Monday, April 25th

Hi Everyone,

Do you know that after today, our High School Seniors only have 19 days remaining until their online courses close? To be considered on track to finish they should be more than 71% complete. Our 6th-11th graders have 33 days remaining to finish up work on their online courses this year; to be considered on track they should be more than 60% done with their current classes. It is important to realize and be able to talk to the fact that online classes close before the end of the school year so grades can be finalized by our contract teachers with Stride Education, and reported back to Chris for transcription. By contract (with our vendor) we have to allow up to 5 business days after a course is complete in order for a grade to be issued. Though many teachers issue grades well within this allowed time we cannot expect that. Since grades are reported on Wednesdays it is easy to work the timeframe backward and see why courses close when they do.

For example, for seniors:

• Senior courses close at 9 PM on Friday, May 20th
• Teachers have the following week to grade
• Soonest grades could be on a report for transcription would be May 25th (very unlikely)
• Most senior online grades will be on the June 1st report-Chris will get these transcribed by the first graduation ceremony on June 9th
• Some additional grades might come on the June 8th report, these will also be transcribed by graduation

For 6-11th graders:

• Courses close June 10th
• Teachers grade the week of June 13th-17th
• Chris transcribes grades from the June 22nd report and the June 29th report

This has been our practice for as long as I can remember…so if you are in a school and get pushback or questions that you don’t feel comfortable answering please send them to me. And, of course, there is a little grey area where we can extend a deadline for students who need a few extra days toward the end of May in order to get to passing or improve a grade. That said, we will have to track these kids separately so Chris can watch for their grades and make sure they are placed on transcripts. We will talk about this with the team and develop a concrete process to share before it is needed. Please do not extend any end dates until we have finalized how that will look. Until then, keep pushing your Seniors toward May 20th!

And since we’re talking days…37 of them until June 16th after today. And no, I didn’t count Memorial Day.

No formal meetings this week! For our North Star-based team we can chat informally on Wednesday. I look forward to seeing you then. Thank you for all of your work on our Division 22 Curriculum Review’s last week! Wow-it feels great to have that done. It was really interesting to explore so many courses at the same time. I appreciate your thoughts, questions and feedback.

For our OSSM team, we will chat via Webex on May 4th. Let me know if there is anything I can help you with before that date.

Please enjoy some photos here from the elementary field trip to the Pirate Park on Columbia Street last Friday. Nice job braving the elements and pulling off a great experience for kids, team! It was fun to see you there. (Though we do need to work on our park terminology…ie…Boat Park versus Pirate Park!)

Have a wonderful week!