School instructional time is precious --- every instructional minute is needed to

prepare the students for High Stakes Testing. 

Students need to arrive on time - 8:30 - and stay for the entire day until 3:30. 

If your students need to eat breakfast, they need to arrive at school between

7:55 a.m. and 8:25 a.m.  The cafeteria doors close at 8:25 to prepare the

cafeteria for pre-kindergarten breakfast that starts at 8:40 a.m.

Parents who bring their children to school after 8:30 will be required to park

their car, bring their children inside, and sign an Attendance Sheet Record

with Rapides Security Officer. 

Parents who check their children out of school early will be required to go

through the same procedure.  Parents who pick up their children in the

afternoon are reminded that school dismisses at 3:30 --- be in line on

time to pick up your children.  Teachers are able to leave school at 3:50.  

If there are any changes in transportation plans, then parents must write a

note to the school spelling out how their children are to get home. 

No note? No change in transportation! 

Cherokee Elementary FYI

"For Your Information" Sheet:

• Cherokee Elementary School, a one-story building situated on a twelve acre site, is located at 5700 Prescott Drive in Alexandria, Louisiana. 
• The attractive school building belies its age of 57 years. 
• In 1953 the school opened serving grades one through seven.  In 1957 the organizational pattern changed to grades one through six.  In 1969 Cherokee became one of the first schools in Rapides Parish to begin a kindergarten program.  Three years later, in order to accommodate this program, a building with two classrooms was constructed.

• The present school population has grown to 750 --- serving students in grades pre-kindergarten through five with four sections of most grades.  In addition, three inclusion special education classes, and two gifted/talented classes are offered.

• Louisiana State Department of Education assigns each school in the state a School Performance Score (SIP).  This score is based upon the school's performance on LEAP and iLEAP (90%), and on students' attendance rate (10%). 

• 1998-1999 school year, Cherokee earned a School Performance Score of 109---School of Academic Achievement (third out of the fifty-four schools in Rapides Parish.)

• 1999-2000 school year, Cherokee earned a School Performance Score of 100---School of Academic Achievement (fifth out of the fifty-four schools in Rapides Parish.)

• 2000-2001 school year, Cherokee earned a School Performance Score of 101.2.

• 2001-2002 school year, Cherokee earned a School Performance Score of 96.2.

• 2002-2003 school year, Cherokee earned a School Performance Score of 101.6, an improvement of + 0.4. 

• 2003-2004 school year, Cherokee earned a School Performance Score of 108.1, an improvement of + 7.5 points.

• 2004-2005 school year, Cherokee earned a School Performance Score of 115.8, an improvement of +7.7 points.  Cherokee was awarded a School of Exemplary Growth Label. 

• 2005-2006 school year, Cherokee earned a School Performance Score of 110.1.  The second year Cherokee was a School of Exemplary Growth. 

• 2006-2007 school year, Cherokee earned a School Performance Score of 105. 

• 2007-2008 school year, Cherokee earned a School Performance Score of 101.6.

• 2008-2009 school year, Cherokee earned a School Performance Score of 108.6.

• 2009 - 2010 school year, Cherokee earned a School Performance Score of 108.1. 

• The itinerant staff includes speech, occupational, and physical therapists, an adapted physical education teacher, an educational diagnostician, a school psychologist, a registered nurse, and a social worker.

• Cherokee Elementary's lobby walls are decorated with the mural that you see at the top of this page. It was painted by students of Mrs. Ethel Dixon along with her students and some school students during the summer of 2010. 

• The front hallway is lined with matted and framed 1950s vintage "Dick and Jane" basal readers' teaching pictures. 

• The attractively decorated school office is located to the right of the lobby. 

• Pre-kindergartener, kindergartners, first graders, and second graders find their classroom along the left hallway.  The school gym is to the rear of the entrance lobby.  Third grade students through fifth grade students walk past the school library to their classrooms along the hallway to the right.  An eight classroom modular building houses grades pre-kindergarten and kindergarten.  Fourth grade classrooms are found on the back hallway.  Fifth grade is located at the back of the main building in an 8-classroom modular building.  Each classroom in this wing has three Internet connections, storage cabinets with a built in sink, and large, attractive windows. 

IN LINE ON TIME

Instructional lessons are planned in sequences that will help students learn.  When students miss days of school learning becomes harder. 

The brain is like the muscles in a person's legs.  When climbing stairs one step at a time, a person's legs are comfortable and do not become tired quickly.  But, when trying to take the steps two at a time, legs tire much more quickly and with discomfort so great that they must stop altogether.  Students who miss school have a difficult time attending to school work missed while absent while trying to keep up with the new materials taught when they return.  Help your child --- mentally, emotionally, socially, academically --- get them to school every day ready to actively listen and learn.

Cherokee encourages all students to be

"in line on time"

each and every school day during the

2011-2012 school year.

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