New Dimensions Charter School
SCHOOL GRADE:
The current school year has been very rewarding at New Dimensions. Our students have been able to experience an inviting educational environment where outstanding teachers are providing first class instruction day in and day out. Our students have also been given the opportunity to experience hands on learning through several beneficial field trips.
As we move forward with a new school year, we need to look back at last year’s state test results. One of the benefits North Carolina public schools offer parents and community is transparency. Public school accountability is a standard practice for North Carolina going back to the early 1990s, and the North Carolina School Report Cards provide parents and community with information on such key issues as student performance, teacher experience, and school safety. Data are provided at the school and state levels to enable parents to compare the performance of their student’s schools with others across the district and state.
Legislation (G.S. §115C-83.15) passed during the 2013 long session of the North Carolina General Assembly provides an additional measure of school performance in the form of School Performance Grades. Beginning with the 2013-14 school year, the annual North Carolina School Report Cards display a letter grade of A, B, C, D or F for each school in the state.
The School Performance Grades are based 80 percent on our school’s achievement score (student proficiency) and 20 percent on students’ academic growth. Scores across the state varied with this year’s release of school performance grades. Among public schools, approximately 8% of schools graded as A’s, while almost 22% were rated as D’s or F’s. We are very proud to announce that the performance composite for New Dimensions for the 2018-2019 school year is a “B”. This is the highest score ever for the school and an indication of great things to come.
I want to personally thank our entire staff for their hard work along with our parents and especially our students for all they did to be achieve this status. We are very pleased with our progress but not satisfied.
One of our top priorities for 2019–2020 is to improve our School Performance Grade. There are a number of key elements that we will put in place to help improve student performance. These include:
- A possible Pre-K Class
- A Reading Specialist to Provide Training in Reading Strategies
- The Warrior Before and After-School Program
- A Daily Intervention Program called Warrior Time
- Academic Clubs and Activities
- Tutoring Through the Burke Augustine Literacy Project
- Reduced Class Size (1 to 16) in Grades K-5
We encourage our community to closely follow our students’ academic progress and work with our teachers to help ensure that all of our students stay on track academically. Working together as a team, we can improve not only how well our students are performing individually, but how our school is performing as a whole.
Helping us obtain this success have been many community supporters who have donated food, door prices and other items for our students and staff. A special thanks to all our community sponsors for their tremendous help this year:
- Bucks Pizza
- Timberwoods
- Friday Friends
- Sain’s Barber Shop
- Arbonne by Julia Norman
- Burke Industrial
- Lowes Hardware
- BUCM
- Rico Guilien and Farm Bureau
- The Grind
- The Purple Pig
- Celebration Worship Center
- Morganton Public Safety
- Thomas Dentistry
- All our Parents Who Provided the School with So Many Things We Need
There is nothing more important to our faculty and staff than ensuring that our students are ready for the next step in their academic career. We look forward to working with our entire community to make sure our students are on track for success.
Sincerely,
David Burleson, NDS Director
Continuing to Build Community: Clergy 11.22.19
New Dimensions Charter School continues in its efforts of Community Building through having different organizations greet students once a month upon morning arrival. The guests hand out smiles, hugs, fist bumps, high -fives, and "good mornings" to the students. Since starting this effort in September, they have had Morganton Public Safety and Morganton Fire Department. In November, several area Clergy participated in this event: Pastor Ronald McLendon of Celebration Family Worship Center, Pastor Lauren Carlson of Calvary Lutheran Church of Morganton, Pastor Keith Burkhart of Pleasant Ridge Baptist Church, Pastor George Logan of New Day Christian Church and Bishop Barry Camp of The Rising Church.
Pastor Keith Burkhart noted, “It was an honor to be at New Dimensions to meet and greet the students as they came to school. My prayer is that they saw the light of Jesus in us and it made their day a little brighter.”
Pastor McLendon was appreciative stating, "Our thanks to Director Dr. David Burleson, staff and faculty of New Dimensions for allowing us to come and greet the growing student body. We all enjoyed this opportunity so much."
In addition to inviting groups to greet the students; the schools Afterschool Program, Camp Warriors, is helping to build community as well. They have visited with residents of Grace Ridge. Campers played games, completed coloring pages, had cookies and hot cider with the residents. Camp Warriors Director, Mrs Sally McIlwain, also had Hartman's Haven Rescue Organization visit with the NDS campers at New Dimensions. They learned how to care for animals and what a responsibility it is.
New Dimensions Director, Dr David Burleson said, "What a blessing it has been for our students at New Dimensions to be greeted by the Police, Fire Department, and several of our local clergy. The high fives and smiling faces revealed that everyone had a great time. A big thank you to everyone who has helped make a great start to our students day at New Dimensions."
Building Community at NDS:
Community is defined by varying aspects of culture, education, age, attitudes, interest and a plethora of other factors. In a effort to build community at New Dimensions Charter School they have started a program where community leaders come to the school and greet the students upon their morning arrival once a month. Community leaders are to include Police, Fire, City Officials, Clergy, Emergency Medical Services, etc. On Friday, September 27th, Morganton Public Safety Officers; Lt Gary Massey, Lt Will Lackey, and Community Officer Casey Kinard greeted New Dimensions students with high-fives, handshakes and hugs. The school alerted their parents prior to the event so they could prepare their students ahead of time. Students were thrilled to see the officers. The students were all smiles as they were greeted by the officers and given words of encouragement for the day. Several comments the staff received were, "I've never given a police officer a high-five before", "My brother wants to be a Police Officer when he is older", "That was weird", "Those cops are nice." Casey Kinard, Community Office and D.A.R.E. Officer stated, "Greeting the students was a great start for our day, I hope the students felt the same. It was awesome seeing the kids and getting tons of high fives!" New Dimensions is looking forward to building a strong community within the school and with others outside their school doors.
2019 NDS Veterans Day Program
Veterans Day Program.mp4