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Full In-Person Learning Webinar

Added Dec 23, 2021 •

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all right David evening again I hope you are all well most of you know me but for those of you who may not I am is it where I'm at West Oak Lane charter school this evening we're coming together to give give you information on our plan for bringing students at 4 for a person learning in January 2022 I like to start by introducing our team have h c e o good evening everyone let me have our assistant principal grade Miss Market good evening everyone we have our lower school assistant principal 82 Mr Meramec though good evening West Oakland family we have under extra special education is Tiffany Thompson good evening how is everyone we had climate mrs. Middleton good evening walk location and we have our director of math and Miss Sue Coleman good evening families now I'm going to turn another new member of our family good evening again everyone I'd like to introduce to you Jackie nunnery Jackie is our compliance officer for the school as a school we title one we receive Title 1 funds from the government that helped us operate and provide services for students and it is under Our obligation to always inform parents of how that money is being spent so I'd like to introduce Jackie nunnery to our school family as our compliance officer and have her share with you how we spend the funds to support your students and our children all together thank you dr. Lee and good evening will Trammell hold on just one moment while I share my screen see perfect thank you so much okay so as Dr Lee mention the purpose of my chatting with you right now is to talk about how we spend our Title 1 funds at Wilkes I'm and how we use those funds to improve the programming for your students okay and as I mentioned we're going to review all of the title one funding and how we use those for as well as the extra funds which is part of the covid relief from the government as well so Title 1 funds for schools with low-income students to support any programming that might help particularly with reading and math but also in all other areas of instruction for Wilkes-Barre school-wide program which means that they're 40% or more of our students are low-income and currently woakes receives a little over $1000000 in funding for Title 1 2 and for programming so as I mentioned earlier as Sir is the elementary and secondary school emergency room funding and that is part of the cares act which is in response to covid-19 so the government allocated about 13.2 billion for these funds and those distributed down to the states and the amount is determined by the title one proportions that each school has within each state So currently for their three rounds of of Grant applications as part of this excerpt so ask her one which was the first brand we got about as 700,000 asserts you was about three and a half million and sr3 is 7 + 1/2 do for look specifically we use Title 1 funds primarily to improve on reading math and science instruction so I can be anything from providing classroom supplies to cover cost for reading Specialist or mass specialist for your students and Title 1 funds are also used to support social and emotional learning so anything from psychology to Social Work Program one also requires that we have a parent involvement pot contact which all of you probably signed in the past for your students and funds through that are also used to support various academic leader Hakeem Workshop seminars professional development as well as professional development for either parent Association FBI which you're encouraged to join if you haven't already and you can find more information on this website Aunt you part part of a title one if we are also required to inform parents of their right to know which basically means that you as parents as family members of Guardians have the right to request information about teacher call vacations in certification as a school we are required to inform you if any teachers are not qualified in the in the subject that they are teaching for more than 4 weeks and you also have the right to request meetings at anytime with any staff member I'm at the school and participate in deciding how we spend the title 1 funds so as part of the parent involvement requirements part of it is it's me and the title one meeting how much we host annually you also and probably seeing the title one policy but if you have it that is on the website as well you can take a look at and like I mentioned as well the school in Perry Compaq and you can follow along and get information about Title One and everything else that's going on at school by scanning this this app and do you have any questions feel free to ask them now in the chat or reach out to me at any time thank you so much Jackie I really appreciate it and again she's always the opportunity for us to let you know how we're spending the government dollars to provide the best education as well as Safety and Security for your students who attend West Oak Lane Charter School we're always that you've given us the privilege of educating your child and the funds that we received from the government greatly assist us in doing so thank you again this nunnery yes. okay until next year going to dive right into the forum person learning model our plans for January 2022 so as of now we are planning to bring all of us are students back for 4 days of in-person instruction every every week okay so students all students will be attending school Monday Tuesday Thursday and Friday beginning all of the factors for consideration when making the decision I'm have been health and