Superintendent’s Welcome Welcome to the new school year 2012-13! As we approach September students and families are starting to think about the start up of school. This year there are changes in the structure and organization of our School District. Districts 6 (Sussex to Rothesay), District 8 (Saint John, St. Martin’s Westfield) and District 10 (St.George, St. Stephen and the Fundy Isles) have now been amalgamated as of July 1, 2012 to be the Anglophone South School District. Our District has close to 25,000 K-12 students in 74 schools and four high school alternate education centres.
The Office of the Superintendent is located in Saint John, on Woodward Avenue and attached to Millidgeville North School and we have three Education Centres with staff who will attend to local issues and support Principals and teachers in each of the three areas. In Saint John, the Education Centre is located within the Office of the Superintendent and is led by Senior Education Officer Debbie Thomas. The Education Centre in the St. Stephen area is in the location of the former School District 10 Office and attached to St. Stephen Middle School; the Senior Education Officer is Jenny MacDougall. The third Education Centre will be located within Hampton Elementary School but for now staff are located in the former School District 6 Office on 70B Hampton Road and Paul Smith is the Senior Education Officer for schools in that area.
Our school boundaries remain the same and our bus routes have not seen any major changes for fall 2012. We are getting calls about school supplies and you may want to check your schools’ website or pick up some basic supplies. You may also check with your school when school administrative assistants are back at work – after August 20th in most schools.
It has been a busy summer with the hiring of teachers, school principals/vice principals, and non-teaching support staff. Our facilities staff has worked hard to clean and complete repairs in schools. In addition, some schools have had major improvement projects.
We are in the process of building a new website for Anglophone South School District and from this site we will have links to the three Education Centres and information about our District. The former School District 6, 8, and 10 websites can still be accessed. The new website can be accessed through the following address: http://web1.nbed.nb.ca/sites/asd-s. The website is a work in progress and we will be migrating information from the three websites over the coming weeks. Links to the previous sites can be found on the front page of the new site while we work through this process.
Information is included below on the opening of schools. Educators return to school officially on August 27 and Principals/Vice Principals attend District meetings the week before. For most students, school begins on Wednesday, September 5th, 2012, which is a day later than usual. On Tuesday, September 4th, 2012, staff will be working with their Principals and Vice Principals on their School Improvement Plans and there is no school for students. Exceptions to the September 5th return to classes are outlined in the information below.
I would like to take this opportunity to welcome back all students, staff and families for the new school year 2012-2013! May it be a safe and happy year for all.
Zoë Watson, Superintendent
Anglophone South School District