Sorry for the tardiness of this week’s update. It was a busy week and when I was faced with the decision of staying super late Friday to get it done or waking up early on Saturday I gave myself some grace and chose the latter. I hope all you do the same and be sure to take care of yourselves during these next few weeks. You are going to have a lot on your plates with everything you need to do to wrap up the year, so be sure to carve out blocks of time for self-care. Please also look after your nurses. Right now with COVID spiking they have been doing double duty with contact tracing and parent notifications.
Focus on Excellence and Equity…
As a reminder, the Bias training is a mandatory training for all our administrators. If you were unable to attend the live training here is a recorded version. Deon recommends watching in a small group so you can dialogue because the conversation is what drives these training sessions. I was out of town during this time so if you’d like to partner with me let me know. Deon has also included a google form for you all to fill out if you want access to more resources, and/or continue the conversation. I set the form to collect email addresses so you are just selecting what you want, and I will follow-up with the request via email.
Department News…
BRYT and Student Success Coordinator Info…
If you have a teacher in your building that is moving to your Student Success Coordinator position please add their name to this spreadsheet.
Sean and I will be reviewing applicants for open positions and coordinating/communicating interviews. We have two dates set for the interviews for these positions – 5/12 from 2-6 and 5/14 from 12-4. Sean and I still need to discuss the format and we may not need all this time, but put a placeholder on your calendars for these interviews. During this first year expect a few bumps in the road as we try to coordinate and arrange interviews. If you have any questions, concerns, or general wonderings please reach out.
BRYT Virtual School Visit: Chickering Elementary School
- When: May 19th from 10-11 AM
- Where: https://zoom.us/j/92921187005?pwd=dEQ1NjBzdEltUzB2S01hckgrZHVTQT09
Our BRYT coaches have set up a virtual visit with Chickering Elementary School in Dover, MA. The visit will include their program overview and a virtual tour from the build team. We will then break out into job-like small groups for Q and A (admin, support staff etc.). This tour is open to all admin and anyone in your building that may want to learn more about the BRYT model and this school’s implementation.
From Alandra regarding Teacher Appreciation Week (next week!): This year we are doing things a little differently for Teacher Appreciation Week. We are inviting families to submit a note of appreciation for a staff member and we will print those on postcards and send them internally to the person. Please help us spread the word to families, as we hope to fill staff mailboxes with notes of gratitude and appreciation. Share the following with families (Or share our post on Facebook):
Has a teacher or other staff member made a positive difference for your family this year? We would love your help saying ‘THANK YOU’ to help recognize all that our teachers, counselors, school nurses and other certified staff have contributed this year. When you fill out this form, we will send a personalized thank you card directly to the staff member. We will also share these highlights from your stories throughout the week.
Please have submissions in by May 5, 2021. Here are three unique “thank you” images that you can feel free to use: Gracias, Thank You 1, and Thank you 2. Visit the following link to share some appreciation, https://bls.fyi/staffappreciation!
From Human Resources– When you are requesting to post a position, please use Templates instead of “New” or “copy from existing”. Here are the instructions.
Tri-County School Response Team Update – We all hope you won’t need this information, but please update your contact list or make a note of this temporary change to our county’s Crisis Response Team:
Nita’s last day as the Tri-County School Response Team Coordinator will be this Friday, April 30th. If you are needing these services this week, please contact Nita as you normally would. Starting May 1st to September 30th, our temporary Coordinator will be Dave Holmberg. As of May 1st, if you are needing the Tri-County School Response Team, please call Dave Holmberg at 541-362-1548. (NOTE: This phone number will remain the same once a permanent coordinator/team leader is hired.)
COVID Info and Updates from From Paul
Events/Activities/Celebrations During School Hours (Follow RSSL)
We have received many questions surrounding the type of activities that are allowed during school hours. RSSL requirements must be adhered to for these events. Some things to prioritize in your planning:
Location: Outside is preferred to inside
Audience: Parents are not permitted as they don’t qualify as ‘essential visitors’. This applies to outdoor events too. Student audiences are allowed.
Occupancy: No limit to the number people in a given space but you must adhere to physical distancing requirements
Physical distancing: Students can be 3 ft apart. Students-to-adult and adult-to-adult are to be 6 ft apart (to the maximum extent possible)
Food: Onsite eating should align with normal school meals/snack time
Performing Arts: At this time, we are not allowing indoor theatre arts, band or choir performances with audiences. When the county case rate is below 200 cases/100K, we will revisit the possibility for indoor performances. Outdoor performances are permitted with student audiences.
Masking: Masks must be worn at all times except when seated and eating at a designated meal/snack time.
Collaboration: Run your plans through your school safety team for their input.
Coordination: Your school should have an events/athletics calendar that identifies what spaces will be used on specific days and times to ensure no overlapping event
Custodians/Nurses: Keep custodians and nurses informed of events/activities
Level Leaders: Keep your level leader in the loop during special event planning
COVID Czar: Identify the person in charge of maintaining all safety practices for your event
Community Gatherings After Hours On Our Campuses
When events occur outside of the instructional day, RSSL is no longer applicable.
