From the Upper Elementary principal's Desk

Dear Upper Elementary School Parents,

What a blast we had on October 31st here at school. It was a spooktacular time for all. Our students had amazing behavior and showed wonderful school spirit by wearing their costumes and joining in the fun. Thank you to all that sent in items for parties and helped their children become part of this whole school celebration.

I also want to take a moment to thank you for attending your child’s conference over these last 2 days. The partnership between school and home is pivotal to your child’s success here at ASD.

Starting Sunday, November 7, I’m excited to announce that we are going back to full time World Languages. This means your child will receive language instruction Sun, Mon, Wed, Thu and every other Tue. Adding these sections to our master schedule will require our other specialist times to adjust a bit. If you have any schedule questions, please feel free to contact your child’s teacher.

Also starting November 7, we will begin to stage students outside at the end of the day departure. Instead of going to the cafeteria/gym, Grade 3 and 4 students will line up under the blue court covered area, by class. Grade 5 students will be staged outside the cafeteria area, in the courtyard. We are hoping that dismissing kids outside will provide a few extra precious minutes of PE time in the gym, as well as expedite departure even further for families.

Speaking about departure, please look for an email that came out from our ES Office this week. Departure and arrival have been slowed when students do not have their DragonCards. To expedite arrival/dismissal, we are instituting a procedure throughout the whole school. If your child doesn’t have their Dragon Card for 3 consecutive days, you will receive an email letting you know this information. If your child comes for 2 additional days without the badge, they will be automatically reissued a new DragonCard, and the old one will be deactivated. The cost of replacement (50 QR) will be deducted from the family account. With this process in place, we are hoping to avoid a great deal of the backups we are seeing at gates.

Over this past year, Internet safety has become an important issue, as kids have been navigating a virtual world. At our next Principal’s Coffee, on Monday, November 15, at 9:00am, our Tech Integration Coach, Martin Reinsmoen, will be giving a talk on Acceptable Tech Usage and Internet Safety. For the first time in a while, this talk will be in person. We are limited to the first 30 parents to respond, so please fill out this form if you wish to attend. You will receive an email confirmation for your attendance by Thursday, Nov 11.

Finally, we have been back at school, full-time for an entire month. We are going to start sending out attendance letters for students who have been missing school. This also will include students that are tardy or have frequent early dismissals. We believe that attendance at school is a huge predictor of school success. When students are absent, we miss them and they miss out! Thanks for sending your child to school each day that they are able.

Have a great weekend and upcoming week.

Regards,

Mr. Toby Tebo

Upper Elementary Principal

American School of Doha

Update November 4, 2021

The ASD Dragons swim team is participating in their MESAC Championships from Tuesday, November 9 through Thursday, November 11. This year the event is virtual with racing being held at the six schools around the region and results being reported at the end of each day. The results will be combined and scored each evening and by the end of Thursday, we will know the individual and team champions for MESAC swimming.

There are more than 30 members of the swim team who have been training four sessions a week since the beginning of the year. The team is quite strong and should be in the running for the overall team title. There will be some excellent individual results, all contributing to the team's point tally.

The swim team would love the support of the ASD community. Racing will take place each afternoon starting at 4:30 pm and running until just after 6:00 pm. We are hoping to live stream the events but watching in person and providing some loud cheers would be awesome.

We hope to see you out on the pool balcony next week. If you want a front row seat we are always looking for help on deck with timing the events. Please send Jeff Slater (jeff.slater@asd.edu.qa) an email if you are available any day to help out.

The team appreciates your support and we look forward to seeing you next week. Go Dragons!