Dear families,
I hope you’ve had a great week! I have just a brief update for you as we head into the weekend. You can watch my video update here.
COVID-19 update
We’re coming to the end of our third week of having our school-based students back in school in hybrid learning. It’s wonderful to hear our buildings filled with the sounds of learning and teaching!
As we met this week with the experts on our Medical Advisory Team, we reviewed the updated data on COVID-19 cases in our community. We are continuing to see elevated data - particularly among the school-age population within our attendance area.
While there’s so much to be hopeful about right now with the expansion of the vaccination program, our medical experts want to emphasize how important it is that we redouble our efforts to control the spread of the virus in our community. That means we have to reduce our contacts, we have to avoid gatherings, and we have to be vigilant about mask-wearing, physical distancing and frequent handwashing when we’re out in the community. This is up to all of us. These mitigation measures are so crucial right now for many reasons - including the continuity of education for our students.
We are continuing our preparations as we move closer to the February 1 date when school staff members will become eligible for COVID-19 vaccines. We know it might take some time for the vaccine to be rolled out to our entire staff here in UA due to supply concerns, but we will be ready for that opportunity as soon as it’s available to us. We’re grateful and excited that education is being prioritized in this process, and we will take this great blessing as another way to support students.
You can view this week’s update to our COVID-19 data dashboard here.
Save the dates - Well-being webinar series continues
We are excited to have partnered with the Upper Arlington Education Foundation to welcome bestselling author and educator Rosalind Wiseman, to discuss her brand new publication, The Distance Learning Playbook for Parents. These webinars will support our families and staff members in honing skills to support the social, emotional, and educational well-being of our students.
Elementary webinar - Wednesday, February 24 from 6:30 until 7:45 p.m.
Secondary (grades 6-12) webinar - Tuesday, March 2 from 6:30 until 7:45 p.m.
More details and Zoom links will be shared in the coming weeks.
Have a great weekend and, as always, go Bears!
Sincerely,
Paul Imhoff, Ed.D.
Superintendent, Upper Arlington Schools