Happy summer to each of you!
First, I want to welcome our new Class of 2024 families! It seems odd that the 2019-2020 school year just finished up three weeks ago and, yet, we are already in the throes of preparing for the fall. Last week, our district administration came together to begin to discuss the AOE guidelines that were sent out on June 17th. We will continue to meet weekly to discuss the best way for all schools to open up and ensure physical and emotional safety for our collective groups. If you have not had the opportunity to read the AOE guidelines, it would be of benefit to you to understand where we are with direction from the Agency of Education at this time. We are currently under the assumption that we will be in Step II for opening schools. This could change between now and the start of school, but our next steps in planning for the fall are going to be based on this guidance.
The last day for students was June 11th, but our staff went through June 19th. Those last six days were incredibly productive in collaborating and learning about ways we can prepare for next year. Teachers spent quite a bit of time in professional development workshops and working together on new student learning for the 2020-2021 school year. Some of their work was planning for what wasn't covered in the last three months and how to embed that into this upcoming year's instruction without losing ground. Additionally, our focus was and is to think about our instruction in a way that is flexible and fluid no matter what the circumstance of the school year may bring.
This week, a group of parents, students, and staff will come together to begin the process of thinking about how we can implement a schedule using the guidelines while taking into consideration the needs of our school community. I know many of you have so many questions and may be anxious about what the fall will look like, but please know that we will be thoughtful on all fronts and MRPS schools are not working in isolation. Through student and parent feedback, MHS learned a lot about our work in those three months of distance learning, and we will do better and continue to keep the rigor, relationships, and support at high levels. I am committed to staying in touch with you as we evolve in our thinking and decision making around the fall and the upcoming school year.
Summer communication, and throughout the year, will be placed on our Solon Salutes Blog. This is where all future communication will be housed. You can subscribe easily at https://solonsalutes.blogspot.com/ by entering your email address on the right hand side, and press submit. When the blog is updated, it will automatically be sent to you. This will limit the communication and the clicks! I will eventually steer away from MailChimp communication unless it's absolutely needed for information beyond the weekly Solon Salutes updates.
Until next time, enjoy the sunshine and stay cool.
Renée DeVore
Principal
Follow me on Twitter: @renee_devore
