Attention Parents PLEASE READ the following
3-29-20
Hi Everyone, and Happy Sunday! I hope that everyone has had some relief over the past week since we last communicated. My prayers are constant for everyone during this strained and unique time. It seems things are changing daily. Today I am hoping to provide you with some updates to keep us all on the same page and functioning. I expect to be communicating again this week as the situation develops. Words cannot express how much I miss every student and all of the things that make our school special each day. Please tell your children I say “Hi” and that we are all thinking of them.
1. Work turn in- tomorrow is the last day to turn in paper and pencil work, including correct and returns and previous absent work from before the closure. The bins are at door D in the vestibule and will be accessible until 10:15 tomorrow morning, Monday March 30th. (this was previously earlier, but has been extended) Teachers will be finalizing 3rd quarter grades this week for report cards to be published on Friday, April 3rd. Only work that has been turned in/submitted will be counted in grades. The work from this coming week, March 30th-April 2nd will begin our 4th quarter. This is exactly on schedule with the original calendar, which is good!
2. What will the future bring? I wish I knew. I am patiently (or impatiently) waiting for the governor to give further directions on school closure. Currently the “stay at home” order is through April 6th, so we will remain closed through then, for sure. April 6th will be considered a ‘calamity day’ for us and there will be no scheduled instruction. I am making this decision now so that teachers and parents can properly plan. I expect to know before then what our future closure will look like (I hope). I have no extra information than anyone else. As soon as we hear, we will work on a plan that makes sense for the needs of everyone and we will communicate that out. For now, please focus on the work for the 4 instructional days this week.
3. During our closure, we were lucky enough to have the playground installation reach it’s completed stage. I shared some of the pictures on the school facebook page (if you don’t “LIKE” our page, please do so!). It is currently closed for use due to the governor’s order, as well as it still needing mulch to be industry safe. We are waiting on the mulch to be delivered and the time frame is unknown at this time.
4. Knights of Columbus- I spoke with our K of C rep and the raffle is still on! Our goal at SJS is to sell 300 tickets. We are currently half way there. If you have some sold that you can drop off in the bins at school, please do so. You can also mail them in to the school- 175 St. Joseph Dr. Amherst, OH 44001. If you need additional tickets to sell, please let me know and I will work on getting them to you. Our turn in date that we are shooting for is April 12th.
5. Religious development- as you all know, all religious gatherings in our diocese have been cancelled and I, for one, am really missing going to mass and practicing my faith outside of my home. The diocese is providing online mass each day and some individual parishes are finding creative ways to hear confessions and broadcast mass, as well. St. Joseph Parish in Avon Lake has a great media crew that has been publishing things, so you may want to check them out, if you are looking for some way to pray/worship. As far as 1st Communion is concerned, things are still on as planned, unless we hear otherwise. If school is still out, but church is back in, we will deal with that as it comes, as well.
6. Lunches and groceries- the school is still providing bagged lunches and bags of groceries for families/community members in need on Wednesdays and Fridays from 11am to 12 pm at the Door A driveway. We are permitted to do this under the charitable services part of the order and we will continue to serve the community as long as we are able. We have been serving between 30 and 50 lunches each time and giving away between 8 and 16 bags of groceries.
7. Standardized Testing- the governor signed a bill that is waiving state testing for this school year. This means we will not take state tests and we may forgo the spring MAP test period, as well. If we should be able to return to school this year and we choose to give the MAP, it would be only to collect data and have a baseline for the students when they move into the next school year. This decision will be made at a later date.
8. Rescheduling/Postponing of Events: I have gotten a lot of individual questions that have all centered around- Will we still this…? What about rescheduling that…? Will the kids still get to…? Right now, I can’t 100% answer any of these questions. Unfortunately, this is an unprecedented time for us and we will continue to make the best decisions we can. I know we will not be able to save and reschedule everything.
9. EdChoice- new information about EdChoice eligibility came out this past week. Our leadership team at the diocesan level is working on compiling information for us to use to educate ourselves and our families. Please stay tuned.
10. Lastly, I am sharing a resource with you about talking to your children about this virus and the situation we are in. Please use it if you would like/need. The study of the mental health effects that this situation overall is having on children is something that will most likely not be clear until it is all over, but trying to address some of it during this time can certainly help.
https://childmind.org/article/
Keep sending me pictures of your at-home learning time at amy.makruski@sjs-amherst.org. We LOVE seeing them. I’ll keep sharing them as I am able. Also, thank you for the messages that you have left for us on the large papers by the turn-in bins. They are so heart-warming and make us even more eager to get back to you soon! I will be in touch, as needed. As always, if you need me, please email me and I will get back to you as soon as possible.
Many Blessings and Stay Healthy,
Mrs. Amy Makruski
P.S. Maybe you have heard that an Ohio company- Battelle- has found a way to sterilize n95 masks. This company is one of the champions of the Ohio STEM Learning Network and hosts the STEM design challenge and showcase each year. We were able to meet some of the amazing people from this company last year and it is very exciting to see the change that innovation can bring about. Who knows- maybe one of our SJS students will be the Battelle worker of the future that changes the world! Go STEM! 🙂
Coronavirus- Parent Info.
