Greetings McKinley Families;

We hope your child got off to a good start. Our goal is to provide exceptional instruction and many extracurricular activities for our students, we call this, “the Practice of the Preach of the McKinley Experience”.  McKinley staff is looking forward to a great year!  

All NYC Department of Education (DOE) schools parent teacher conferences (PTC) will be held virtually this year.  In accordance with the DOE calendar, our first PTC is scheduled for September 21st from 4:30 PM to 7:30 PM.  We have prepared presentations from each subject, on each grade level for you to review; please see the links below.  Take some time to review your child’s class schedule with them.  Their schedule will provide you with their class number and allow you to determine what subjects and teachers your child has.  To communicate with teachers, each presentation will provide the teacher’s email. 

 For our first 2023-2024 PTC, we scheduled a live welcome from Principal Janice A. Geary at 4:30 PM.  The live welcome will be via a Zoom meet.  Due to NYC DOE Zoom constraints we can only host up to 300 participants in this meeting.  If you are unable to attend the meeting, we will be recording and posting it on our website (www.mckinley259.org) immediately following the meeting.  The Zoom link will be sent to you on Thursday, September 21st.  Additionally, there will be a PTA meeting that same night September 21st, 6:30 PM; Executive Board and School Leadership Team (SLT) elections will be held.  There will be more information to follow.    

Each morning our children are met and greeted by their grade Assistant Principal at the entrance doors.  We use the 74th street side/auditorium of the building for our 6th graders, while 7th and 8th graders come in through the schoolyard onto the plaza (schoolyard center entrance).  Principal Geary, and our Lunchroom Coordinator, Ms. Kershteyn, walk through McKinley Park and down Fort Hamilton Parkway each morning to remind the children to get to school on time. School guidance counselors, social workers and our SAPIS worker, in addition to various other staff are available during morning line up to greet and address any of the childrens’ needs.  

In the mornings, breakfast is available from 7:25 AM until 8:25 AM.  In addition to serving breakfast in the cafeteria, we have grab and go breakfast available by each door and in the plaza where we have added additional picnic tables for our outdoor dining option.     

Our 6th graders should have been provided a walking tour with their class to familiarize the locations of all key areas of our building and how to navigate.  I would like to welcome our new librarian, Ms. Cummings.  She will be inviting all 6th grade classes to get acquainted with our resources and online library tools, as well as introduce our borrowing and drop-off program.  She will also introduce our digital book collection to your child.  7th and 8th grade ELA teachers will receive this information to present to their classes.  We also welcome you and your child to take a book or share a book in our little free library box.  Our little free library could be found to the right of the front entrance on 73rd street.  

Great news and events! 

• We have worked over the past several years to assure air-conditioning in all of our classrooms.  Our most recent upgrade was to install air-conditions in our 3rd and 4th floor gyms.   We are hoping for this project to be completed within the next several weeks.  

• Additionally, bleachers have been installed in our 4th floor gym.  We hope your child will be active in one or more of our many after school programs and that you have the opportunity to watch them from the bleachers.   

• New filtered water fountains in front of the 3rd and 4th floor gyms.

• Classrooms have been given a fresh coat of paint.

• We hope to see you cheering on our band, cheer, and flag students at the Ragamuffin Parade on Saturday, September 30th.  The parade starts at 1 PM on the corner of 76th Street & 3rd Avenue, it will continue down 3rd Ave past the Ragamuffin Main Stage on the corner of 90th & 3rd and finish on 92nd & 3rd Avenue. 

• We Look forward to seeing you at our winter concert in December, our theater production of “Shrek” in January, followed by a spring concert and musical production.  More information to follow.  

And we have so many more good things to come.  

PTC school communication will be sent to you from 2 sources that we are using for communication to parents.  Typically, only one system will be used to communicate information.  We are using the Department of Education (DOE) Grade, Attendance and Message Application (GAMA) and an additional vendor, School Messenger.  GAMA will be used for mass informational messages while School Messenger is used when a targeted audience is needed and to call when your child is absent.  We are relying on the information you provide in your NYC Student Account (NYCSA).  Please make sure we have a current phone number and email on NYCSA to contact you.  If you did not get this message twice, your email is not registered as the primary email on NYCSA.  If you did not get the second email, please check your NYCSA to determine what email and phone number you provided there.  Parent communication is critical to supporting your child's success.  Any questions please email Ms. Cullen, the Parent Coordinator at Ecullen3@schools.nyc.gov.

Students' grades will be accessible to parents in GAMA.  Many teachers are also using Google Classroom.  If you would like to have a parent’s view of the gradebook in Google Classroom, please have your child share their log-in with you.  

I would like to welcome our new: 

• Parent Coordinator, Ms. Erin Cullen who is ready to support you. Please contact her via email at ecullen3@schools.nyc.gov or by phone at 718-833-1000, extension 2200.  

• Assistant Principal of the sixth grade, Science, World Languages, STEAM, and Physical Education, Richard Lebowitz, can be reached via email rlebowitz@schools.nyc.gov or via phone 718-833-1000, extension 1420. 

All our activities and other important information can be found on our website www.mckinley259.org, as well as on Instagram: @259events, and Twitter: @kinley259. 

As part of its educational program counseling and guidance services are available at William McKinley IS 259.  Services offered include individual, educational, academic, career, and group guidance counseling.  The counselor can assist students and families with referrals to outside agencies when deemed necessary.  Students wishing to see the counselor should stop by the guidance office to make an appointment.  Parents should feel free to call for an appointment if they have any questions regarding their child.  Questions that pertain to student schedules, student-student conflicts, courses, requests for grade updates, and student personal issues are to be addressed with the school counselor.  If you wish for your child to speak with a guidance counselor, call the main office (718-835-5100) and ask for your child’s guidance counselor.  

Guidance Counselors

• 6th Grade: Ms. Gennaoui

• 7/8 Grade Even # Classes: Ms. Rousseau

• 7/8 Grade Odd # Classes: Ms. Madonia

Our curriculum teams prepared the following presentations for you to review. Please review this information with your child.  If you have any questions, McKinley staff will be available via email on Thursday, September 21st from 4:30 PM to 7:30 PM to respond to any correspondence.  Each presentation has teachers’ email addresses.  

Thank you for allowing us to guide your child through middle school. These are exciting years and go very quickly. We look forward to working with you and your child.  Hoping for a great successful year for all.  

Regards,

Administration

• Principal, Janice Geary  JGeary@schools.nyc.gov 

• Parent Coordinator, Erin Cullen, ECullen3@schools.nyc.gov

• 6th grade, Science, World Languages, STEAM, and Physical Education, AP, Richard Lebowitz RLebowitz@schools.nyc.gov

• 7th Grade, Special Education, Paul Parrella PParrella@schools.nyc.gov

• 8th Grade, Social Studies, ENL, Arts, and Safety AP, Danielle Noto DNoto2@schools.nyc.gov 

• Math, Safety, Technology Programming AP, Elizabeth Urena EUrenaalvarez@schools.nyc.gov 

• English Language Arts, and Administration AP, Anthony DeBenedetto ADeBenedetto@schools.nyc.gov 

ZOOM LINK SENT VIA GAM/SCHOOL MESSENGER. PLEASE EMAIL ECULLEN3@SCHOOLS.NYC.GOV IF MORE INFO IS NEEDED.