safety always been first and foremost for us and things have changed at the beginning of the panda if you remember we were fully virtual I'm at that time I'm there was no vaccination available we really weren't they were just texting people and you know things were really out of control over the beginning of a pandemic and I'm just really scared I'm trying to figure out exactly what was going on I'm since that time we've come quite a ways and so you know they were vaccinations available for adults first and then children squabbling over a 12 and older and now we are down to five years and older students and children can get vaccinated as well as we have weekly covid testing for staff and student here on site and so with these two racism plate we believe these added layers position us so that we can safely bring students and staff back into the building for full in person learning we are also keeping our eye on what would that the situation with Delta and Omicron and the community virus transmission rate as well as school virus transmission weight on while we've had some positive cases here at school we really have not had any major brakes on where we needed to shut down whole grade levels whole floor or even the entire school so we've been managing really really well and again I'm we do believe that with students five older being able be vaccinated if parents choose to do that that will add that other layer of safety that we really need to bring through this back for the full instruction that they need to receive I'm while keeping everyone safe we are also on can you link to look at Jaime we blew it considered timing when we thought about when we could also make this shift and I'm January is the beginning of the second trimester so we're not changing what we're doing right in the middle of a trimester first student a teacher and so this gives us a nice clean start at the beginning of trimester 2 for some consistency I'm across that. Of time actually we had our first vaccination clinic on December 11th which was the two Saturdays ago our upcoming second vaccination clinic will be on Sunday January 2nd in our gymnasium from 9 to 3 this is primarily focused on those who received the first Fascination on December 11th however we will be doing boosters for all age groups other than 5 will love and they don't have a boost your butt from 12 12 and older will also be offering the booster shots of both Pfizer and moderna if this is the first shot for your students appoint will be made available through the pharmacy to get the first shot and then the second shot will have to be arranged at a different location but I want to promote this date for you if you've been watching the news you see people are around the corners now I'll try to get an accessible vaccine or if that's accessible testing because they're planning together or be with family over the holidays so again Sunday January 2nd 2022 from 9 to 3 and our gym will be offering boosters for ages 12 and up both Pfizer animal derna and offering basa Nations for students and children ages 5 to 11 we open this up not only to our school Community but to come Unity around our school location as well thank you back late I'm just want to respond to a couple of questions that were in the q-and-a and again if you have questions use The Chew in a question to answer feature in order to type your question are we won't either type in answer to you or we will answer it live some of the questions in the chat with regard to whatever you have religious beliefs or anything like that around vaccination we are not vaccination is not mandatory that students are vaccinated so that is your choice it's just an added level of protection on while they're here in school and I'm again as I mentioned on the previous screen we are continuing to watch Amber the what's happening with a crime and any other variant that may emerge but at some point we do have to bring it back for a stand learning we really hung out there long stimmel school and you know we're proud of the fact that we've done that because we were doing it for the health and safety of our school Community but now that there's if they have student vaccinated and we really feel you know we we've done our due diligence is so now it's up to parents to make a decision about any additional layers of protection you want to put in place for your children we will get to some of these some of the other question I'm around masking and mitigation measures a bit further down the presentation good evening families are so some of you might have received the information that we will be fully virtual the first week when we return from the winter break so that is Monday January 3rd to Friday January 7th the reason for this week being full virtual upon coming back from the holidays and and and winter break if we want to make sure that we give time after it made some family gatherings over the Christmas holiday or any of the holidays such as New Year's time for either symptoms to arrive arise if if that is the case and just to give us some time to decide between maybe some testing and really just not a full two-week quarantine or or a virtual schedule but it will give us some time just to decrease hopefully some of the virus spread and making sure everybody stays safe and does not return into the building if any symptoms of covid-19 arise on so this week will the week of the 3rd to the 7th will still be fully virtual and we will share b a schedule with you of when you log on or your student logs on to zoom with their teacher during those days do we are planning to return full in person Monday January 10th so right after that first full week of virtual after the break the