County Risk Sector:You must adhere to the risk sector guidance at the time of the event so you’ll need to create multiple scenarios to adapt to the possible changing levels with our county. Confirm Deschutes County Risk Level here.
County Guidance: County Risk Sector Guidance changes at the governor’s discretion so you’ll need to check back regularly for updates. The chart is a big picture overview, and if you want to dig deeper based upon a specific activity, there is a helpful interactive Oregon Coronavirus site.
Location: BLS recommends that events be planned for outdoors and then moved indoors or cancelled should the weather require it.
Occupancy:
- For indoor limits
- Refer to the County Risk Sector categories of Indoor Recreation and Fitness Establishments (for a physically active event) or Indoor Entertainment Establishments (for an entertainment event)
- For outdoor limits
- Refer to the County Risk Sector categories of Outdoor Recreation and Fitness Establishments (for a physically active event) or Outdoor Entertainment Establishments (for an entertainment event)
- Outdoor Recreation and Outdoor Fitness Establishments (K-12 Sports)
Audience: Parents are permitted but designate a ratio per student that ensures you don’t exceed maximum occupancy limits.
Physical distancing: All must be 6 ft apart (to the maximum extent possible)
Food: No onsite eating is allowed (this is a BLS COVID Core Team decision)
Performing Arts: At this time, BLS is not allowing indoor theatre arts, band or choir performances with audiences. This may be reconsidered if county case rates drop below 200/100K.
Masking: Masks must be worn at all times by all
Collaboration: Run your plans through your school safety team for their input (or with Dave Williams if it is associated with athletic programs).
Coordination: Your school should have a events/athletics calendar that identifies what spaces will be used on specific days and times to ensure no overlapping events
Custodians/Nurses: Keep custodians and nurses informed of events/activities
Level Leaders: Keep your level leader in the loop during special event planning
COVID Czar: Identify the person in charge of maintaining all safety practices for the event
Updates, Reminders, Info, To-Do’s, and Rants…
Summer Programming – Below is an update/adjustment regarding pay for both classified and certified employees who work in our district summer learning program. Please share this with your entire staff and encourage any interested to apply.
- Certified (teachers and student services/deans) will get a stipend of $5500 for 3 weeks of summer school and 3 days of training. This is 120 hours of expected work.
- Classified will get a $3500 stipend for 3 weeks of summer school and 2 days of training. This is 112 hours of expected work.
- Classified hired in the afternoon will work half days for $1750.
- HR has edited the current job postings to include the new stipend. Postings will be up for another 10 days.
Kevin will be discussing summer programming at our Monday Horizontal. Here is a link to his presentation.
Staffing plans and hiring – I’ve completed reviewing staffing plans and have been slowly reaching out to you all of you with some random questions and clarifications. We are experiencing some log jams in staffing that the coaching and online hiring will hopefully clear up. So for the time being I am not approving any teacher hiring for regular classroom positions. However, we can move forward with classified hiring . Please send me an email with your needs. In this subject field of the email put: CLASSIFIED HIRING REQUEST. That will get my attention so I can then notify Paul the posting request can be approved.
Speaking of hiring, thanks for your patience as I learn the process and get up to speed. I promise to be better next year.
School visit Sign up – I need to get out to your school for a visit during May. Please navigate to this spreadsheet and sign up on for a time on the Visit #3 tab. If there are no times that work please give me a call and we will work something out. Some of the things we’ll talk about:
- Lexia/Dreambox usage
- Staff observations and evals
- SLGG’s
- Lingering staffing plan questions/situations
Transferring back to brick and mortar or to CDL – Please share the following message – or this content in your own words – to your parent community: In the best interest of student learning, this week will be the last week to change from one district educational placement to another (e.g. home school to D CDL or BLPO to home school). Beginning May 10, students will not be allowed to transfer out of their current learning program into a different one within the district. [There may be exceptions to this … so reach out to me if you have a situation that needs to be reviewed.]
Title Purchases – JoAnne and I have set a tentative date of May 14th as the last day for Title 1A purchases. Please try to get all requests to JoAnne by this day. Thanks.
Calendar
- 5/3 – Horizontal – Kinsey, LEAD video, Kevin Milner Summer Programming (here are the slides)
- 5/5 – High Lakes principal interviews
- 5/12 – 2pm – 6pm Student Success Coordinator Interviews
- 5/14 – 12pm – 4pm Student Success Coordinator Interviews
- 5/14 – principal self reflections
- 5/19 – 10am – 11am BRYT Virtual School Visit: Chickering Elementary School
- 5/19 – Excellence and Equity Leadership meeting
And Finally…
There’s no denying that this has been a tough year for all us and all our families. But every once in a while something happens that makes us forget all the troubles we’ve gone through and and lifts our spirits. Chris Goffrier just returned from a year long deployment in Djibouti and Brian at Highland got to orchestrate the reunion between him and his son. Go find some kleenex.
