Updates to In-Person Learning Time Expansion

March 7, 2021

Dear Families:

Tonight, I share the outcome of a very busy few weeks.  What we share tonight reflects remarkable collaboration between leaders, teachers, and staff throughout the schools.  At Tuesday night’s Joint School Committee meeting, the agenda focuses on the plan to expand in-person learning.  The agenda and supporting documentation are found here.

A summary of the plan is to:

April 5:  Return all elementary students to full-time in-person learning

April 26:  Return all middle school students to full-time in-person learning

April 26:  Expand high school in-person time based on a plan to be shared by April 1

Tuesday’s discussion will include an overview of the revised safety protocols and many, many logistics as we modify our current structures.  The principals will share the details of these plans over the coming weeks.  Remote learning remains an option for all families for the remainder of the year.

This weekend, we learned of 3 new positive student COVID cases.  One student attends Alcott and 2 attend CCHS.  The District Dashboard is updated as of yesterday.  Our total number of cases since school opened is 150.  The DPH Community Dashboard places Concord in the yellow risk category and Carlisle in gray.

Last week, we tested 1280 students and 288 staff.  With upcoming modifications to the safety protocols, asymptomatic testing takes on greater importance.  Please, please consider having your child participate by providing consent through the Aspen portal.  Positive pools are rare and result in only a 24 hour timeline for individual testing.   Our goal is to reach the 80% participation rate that we have seen in other districts.  We do not want to return students to the schools full time only to have to shift to remote learning for two weeks because of school transmission.

This week marks one year since the schools closed and the impact of the pandemic became an unimaginable reality.  Together, we navigated each phase of the journey with the focus on doing what was best for the community’s children.  We look forward to approaching this next phase with the same common goal and partnership.

Best,

Laurie