I thought I would do a little head lice review. The issue of head lice is one that often causes strain on families and the school. In the coming days we will be communicating with all parents about this issue in an attempt to increase understanding about “head lice” as well as District policies and procedures for dealing with head lice. Here is the procedure followed by our schools with regard to head lice:
When a parent notifies the school that a child has lice we check the classmates of that child to insure that the lice have not spread to other students.
If a child is found to have lice at school, the child is sent home immediately with instructions on how to eliminate the lice. Once the child has been treated he/she may return to school.
Mrs. Heckman, our school nurse, checks all students who have been treated for lice after seven days to insure that they are free of lice.
When a child is confirmed to have lice in school, the classroom is vacuumed and desks and chairs cleaned in the event that a louse has jumped off the infected child.
The District complies with all suggestions of the Center for Disease Control, American Academy of Pediatrics, and DuPage County Health Department. To our knowledge there are no additional steps that we can take to reduce the incidence of lice in the school setting.
We rely heavily on parents of students to control the spread of lice! Parents are an essential part of the solution to reduce lice!
Future communications will include information about lice facts to help all of completely understand this issue. Should you have specific questions about this issue please contact your

Count Down to Halloween

Around this time every year we have the State Inspectors and our local fire department walk through our building to make sure that it is safe and secure for all our students. We are proud to report that we received an excellent rating.

We also celebrated Bus Drivers Appreciation Day. We are extremely lucky in this district to have the bus drivers work directly for District 66. A big thank you for all they do for us.

One last thing -- many members of our District 66 were recertified as skilled practitioners in CPR and AED. You can feel safe at District 66.

Safety in our Schools

I was fortunate enough to attend the DuPage Regional Office of Education where the DuPage States Attorney's Office hosted a School Safety Conference on October 15 to address the issue of promoting a safe -learning envioronment in our schools. Current trends and issues were presented, and the conference featured the best practices in School Safety, a panel discussion regarding school threats and violence, available resources from DuPage County offices, and featured a keynote presentation from the FBI regarding assessing levels of risk, debunking myths, and knowing how to recognize a student who may be prone to violence.
I certainly hope everyone has a wonderful weekend .

Illinois Principal Association

This week I was privileged to attend the Illinois Principal Professional Conference in Peoria. I attended a variety of legal updates and other small group sessions on topics affecting administrators and schools . One of the speakers were Dr. Christopher Koch, Illinois State Superintendent of Schools, who updated attendees on the state of education in Illinois. I was also able to attend a speech by Michael Dorne a nationally renowned speaker from Georgia who presented, "School Safety Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow", which focused on the importance of a safe environment. The mission of the Principals Association is to advance learning through effective educational leadership.

We also had a treat for reaching a magazine sales limit during our magazine drive. Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Vetter graciously had four teachers and four students compete in a wild game of Mario Race Car Driving. Make sure you ask your children how much fun we all had with Mr. Coffee, Mrs. Bell, Miss Stetka and Mrs. Cirjakovic and our wonderful students. Have a safe and restful long weekend.

Fall is finally here and all our Chicago teams are involved; some are winners and some are not. However, for us here at Prairieview we are all winners because of the Darien Rotary Club. All our third grade students this year received a Student's Dictionary. Having all our children with a dictionary, written at their level, we are able to achieve much more. Remember this weekend we have Movie Night tonight and Market Day on Saturday; it should be a busy District 66 weekend. Have a nice one and stay safe.