Monday following the 10th we will plan to bring all students into the building and the time will be as follows 74 5 a.m. to 3 p.m. every Monday Tuesday Thursday and Friday so those four days of the week will be when you didn't will report to the school building from 7:45 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Wednesdays we are still doing virtual instruction so that will be from home via zoom and that will be a shortened day so it will be from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. students will log on to zoom for those hours of 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. and do some activities with some learning activities with their class in with their teacher we feel that it is imperative to still have that virtual day in the middle of the week so that we can put in place all the mitigation efforts that we have to keep our staff or community and especially our students safe we do a full sanitization on Wednesdays of the entire School building and we have found that it has really helped keep our levels low so we do not want to take that away just yet so we will still be virtual on that Wednesday so that we can make sure that we deep clean the building and keep everybody in the building stage next we're going to that's some other mitigation measures that we have in place until again we we do believe that the most effective mitigation measure available right now is the vaccination for those who choose to have your children vaccinated but we are still going to keep as many of the other mitigation measures in place at absolutely possible I'm again I do see some questions in the queue in a about the rise in cases with over crying and other school having to shut down and we begin we are watching that and we we are planning to bring through this back into the building should the situation in the community at large and the mendacious from the health department state that we should do so and just as we have in the past across the school year I'm when there is a positive case in the classroom we have set the classroom down and had everyone quarantine as a result the measures that we hadn't played have prevented a major outbreak and so we believe that we've only gotten a handle on how to manage this is it best as possible and we have not had to shut down a whole grade level or floor or the entire school and so we do believe that using a hybrid model was a part of that but again with the available vaccinations and stood some students are being vaccinated already staff and with that as well as the other measures that will continue to keep them place we're hopeful that we'll be able to manage it but it should we not be able to do it safe and we get back in an hour data shows us that we need to make a different decision we are prepared to do that okay does we have in the past so one of these has that going with everyone coming back into the building we are going to only be doing the temperature scanning for students who are symptomatic I'm one of the things that we've been watching closely with get our own data and over this period of time and we have not used really identified student who were symptomatic via the temperature scan at during an admissions most of the students who have fight the fever has been so during the school day at work had other symptoms that alerted us too bad and they were headed temperature taking and taking in the nurse's office and then we follow our protocol there after and so are you in a while back the health department already stated that the temperature scanning what the most effective way to determine if a student with symptomatic a cold is it for a while because again we wanted collect our own data and determine what works best here at West Oak Lane charter school and that has not been the way that we've been identifying students for symptomatic and positive for covid-19 students will be sent to the nurse if they are symptomatic at all the temperatures will be taken there and then we will proceed from there so that temperature standing at the entrance entrance entrance will go away for student dog to come the building all teachers and staff and parents and any visitors will continue to be scared upon entry to the building with regard to mask-wearing we know that decision has been made to allow schools and districts to determine whether or not students are going to be wearing masks we are going to stick with the mask mandate here was away charter schools for every student and every staff member it's a we will not be dropping that that is a mitigation measure that which we believe will help to keep the virus spread down in our school spider so I can bring all of her students back into the building they're going to be sitting next to each other a little closer so as part of additional layer we are going to keep the dust partitions up so that the students can use it as a shooting at the border to divide them in the other student so just added that additional layer of p.m. along with them continuing Shredder mask we will continue to encourage hand washing and we do have an sanitization stations in every classroom and in areas of the building and so we will continue to make sure that we are this mitigation measure just call me we also will still continue to use the isolation area within the nurse's office so we do have an isolation area in our nurses office now that is used for any students that might present with symptoms until we can get with the with the okay of the parent or the family to make sure that they are it is possible and then of course contacting is there any symptoms that arise so this helps is just keep everything that in case there is a positive case everything