Good afternoon, CodeRVA Families-
It’s almost time to go back to school! Our staff is ready to see all our Raptors return on Monday!
On Monday we will host grade level assemblies for all our students. We do this annually so that we can welcome back each grade level, introduce our administrative team, and remind students of the high expectations we have for them in the upcoming school year. In advance of those assemblies we wanted to share some changes your students will hear about on Monday. Please take a moment to review this information with your student.
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First, throughout last year we noticed what seemed to be a trend of increasing numbers of students tardy to school. Over the summer we pulled all the data on tardies we could gather, and the trend we suspected was true. In addition, many of you may have received notifications that your student was not in the correct location in our school building during the school day. Because we understand the importance of students spending as much time as possible in instruction, we have changed our tardy to school procedures to help us more accurately track who is arriving late and when. Likewise, we want to make sure that students are in their classrooms when the bell rings for each rotation. Please see the updates below.
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Once the 8:47 a.m. bell has rung, students should go directly to Rotation 1.
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Students not in Rotation 1 by the 8:50 a.m. bell will need to go to the Main Office to fill out an electronic tardy form that asks for the time the student arrived to school and the reason they are late
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Students will receive a tardy pass that must be given to their Rotation 1 teacher.
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We will continue to monitor tardy to school and tardy to each class data, and if concerns persist, we may update families with how consequences will be assigned.
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One item that has not changed is the expectation that all students comply with Virginia’s law that makes schools cell phone free areas. We will implement our cell phone procedures, which have not changed since last year, starting on Monday. As a reminder, you can find those procedures summarized here:
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All phones need to be turned off and put out of sight no later than the 8:50 AM bell. They may not be seen again until 2:56 PM..
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Phones will be confiscated if they are seen during the school day. Phones are labeled with the student’s name and are in the Main Office waiting for the student to pick them up at dismissal.
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Families will be contacted by email or telephone for violations 1 and 2. Students who accumulate 3 violations will receive a day of In School Detention. For violations 4, 5, 6, etc., students will turn in their cell phones no later than 8:50 AM daily to the Main Office for the number of days that corresponds to the number of violations. For example, on violation 5 the student will turn in their cell phone for 5 days.
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Other than cell phone violations, the other negative behavior we saw most frequently last year was an increasing number of students who were turning in work that was not their own; plagiarism; and the misuse of artificial intelligence (AI). We believe that when students go against our expectations for behavior, the first step is to reteach the expectation. As a result, we have developed a series of self-paced lessons for students to engage with in order to review what is the proper use of AI and what is not when it comes to completing schoolwork. In the unlikely event that your student is found to have plagiarized an assignment or improperly used AI, we will have a conversation with them and you. If this same behavior occurs again, we will have students complete those self-paced lessons. We have found success in the past in communicating changes to consequences in advance, so we are making families aware now of this new strategy to help teach students to submit only their own work and to how to properly use tools like AI at school.
- Our last adjustment to procedures to share today is that we have moved our 11th and 12th grade Internship teachers to an area of our building called the 400s. The restrooms in that area of the building are now solely limited to students currently enrolled in the Internship program. No 9th or 10th grade students are permitted in that area unless they are in a session with our Work-Based Learning Coordinators, and only 11th and 12th grade students currently in the Internship can be in that area or accessing the 400s restrooms. As a result, students may only access the single stall restroom located in the 200s between Ms. Welsh and Mrs. Nesbitt’s rooms. The good news is all other student restrooms have been restored to fully-functioning areas over the summer (thanks to Dr. Harmon and Mr. Neal’s handyperson efforts!) and students should pay attention to the new signage on display near each restroom. We thank our Raptors in advance for helping us to keep our restroom spaces safe and clean throughout the day!
Next, is your student driving to school this year? If so, please note families will need to complete this form. (We will also have paper copies available in the Main Office if needed.) No students may drive to school without a completed form, and there is no parking fee associated with this form. Even if a student has a completed form on file from last year, we must have a new form completed for this school year. As a reminder, CodeRVA students should park their vehicles in the parking lot at CodeRVA only. Students should obey all street signs and not park in restricted locations as they may be towed. CodeRVA is not held responsible for any vehicles that are towed from the areas surrounding our school.
Last but definitely not least this week, I need to share two important changes to dates I previously shared. For once we tried to give advance notice of events, and then our partners at The Park asked for us to adjust based on their booking calendar. Since we do rely on them to host Homecoming for us and we share a parking lot, we have had to make two changes.
Homecoming is now moved up a week to October 9, and the dance will be 7-9 PM upstairs in The Park’s Hideaway. Stay tuned for more details and this year’s theme.
Back to School Night is also moving by one day to September 23. Exact times for this event are still being settled, but you can estimate it will start around 6 PM. Thank you for your patience as we work hard to be good neighbors. For years we have been asked to only hold our evening events on Mondays and Tuesdays since The Park is closed then, but that seems to no longer be the case.
That is it for today, Raptors! Below are several reminders from previous emails sent this summer. Please be sure to check those out if you haven’t been spending as much time in your Inbox as I have been.
I hope all our Raptors had a good summer, and we look forward to providing a calm, consistent environment for them to return to along with incredibly caring teachers who have been working so hard this summer. Let’s make the 2026-27 school year the best yet at CodeRVA!
#WeAreCodeRVA
Previous Raptor Rundown Reminders
We apologize for a previously incorrect YMCA link shared with our 9th and 10th grade students enrolled in Health/Physical Education. You can access the correct link here, and if you are having trouble with enrollment, please contact the YMCA directly.
There is no wrong way to PTSA! Join today: https://www.givebacks.com/
Please pay your student’s fees online! If you are not sure how to do that, you can refer to this document: How do I Pay School Fees? to assist you with logistics, and Henrico County has created this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?
In addition, we still have one in person fee paying opportunity for families wishing to use CASH OR CHECK ONLY for their fees. We will not have any online stations set up for fee paying since families can access the online system from any phone or computer. If you can’t make the date below but still want to use cash or check, please send the exact amount to school with your student when they return to campus.
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August 26 3:15-4 PM