School News

After having earned the prestigious Caring School Climate Award last year, Project Cornerstone is thriving at Marshall Lane. Parent readers are sharing Cornerstone books and activities with each class once a month. A group of upper grade students will be participating in a Project Cornerstone workshop in November called “Expect Respect”.

This year, our Fun Visor program has expanded. Every Friday, volunteers have special
activities or projects for students to participate in during lunch recess. Students will
participate in service learning projects, make bookmarks, create cards for senior citizens,
play with legos, blow bubbles, or play cooperative games, to name just a few of the many
opportunities they can choose to join. Our thanks to all of the parents who are involved
in helping Project Cornerstone be so successful at our school.

If you are interested in helping with Project Cornerstone in some capacity, please email
Mrs. Spencer at pspencer [at] campbellusd.org or give your name and contact information
to someone in the office and we will pass the information on to the coordinators of this
effort.

Our new school website has a new newsletter distribution system that helps you stay current on events and issues every week – even if you have children in more than one school! (Disponible en Español también.)

Subscriptions from past years are no longer valid. 

Subscribe to the new system today.

Please add these dates to your calendar:

Monday, October 12th—PROFESSIONAL DEVLOPMENT DAY for teachers. NO SCHOOL for STUDENTS.  Enjoy your long weekend!

Wednesday, October 14th--“Rising Young Author’s Awards” at Barnes and Nobel on Stevens Creek honoring Marshall Lane 4th grader Faith Gonia and other students from the Campbell Union School District at 7:00 p.m.

Thursday, October 15th –Great American Shakeout Drill at 9:45 a.m.
Marshall Lane will be participating in a statewide earthquake drill

Monday, October 19th to Friday October 23rd—Parent/Teacher Conferences;
STUDENTS WILL BE DISMISSED EVERY DAY at 1:35. Please arrange to pick your child/ren up on time.

Saturday, October 24th—MARSHALL LANE’S 44th ANNUAL PUMPKIN WALK from 1:00 to 5:00.  Come join us for Halloween fun, games, food and activities.

Dear Parents,

Last year, our students took the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium Test. Smarter Balanced, or sometimes referred to as “The SBAC Test”, which utilizes computer adaptive technology to measure student achievement. The goal is to measure student progress toward college and career readiness in both English Language Arts and Mathematics.

Results are in and if your child was in 3rd grade or above last year, you will be receiving information about their test scores in the next couple of weeks. The

2015 SBAC results cannot be compared to previous years’ results on the California Standards Test (CST) or STAR Tests:

• They measure 2 different sets of standards.
• They use different scaled scores.
• A “Proficient” score in previous CST scores does not equal a “Proficient” score on Smarter Balanced.
• Whereas the CSTs focused on skills, the SBAC focuses on critical thinking.

CUSD prepares students for college and career readiness by building the critical thinking and problem solving skills that can be applied in any context. The Common Core Standards guide schools to focus on deeper, richer, and more applicable learning. Results of the SBAC are one indicator on a dashboard of measurements used to assess student progress. Using a car metaphor—while the odometer is important, it’s not the only gauge on the dashboard. Within CUSD, we have a system of assessments—curriculum-embedded, district-wide, as well as statewide assessments—that are used to gauge student progress.  This year’s scores will be used by the state of California, Santa Clara County, the Campbell Union School District, and Marshall Lane to set a baseline for future growth and continuous improvement.

As with any assessments, these results tests measure a moment in time.  It does not tell us everything we need to know about a particular student.  However, it can show trends and areas of strength or challenge.  Our staff has been busy disaggregating the data and looking at it in a variety of ways to inform our instruction.  Here are some things that we will be working on:

• Increased computer access and skills
• Focus on writing ability
• Work on teaching students to communicate their mathematical thinking
• Increased collaboration between grade level teams and across grade levels.

If you have any questions or concerns about the assessment data or your particular child, please contact your student’s teacher(s).