TA News

Dear TA Families,

Morning frost, bare trees, sunlight slanting toward the solstice: late fall is certainly in the air. Here is the news from TA as we shifted into November this week. 

Community Day Re-Cap

• On Wednesday, Nov. 3, we had our second TA Community Day of the year with a special schedule of activities and an overarching theme of gratitude. The big goals of the day: 1) to build community within our advisory, our grade, and our school; and 2) to carve out time for students to focus on the ‘big picture’ level of their learning through transferable skills and creating a personal portfolio.
• A few highlights included: the TA stage band performances, a bonfire and hot cocoa, two half-school assemblies in the gym, advisory time, grade-level activities, gratitude cards, and launching individual personal/academic portfolios.
• Every student started building their own portfolio, which they will use over time to collect and reflect on their academic work, track their progress on TA’s schoolwide transferable skills, and create their personal learning plan.
• Ask your student about their experience of the day – what did they enjoy? what did they learn? what new connection did they make?

Campus Health & Safety

• We completed our fifth week of Covid surveillance testing on Tuesday. The rate of participation increases each week, with 113 people getting tested this week (staff and students). Fortunately, we had another round of zero positive cases.
• While the pandemic has dominated a lot of effort over the last 20 months, Covid isn’t the only area of health and safety we pay attention to. TA participated in the new mandatory testing for lead in school drinking water earlier this fall. Results for two taps (out of the 29 tested) required follow up steps. We outline the results for all taps and next steps in this memo to the TA community.

Technology and Learning Expectations

• We created the following document to help all of us within the TA community navigate this phase of the pandemic and to help maintain consistency and continuity with the academic experience: TA Technology & Learning Expectations, Q2
• Please review, discuss at home, and reach out with any questions. One key takeaway should be that students are expected to bring their laptop to and from school daily, fully charged and ready to be used regularly. 

Championship Highlights

• Congratulations to our girls’ cross-country team for winning the Division III state championship! Read the full story:  thetfordacademy.org/2021/11/ta-girls-win-cross-country-state-championship
• Congratulations to the TA robotics team for bringing home multiple trophies at their first competition since pre-pandemic days! Their story is also posted on the TA website:  thetfordacademy.org/2021/11/tas-robotics-team-wins-big-at-tournament

In other news, students brought home their Q1 report cards (and my quarterly academic letter) to families on Monday – make sure to ask for it. This Sunday, we are hosting admissions open houses for prospective students exploring TA as an option for Fall 2022 – please spread the word.

Have a great weekend!

Carrie Brennan, Head of School

Featured photos: The TA stage band puts on a show for each of two ‘half-school’ assemblies during Community Day.