services.
Early Student
Arrivals
Students should not be in the school building unsupervised. Students
should not arrive at school any more than 15 minutes before the
official beginning of the school day. If a student arrives prior to
this time, the student must remain outside the building. There is no
supervision provided for a child prior to this time.
Attendance/Safe
Arrival
If a student will be absent or tardy, a parent must use the Safe
Arrival Telephone tape to notify the school. The telephone number for
the Safe Arrival tape is 978-264-4098. If a student is marked absent
and the Safe Arrival tape was not notified, a parent volunteer will
call a parent at home or at work to verify that the child is safe. If
a parent cannot be reached and there is a concern about the safety of
that child, the Police Department will be called.
Tardiness
Students are discouraged from coming in late to school. As the
agenda for the day is often discussed at the beginning of the day, it
is difficult for students who are tardy to get oriented to the
expectations of the day. Students who do arrive late must sign in in
the office before going to their classrooms. (See Appendix 6 for
pertinent information.)
Request to Leave
School Early
A written request, available in the office, to have a student
excused from school early should be sent with the child on the
morning of the dismissal, including the time and reason for leaving.
Early dismissal is discouraged, as important classroom activities
take place at the end of each day. As classroom time is highly
valued, all medical appointments should be made outside of school
hours, whenever possible.
For purposes of safety, a child will be released only to their parents/guardians unless the school has been notified in writing by the parents that they have granted permission for someone else to pick up their child. The parent, or authorized person, MUST come to the office to sign out the child and have the student dismissed from the classroom.
General Dismissal
Procedures
Please be aware that no dismissal arrangements will be taken over
the phone.
All students who have permission and are not going home on the school bus (walkers, bikers, students to be picked up by parent) will be discharged by teachers from classrooms five minutes before the students taking buses. Students being picked up should meet their parents in the lobby after the parent has signed his/her child out in the office. Students who ride the bus are assigned to a bus room. They go to their bus room at dismissal time and wait with the bus room teacher for their bus to arrive. The teacher escorts the students to their bus and loads them onto it.
Parents must notify the school office before any student is removed from the school at any time. The parent should also notify daycare providers that the student will not be there due to illness or any other reason. This is important, as daycare providers often call the school worried about missing children. It is the parent's responsibility to notify the daycare when a child is not going to attend the daycare.
Students Remaining
After School
No student is to remain after school without the consent of both
their teacher and parent or guardian. Parents must arrange for
transportation if they have agreed to have their child stay after
school. Teachers will contact parents if there is a need for children
to remain at school after the normal school hours.
Walkers
For the safety of each child, we try to make ourselves aware of
the dismissal plans for all of our students. At the beginning of the
school year, teachers will gather the names of all students who have
written permission from home to walk home on a regular
basis.
All students who bring notes requesting permission to walk home just for that day must present those notes to the classroom teacher before permission is granted. These notes are then sent to the office to receive final approval, and to allow us to keep a record of that day's student walkers.
Kindergarten students are not allowed to walk home.
Bicycles
Bicycle racks are located on the school grounds. All bicycles
should be locked when placed in the racks. Any damage to bicycles
should be reported to the office.
Elementary Bus Pass
Procedure
Please be aware that no dismissal arrangements will be taken over
the phone.
One-Day Bus Passes
1. When buses are not full, a one-day bus pass will be issued to
students in grades 1 through 6 for any purpose, provided that the
parent or guardian notifies the child's school in writing on the
appropriate form. Forms are available in the school
office.
2. One-day bus passes will not be issued to kindergarten students except in a case of an emergency determined by the Principal.
Permanent Bus
Passes
1. Permanent bus passes will be issued to students in grades 1 - 6
who will be attending an after school program on a regular weekly
schedule. A permanent bus pass must be submitted by the parent or
guardian on the appropriate form. Forms are available in the school
office.
2. To make a permanent change for a kindergarten student, a parent or guardian must contact the Transportation Department (978-264-4700, ext. 3228) for permission. Then a parent or guardian must submit a permanent bus pass to the school office on the appropriate form. Forms are available in the school office.
School
Cancellation
Do not call the Acton Fire or Police departments to determine whether
or not schools have been canceled. This practice seriously interferes
with the respective departments' notification of emergencies and
ability to respond in a timely fashion.
Parents are advised to listen carefully to radio/TV announcements to determine whether school will be canceled for the day. Check the school system's web site (ab.mec.edu) for cancellation information and to sign up for the AB Emergency Notification mailing list. If the weather is threatening, and parents will not be home that day, parents should make arrangements for their children in the event that school closes early. It is the parent/guardian responsibility to monitor school cancellations.
Emergency
Dismissal
In the event that school is dismissed prior to the regular dismissal
time due to emergency conditions, i.e. weather, heat, or electrical
problems, students will be sent to the location they normally go to
on that day. An Emergency Dismissal handout is sent home at the
beginning of the school year with each child. You should use this
handout to review and discuss with your child where he/she should go
if they come home and you are not at home. Please do not count on
being able to reach the school by telephone on a day such as this.
The school lines are usually quite busy.
THE SCHOOL IS NOT ABLE
TO NOTIFY PARENTS.
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All visitors and volunteers must report to the main office upon their arrival. They must sign in and obtain a VISITOR'S PASS before visiting any classrooms, cafeteria, playground, or any other part of the school. Before leaving, visitors should turn in their pass and sign out. For the safety of all children, no parent/adult is permitted to go to a classroom without first obtaining permission from the office. According to State Law Chapter 385 of the Acts of 2002, anyone who may have "direct and unmonitored contact with children" must have a CORI (Criminal Offense Release Information) check done prior to volunteering in the school.