Family Handbook
General Information
Possible Changes
We hope for a year of consistency; we know changes can occur.
Routines and policies presented in this handbook could be revised throughout the year. We will update the online version of the document at cpe1.nyc/handbook.
CPE1 Year-Long Calendar
CPE1’s yearlong calendar includes no-school days, important meetings, and school events. Find the entire 2024-2025 calendar at:
https://cpe1.nyc/calendar.
Early Dismissal Days
We dismiss at 11:50 on:
September 5 (pre-K and kindergarten)
September 6 (pre-K and kindergarten)
September 9 (pre-K)
November 7 (all students)
March 6 (all students)
School lunch is provided before students go home. Children are dismissed from the courtyard.
Yellow school buses take students home at 11:50 on November 7 and March 6.
Phone Number
To reach the main office, call 212.860.5821.
Please save this number in your contacts so that you recognize the number if the school calls you.
Calling School
Call 212.860.5821 for:
Questions
Emergencies
Pick-up changes
After-school changes
During the school day, teachers are focused on children. If you email or text them, they probably won’t see the message in time. Instead, please call 212.860.5821, or email both Donna (donna@cpe1.nyc) and Stephanie (stephanie@cpe1.nyc).
Messaging Service
CPE1 sends quick information, longer letters, and emergency notifications to your cell phone, in the language you prefer. All parents and guardians should receive these messages through remind.com.
To sign up for our messaging service, please click here. Then, enter the class code: 4cpe1.
The Remind app is free. Click here to download the app.
Being Absent
If you expect your child to be absent for one or more days, please tell our school secretary, Stephanie, (212.860.5821 x 2041, stephanie@cpe1.nyc). Please tell your child’s teachers as well.
Each time your child misses school, it counts as an absence. There are no excused absences, only explained absences. When you send us doctor’s notes or other explanations, the absence is explained, but it still counts as missing school.
If your child has an appointment such as a doctor’s visit, please bring your child before or after the appointment.
Being On Time
School starts at 8:30. Children are marked late after 8:35.
Be on time. Morning routines are essential to CPE1’s curriculum, including math and reading. On-time children also enjoy talking and playing before school, and have happier transitions to class.
If your child comes late, teachers face two bad choices: either keep teaching while ignoring your child, or welcome and help your child while the rest of the class waits. Being on time is fairer to the whole class, including your child.
Daily Schedule
7:45am: Early drop-off in the school yard
8:00am: Breakfast begins in the cafeteria
8:30am: School day begins
11:45am: Outdoor play (Times may vary for pre-K and K-1)
12:15pm: Lunch (Times may vary for pre-K and K-1)
2:45pm: School day ends (dismissal in the courtyard)
Morning Arrival
Between 7:45 and 8:30, children should enter through the playground gate on East 106 Street. They say goodbye to their adults on the sidewalk, then walk down to the school yard to play with other children.
Arrival is a time for children to play and socialize with more independence. Families do not come down to the schoolyard.
By 8:30, teachers pick up children from the school yard to go upstairs.
Rainy Morning Arrival
In drizzle and light rain, we have morning arrival as usual, outside in the school yard. If it is raining heavily, children go to the auditorium.
During heavy rain, your child should enter through the Madison Avenue courtyard.
Breakfast
From 8:00 to 8:20, the school cafeteria serves hot breakfast. Breakfast is free for all students.
Children may bring breakfast from home to eat in the cafeteria.
If you want your child to have breakfast in school, please arrive by 8:15. Children do not eat breakfast in their classrooms.
Lunch
School lunch is free for all students.
Click here for the citywide school lunch menu. Our cafeteria serves the food court menu, which means students choose a either the daily special, pizza, burgers, black bean burritos, mozzarella sticks, or sunflower butter-and-jelly sandwiches. Additionally, there is a salad bar.
You may send lunch from home. School staff do not heat up lunch from home, so please send hot items in a thermos.
Dismissal
Our school day ends at 2:40. All classes are dismissed from the courtyard on Madison Avenue between 2:40 and 2:50.
Teachers make contact with every child before that child is dismissed. Please come into the courtyard if you are picking up your child. If it is raining heavily, please stay out on the sidewalk so we can get children out faster.
We will dismiss your child only to guardians and people listed on your child’s emergency card. If someone else is coming to pick up your child, please alert the main office (212.860.5821) and send a note to your child’s teachers.
Arriving Late
If your child arrives after 8:30, do not drop your child outside of the school. Please go to the main entrance on East 106 Street. If no CPE1 staff member is present, please call the main office (212.860.5821 x 0). Wait with your child until a CPE1 staff member arrives.
To ensure accurate attendance, you will be asked to sign your child in if you arrive late.
Early Pick-Up
Please send a note in with your child notifying us that you’re picking up early. Children leaving before 2:50 must be accompanied by a guardian or authorized adult.
When you arrive for early pick-up, please sign in at the school safety desk. Then, go directly to CPE1’s main office in Room 204. (Please do not stop off in your child’s classroom.) Please allow enough time to sign out your child and gather belongings to leave for the day.
Late Pick-Up
If the adult responsible for picking up a student is running late, be sure to call the main office (212.860.5821), or email both Donna (donna@cpe1.nyc) and Stephanie (stephanie@cpe1.nyc).
Children who have not been picked up by 3:00 are brought to the main office. If you arrive after 3:00, you will have to sign in at the main entrance, then come up to Room 204.
School Bus
Stephanie (stephanie@cpe1.nyc) can provide information about yellow school buses.
Eligibility for yellow buses and OMNY cards is based on age and distance from school. Children may be given either a bus route or a OMNY card
, but not both. This regulation is strictly enforced by the Office of Pupil Transportation.
Please send a note with your child if they will not be riding the yellow bus on a certain day. If your child’s bus plans change during the day, please contact Stephanie and Donna before 2:00pm.
After-School Programs
Three after-school programs pick-up from CPE1’s school yard at dismissal: Wildarts, Children’s Aid Society, SCAN-Harbor.
Wildarts is for pre-K only. Children are escorted to nearby PS 108, on Madison Avenue at East 108 Street.
Children’s Aid Society brings K-5 children to PS 72, on Lexington Avenue at East 104 Street.
SCAN-Harbor is a K-5 program located in the Lehman Community Center, on Madison Avenue and East 107 Street.
Visiting the Building
Visitors must sign in with school safety agents.
Citywide regulations require that all adults must show photo identification each time they go to a school office, a classroom, or a meeting. Bring your original ID card, not a photo.
Families will not come onto CPE1’s floor for arrival so that teachers, and especially children, focus on their morning routines.