isolated on so that it doesn't spread to anyone when using the nurses station and it also allows for other students in case they are in need of the nurse's office that do not have covid-19 symptoms that they are able to take advantage of the nurse's office as well we still will have our bottle Philly or water bottle filling stations however we let her we'd like to take this time to remind all of our families that it is best to have there bring a filled water bottle to school each day that water bottle coming to school completely filled make sure that it cuts down on any interruptions into instruction on and make sure that they have water for the majority of the school day but of course we do have those water filling stations available just to ensure against safety but nobody's taking from the water fountain but instead of using a water bottle filling station we will continue to do our weekly covid-19 testing on on Mondays kindergarten through 3rd grade will be tested and on Thursday 4th play through eighth grade will be tested I'm students are only tested if if you as parents give us permission to do the covid testing on your students you can sign up on dojo to be able to give us permission to test your students these are mouth swabs not nasal swabs that are more comfortable for the students to be tested again Mondays will do the entire lower school kindergarten through 3rd grade Thursday's will do the entire middle Upper School 4th grade through eighth grade and this includes our staff as well one thing if you want to sign up for the testing you need to down West Oak Lane charter school so he went the app and sign up there okay thank you you download it from the Apple Play Store students will continue to have lunch in the breakfast and lunch in their classrooms we are not going to go back to using the cafeteria right away we we've been doing really really really slow roll on everything and we want to continue to try and do that as much as possible so we're not going back to the use of the cafeteria we're not bringing class this together in the gym or any other congregants settings as mentioned earlier we will continue sanitization on Wednesday that actually the building and thoroughly as every night but the desalinization will happen. Wednesday's with students are at home I'm learning virtually we do still exercise 8 to move to full virtual instruction I really need everyone to the Harris and understand I'm just as we've been transparent with you thus far and have put health and safety I'm first and have communicated with you when ever did was a positive case in the school Eva if only that student or staff member needed to quarantine and it did not impact your child directly on we have always communicated when it happened so you have the data as well and that you know what's happening in your child I'm so we will move to full virtual instruction it it shows that we should truly we report every single positive Chase to the health department along with a list of any staff and students who have do a positive case and they actually give us a recommendation on whether or not we need to close of a virtual when we need to go to the classroom of four agree or the entire school that says I'm we have been still shutting down an entire class or one positive case and that is the practice that we are still going to follow so I'm I do want you to hear us and understand that it's not going to be a situation where we're bringing everyone back and have all of these cases in the school and it keep going on and on with business as usual we will shut down in classroom if there's a positive case in the classroom just as we have done all year and they will be home running virtual for the 10 days bird that allows the teacher to focus on the entire class class is home quarantine in so that we can contain it and that has been really effective or you're in West Oak Lane Charter School tickle that is the price it was going to continue to use we can also move to full virtual instruction if it's a snow day or inclement weather as well as if there's not enough staff to ensure that weekend I'll keep the students in school and when we shift back to Summer and then we are going to continue to focus on our environment climate and culture because we understand that we're bringing two cohorts of students together zoom in their classroom but they haven't been together physically in the classroom face-to-face the entire class and so I'm we're definitely going to continue to work with students one building relationships and getting along well gather and manage personal relationships and we do that through our social emotional program Second Step where students learn skills for interacting with one another and for dealing with their only just a problem solving showing empathy toward one another always we want we need parent as partners of you all have little long I'll still buy I'm all this time and we appreciate you I'm has been really difficult for many parents to navigate having to assemble children into the building for two days and find somewhere for them to be for the other Days Inn appreciate that you stood by our sides and entrusted the decision that we were making and we ask that you continue to trust in us and trusted decisions that we're trying to make we don't have all the answers what we do know is that we rolled out slow enough that you're not that we have been able to collect the data we know what works fairly well here West Oak Lane Charter School under the circumstances and we will continue to watch that we will send you to be careful we will continue to put the health and safety of your children and their first and foremost but we do also understand