So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, good night! I hate to go and leave this pretty sight… well folks, it’s been real. What a year we’ve had. We’ve laughed, we’ve cried, we’ve sledded, we’ve danced, and we’ve laughed so hard, we’ve cried. Thanks for tuning in. I’m going to the pool.

Last weekend and this week

We hope that you had a wonderful weekend celebrating Juneteenth and its significance to this country. The celebrations in Memorial Park were epic!

Looking forward to this week, here are some important dates to remember:

Today and Tuesday are regular full days of school.
Wednesday through Friday are HALF DAYS. This means no lunch at school and 12:45 dismissal!
AND, this Friday is also the LAST DAY OF SCHOOL. Don’t forget your child should wear their shirt for the Tuscan Rainbow on Friday (see above for colors!)

Let's Make A Rainbow

All, it is time to start planning for our annual last-day-of-school-rainbow photo! We are short on space this year, but not on creativity.

Please start preparing for your child/children to wear the color for their grade that day, Friday, 6/24. Any shade of the color is fine!

Feel free to email us at tuscanschoolpta@gmail.com if you need a shirt in your child's color.
If you have a shirt to lend or gift, answer away!

Color assignments (your child should wear the color to match their current grade this year):

Kindergarteners: purple

First graders: blue

Second graders: green

Third graders: yellow

Fourth graders: orange

Fifth graders: red - NOTE: all 5th graders will be given a red shirt on Thursday, 6/23 as a gift to celebrate their moving up.

Let us know if you have questions! Thank you to Tuscan parents and photographers extraordinaire, Mason Levinson and Tracy Sham for taking the photos.

A big thank you...

… to the parents (Umran Zia, we’re looking at you) who took the time to speak to us, but we couldn’t get to your amazing story. We will in September. In fact, if you’d like to contribute to a Tuscan profile over the summer, get in touch at tuscanschoolpta@gmail.com.

And remember, School Supply Boxes are back for next school year!

The PTA is partnering with a new school supply vendor, Bright SchoolKitz® to provide supply kits to match your teacher’s supply list for the 2022-23 school year. Thank you to our wonderful teachers for already putting together the supply lists! Order now and eliminate the back-to-school shopping hassle. Kits are filled with brand names (Crayola, Elmer's, etc.) and quality products that are competitively priced with local and large retailers. Hurry! The earlier you order, the lower the price!

Use this link to order your supplies.
All kits ordered before 6/24, the last day of school, are discounted, though they will be available to order through early October. Kits ordered by families will be shipped to your home because of the construction at school.
NOTE: Kits will be provided by the Tuscan PTA to all Tuscan students who qualify for free and reduced lunch. We will make arrangements with Ms. Buggy to get kits to the children before school starts. Does your family need assistance with buying a kit regardless of FRL status? Contact us via Ms. Buggy, the Tuscan social worker, no questions asked, the PTA is here to help. Please contact Ms. Buggy and let her know the grade your child will be in come September. We’ll buy a kit and you’ll be able to pick it up from Ms. Buggy before school begins.

Questions? Contact info@schoolkitz.com or 1-844-937-5489.

Tuscan specific questions? Feel free to contact Laurie Gates.

Yearbooks!

We will be distributing yearbooks via your child’s teachers on Thursday. There are a limited number of books left over for purchase if you didn’t order one. We will be selling them for $30 each. Details to follow in a separate email later this week. Questions? Email Ronni @ TuscanPTAPres@gmail.com

Election Time!

Last Wednesday, June 15, we had the last PTA meeting of the school year and our elections. Congratulations to the new Executive Board:

President: Nóra O’Rourke
Vice President: open position, TBD!
Vice President of Equity and Inclusion: Joanne Charles
Treasurer: Mark Slosberg
Communications/Newsletter Editor: Emma Maksimovic
Secretary: Laurie Gates

Please congratulate and thank these fabulous volunteers. Remember, we still NEED YOU next year. There are many positions available, some with significant time commitments and some with little. We will write some role descriptions and post them over the summer.

And a final farewell from Ronni Schwartz

I’ve been a Tuscan mom for ten straight years of my life now, and it’s about to be over. I went to the same school my entire childhood from pre-K through 12th grade, so change is hard!

All those Tuscan Shows, all those art shows, all those times I got to be a mystery reader, or work the prize table at the Tuscan Fair.

All those amazing, amazing, amazing teachers and paras and specials teachers and staff.

And of course, all these wonderful kids and parents and families. Not that you don’t know it, y’all, but you have some genuinely delightful kids.

In case it’s not totally clear, I am going to miss the hell out of all of it. Even though so many of you are coming along with me as we send our kids to MMS next year, and some of you already have kids like mine at Columbia — we all have this same journey ahead of us, and thank god we’ll be doing it together. (Or staggered, as the case may be.)

But in this one last Tuscan newsletter when I’m president of the PTA, I get to say… it has been a wild ride this year - if you think about where we started from just days after a devastating storm and trying to regain some normalcy.

So - first, thank you to the amazing PTA executive board: VP Nóra O’Rourke, Treasurer Mark Slosberg, Comms and Newsletter Editor Emma Maksimovic, VP of Equity and Inclusion Joanne Charles and Secretary Laurie Gates. And Regina Eckert, our webmaster extraordinaire and honorary board member. You are all dear friends and I’ve loved working with you.

Thanks to the rest of the incredible team too:

Our incredible Spirit Wear co-chairs: Erica Galea and Laura Carney.
5th Grade committee: Jennifer Melone, Frankie Sirianni, Cary Midland, Jennifer Roszell and Laurie Gates
Tuscan Show Directors: Katie Rickard and Missy Wahlers and business manager Amy Merlino, art crew Maddy and Jake Shaw and ALL the parent skit directors
SEPAC liaison: Kay Puthaaroon
Teacher Liaisons to the PTA: Jessica Wheeler and Melanie Secor
100th Day of School Food Drive and Winter PJ drive organizer: Claire Sinclair
Picture Day chairpeople: Tracy Sham and Vanessa Parvin
Membership chairpeople: Jennifer Padley Kantor and Tracy Sham
Class Coordinator leader: Jennifer Roszell and CC orientation: Christina Taber-Kewene
ALL the Class Coordinators!
Teacher appreciation: Jennifer Roszell
Halloween party planners: Jennifer Melone, Abi Werwath and Frankie Sirianni
Tuscan Fair planners: Holly Keith, Regina Hanley, Maddy Shaw and Rebecca Scheer
First Day of School coffee: Meredith Lambert, Laurie Gates and Cindy Price
5th Grade Sweatshirt coordinator: Meredith Lambert
Student programming/assemblies and Book Fair: Meredith Brehm
Photographers: Mason Levinson and Tracy Sham
DJ every time we ask! Mike Lehrer

If I have forgotten anyone, please forgive me - I hope I thanked you enough in person to make up for it. Thank you to everyone who volunteers to make this school (and all our schools) better, to everyone who pitches in to help, even when you’re exhausted and have millions of other things to do. Thank you for donating money to allow us to do programming and support activities that enrich the experience for our kids and help our teachers and staff. Thanks for your patience when things didn’t go as planned and thanks for keeping the drama to a minimum. This year has been a pleasure.

Much Tiger and rainbow love,

Ronni

PEACE OUT, ITâ€™S SUMMER TIME!

SUBJECT: Tuscan PTA Newsletter 6/20