Save the Date: Special PTO on March 21st at 7:30 PM: Response to Intervention - Addressing the Needs
of All students at Franklin
Dear Franklin Families,
I am writing to invite you to the second family workshop in our Inclusion Presentation Series on Tuesday,
March 22nd at 7:30 PM. We were fortunate to receive positive feedback from many of you following our
first workshop on October 6th. After speaking with several parents and after reviewing the result of the
post workshop evaluation online survey, two primary questions surfaced:
1. What is the school doing to ensure that we meet the needs of all our children, including those
who perform at or above grade level?
2. To what extent the inclusion model is beneficial or deleterious to the academic and social growth
of typically developing children?
Our workshop on Tuesday, March 22nd at 7:30 PM is our response to the first question. If you have ever
wondered about the systems, structures and educational offerings the Franklin Elementary school has in
place to ensure that we are addressing the needs of our typically developing students, you will find the
workshop on Tuesday, March 22nd helpful. A multidisciplinary team composed of Franklin teachers,
parents, members of the district’s Elementary Stabilization Program (ESP) and me have been hard at
work to plan and execute a workshop that we believe will be relevant, informational, helpful and practical.
We will distribute two handouts at the end of the workshop that families can use as resources to support
their children and to answer their questions.
I hope the following article, entitled: “Inclusion and the Other Kids – Here is What Research Shows So
Far About Inclusion’s Effect on Nondisabled Students” will help to answer the second question. Although
the article is a bit long, I encourage families who may have questions or concerns relating to the effect of
inclusion on their children to peruse it. Please see the link to the article below:

Inclusion_and_the_Other_kids.pdf
I would like to express our deepest gratitude to the PTO for their support and for allowing us to use the
PTO meetings for these presentations. It is important that we keep in mind that the purpose of these
presentations is not to provide information only. These workshops are in keeping with our commitment to
continue to build Franklin into a caring community in which all our children feel loved, liked, accepted and
supported by their peers and by the adults they encounter on a daily basis. We also want all families to
have the confidence that we have systems and offerings in place to meet the needs of all our students,
including our typically developing children, so that we accelerate the learning of our students who are
behind grade level to reduce the achievement gap and continue to push our students who are at or above
grade level to higher levels of achievement. Our entire team looks forward to seeing all of you at our 2 nd
workshop in our inclusion series: RtI: Addressing the Needs of All Students at Franklin on Tuesday,
March 21st at 7:30 PM.
Thank you,
Joel