that at some point students have to get back in school for school in person like I'm in Indy I don't know that you're fine the other schools if any maybe one or two others that that are not that fully in in the building already and so again and it's time for us to try and make it as long as we can do it as face possible I'm just going to be coming up in January for you to remember January 3rd that's when the virtual class starts with suitable log into their classroom on June on that Monday and every day through that Friday January 7th and then on Monday January and January 10th that is our Target date to bring all of the students back into the building for who a in learning again that is going to be dependent upon the date of that. They're in the recommendations that are being made by the health department and then on Wednesday January 10th we will have virtual parent-teacher images for trimester 1 and on Monday January 17th on school will be closed you will not have classes and that won't be in observance of Martin Luther King Jr's birthday do see some questions when they that I wanted to speak to and one was about Transportation the state of Transportation really didn't have anything to do with us being in the hybrid mode it's really about the state of transportation and like many other fields there is a bus driver shortage and they have not been able to fill those roles and we are actually we actually are working with like 3. bus companies right now we used to only work with Durham and we have about three different bus companies and only about four buses showing up to the school on a daily basis and so that is a real problem miss you that spans across I'm not even in Philadelphia you know about cross the country and they are working hard to try and rectify that to draw drivers over to the school bus all positions in in home you know getting drivers mocs for now I'm nothing has changed guard to the buses that are coming to West Oak Lane charter school we will be notifying do the district and the bus company we will be moving to a fool in person model 4 days a week and so they will know the pick through this every day except for Wednesdays instead of just the two days that your child was coming to school during the hybrids and Carmen guys any other question we need to answer in the chat out now social distancing in the classroom we won't be able to achieve as much bathroom as we have and again long while back to health department where on the health department meetings all the time Dr Lee and I and then relax that social distancing guidelines way back in the beginning of the school year to say that school did not need to try and Achieve that 6-foot distance but you should try to achieve three feet or as much distance as you possibly can and so are we stuck with it because again we needed to see for ourselves and so do some of that social distancing will go away we will still have the partition there we will still have the matching there and hopefully I'm student vaccinated and so mitigation measures will be the one that we will be watching to see you know how how we fare with regard to We believe that you know we can keep our students safe with those measures in space I understand some parents may not want to have your child will be back in school it's time for us to try and get there though and so I understand it but we have to do what's best for children in both ways and again we're never going to ignore the health and safety aspect of schooling up for a children or I can but we are going to make an effort to bring all of the children back into the building 4 days a week we will watch and again if there's a positive case in your child classroom we will shut that classroom down we will shut it down and they will quarantine so we're not going to have your children in a situation where there's covid cases all around them and then there's nothing that we're doing about that just trying to keep them safe so there is no fully Birch I mean fully bird-watching at this time we will be opening fully in person and in that will be the option for on WOW I'm with regard to the flat rate program with the district for pickup and drop-off I sent is a diffused or completed your application online with the district they were processing all of those names and so there was a list of about six hundred or so of our parents with completed the application I completed the application and when we first received the spreadsheet not all of the names were on the approved list so we have been in contact with someone at the district who is told us that they're still going to the process of approving name you know that some parents have we started started receiving those checks I'll remember there is a part that you have to do every month there's a park that we as a school have to do every month and we are doing our part to account for the student the number of days during school is what the district wants how to make sure that they're coming your children have to be here certain percentage of these in order for you to qualify to to get that flat rate payment I'm as well as you have to complete a component and you can find the information on the school district website please remember this School District Administrative and a school district manage process and so they are really the holders in the keepers of this music right that we play and we are doing our part okay I'm with you on how many people have to get sick of all the fuss go back and so again we are going to be going by the health guidelines are anticipating they may adjust something based on Omicron depending on what happens even after the winter break and so we will be tuned in to hear what those