Dear SDW Parents/Guardians,
We trust this email finds you in good health and spirits and that you are making the most of the summer break.
Nearly 1,900 SDW students wrapped up a fun and productive Summer School session last week, and we have opened Annual Registration for the 2024-2025 school year!
Annual Registration is an annual event that begins in mid-July for students who completed the previous school year at a School District of Waukesha school. It provides parents/guardians the opportunity to verify and correct household information, parent/guardian information, emergency contact information & sequence, update other household members, and lastly, student information.
We encourage families to begin this process early to ensure that our records have the most up-to-date information for each student. This will make back-to-school communications more accessible and practical and help parents/guardians become more acclimated with Infinite Campus. Please note that annual registration must be completed in Infinite Campus to view middle and high school schedules when they become available for families on August 1st.
To assist you with the Annual Registration process, we have developed resources to assist you:
Communication Tools: You may notice this communication looks a bit different than previous SDW communications. Effective July 1, 2024, the district discontinued using School Messenger and Safe Arrival. This change streamlines communication in one location, Infinite Campus. Moving forward, all communication and absence reporting will be done through Infinite Campus. Additional information on absence reporting in School Messenger is forthcoming. In the meantime, please review the following documents to better understand how to adjust your communication preferences in the IC parent portal.
Additionally, please visit the following back-to-school resources:
Important Back-to-School Dates (Schools are in alphabetical order by grade level.)
If you need additional assistance with the Annual Registration process, please email enrollment@waukesha.k12.wi.us.
Transportation
As we move closer to the beginning of the school year, we want to provide you with information about transportation services for the School District of Waukesha. This communication is being sent to all families district-wide as transportation needs often change, and we want to be sure you are aware of the transportation options the district has to support those needs.
The first resource for transportation options is our School District of Waukesha website. Once at the website, select from the “Menu” option and scroll down until you see the “Departments” subheading. Under that, you can select “Transportation.” This will be the starting point for providing information on the transportation services we offer. If you have questions regarding transportation that cannot be answered through our website, please contact our Transportation office via phone at 262-970-1150 or email at transportation@waukesha.k12.wi.us.
All of our families who qualify for or who have previously used any of our transportation services are being contacted as needed regarding those services and the steps they need to take to solidify their transportation needs for the upcoming school year. After August 23, 2024, parents can access Infinite Campus, view the "Transportation" tab, and see bus route information, including route number and estimated pickup and drop-off times.
If your child qualifies for transportation but won’t be using district transportation services, please complete the 24-25 Transportation Opt Out form (if you haven’t already).
In addition, I want to share some recent information that was provided to our School Board regarding transportation:
The School District of Waukesha needs 76-80 bus drivers for the 2024-2025 school year. There are currently 58 drivers for the upcoming school year, so we have approximately 20 more spots to fill.
Our transportation partners, First Student, are working diligently to fill these open positions. However, we can always use your support in the community to spread the word for anyone interested in driving a bus with wages starting at $24.00 an hour, a sign-on bonus of $4,000.00, and a guarantee of at least 25 hours per week.
New-to-district families must enroll by August 1, 2024, to be assigned a bus route for the first day of school. First Student will work diligently to route students who qualify for transportation who enroll after August 1st, but there is not a guarantee that bussing will be available for the first day of school.
We encourage families who utilize bus transportation to have alternative transportation plans for the beginning of the school year in the event we are still finalizing drivers and routes.
We appreciate your partnership as we look to ensure transportation needs are met for all families now and throughout the school year. Continue to use the information from our Transportation Website linked here or contact our transportation office as needed. We will continue to update families on transportation throughout the summer.