recommendations are again if there's a positive case in your child is 11 positive case in your child classroom does the classroom quarantine for 10 days that the practice that we're sticking with until we're told that we're not allowed to do that okay there's out there there many recommendations out there around how schools should move and operate weather is testing his to stay in school and letting them stay even though there's a positive case in the classroom and just keep texting them whether it's just the kids who were sitting right near the student we have opted take the safest option that's available to us and that is to shut down the whole classroom if there's one positive we will continue to do that and we will continue to report on these cases to you as they happen so weak you don't feel comfortable that we're getting information that we need we going to be harvested Mystic or I will also add that currently under the Philadelphia Department of Health if they are sick or more positive cases within a week the whole school shuts down and that's what's been happening to a number of the schools in Philadelphia if you've been listening to the news in the past week and a half on base have to come hold schools down of some schools have had 16 or 17 outbreak within a week but that number that the public health department originally put out with six or more cases within a week with justify closing down your home and thankfully we have never been faced with that situation so I'm again if there's one positive student in the classroom we are shutting down the entire classroom for 10 days so they can quarantine is it what has worked here at the school it's what's prevented an outbreak and we want to continue with that as much as possible so that's what we're doing here build a drop off and pick up but it'll stay the same time so school I'll still start at 8 and I mean 7:45 I'm sorry 7:45 it ends at 3 for all students I'm drop off is the same process and again will be bypassing the temperature scanner so that just need that process up a bit more with regard to dismissal we are still planning to dismiss in the same fashion as of now yes parents are going have to wait and then going to the gate one thing is that not once this school year I'm have parents had to wait Beyond 3 pick up time dismissal time at 3 to school day ends at 3 everyday parents have been able to get in touch by the gate and pick up their children many times before 3:00 if you're there before 3 and will certainly buy for your car a question on if a child shows up sick at home are they allowed to return without a negative covid test for the guidelines state that if the student it comes in their symptomatic they have to stay home until they're symptom-free and if they are here at school already do we do do a rapid test on that student if the parent gives us permission not all parents have given us permission to test your children and so we have parents who get their children tested outside of school but as long as the children is the child text symptoms they are allowed to return to school if they have a positive cake that they test positive for covid then they do have to stay out and do the 10-day for as long as they do the 10 day quarantine did you not need to show a negative  and those are the health guidelines the health department guidelines how is about if students not all students are required to be tested how you catch a potential asymptomatic cases in that scenario the truth of the matter is that we may not be and so I'm that been the case all along that the neighbor covid all along it's just one of those the matron and that would be whether or not we're hybrid or you know whether we're fully in person but the truth of the matter is we cannot mandate that parents allowed with the destination installed with carrots all of the parents to allow us to test children but if not if they have symptoms papers that was said in that they don't have symptoms you're correct we may not catch that now so will that be cancel it won't be counted against the child if they're out because of covid and will it be able to attend birthday won't be a option but students will receive now if the entire class is quarantine and then the teacher can teach to all of the students virtually on zoom and so that's how they receive instruction if it's just one student who had committed or that the quarantine because of remember has a cold but we will ensure that the student gets the assignment and has an opportunity to they do have Jim inside the classroom we're not bringing students together in the cafeteria or the gym already conquered gets that he won't be having assemblies or anything like that they look like we've answered all of your questions for this evening I want to thank you all again how much I know that this is hasn't has been a really difficult time and to think about what lies ahead you know can be really scary at times but just know that we always have to go to put health and safety first but we also recognize me get the kids back into the building before in person learning that also what best for children and so we encourage those families who feel comfortable and choose to do so to get your child vaccinated for the extra layer of protection and as well as no. we are going to keep all of the mitigation measures and played that weekend in order to keep our entire School Community safe you're quite welcome I'm happy holidays to all please stay safe and we will see you in the new year happy holidays everyone please stay blessed look out for one another and we continue to support and care about all of you so have a great great thank you for coming thank you Happy New Year to you as well