July 30, 2020
Dear Sayre Families,
This past week, I read over 40 pages of comments regarding your opinions about the opening of school. Your remarks reminded me how fortunate we all are to be in such a thoughtful, caring, and intelligent community. Even though competing viewpoints were presented, a tone of overarching graciousness imbued the comments. These are times of difficult choices and strong opinions and our ability to maintain respectful graciousness is a hallmark of how we best navigate this year.
The following decision has been made taking into account a range of information from parent and employee perspectives, COVID-19 updates, governmental guidance, and enhanced health and safety measures on campus through an investment in materials and additional personnel in excess of $300,000. The school year will start on August 20th on campus with a soft opening. We will begin with a combination of half attendance per day on campus on alternating days and/or half days of instruction. This structure will carry us through August 31st, after which we hope to transition to full attendance. This approach will enable time for our students and faculty to adjust to the flow of the school day and our new health and safety measures.
The specific details of the openings are outlined in the divisional letters. We also have arranged the following divisional Zooms next week with administrators and the school nurse to address questions related to the operation of school and our health and safety measures:
Lower School: August 4th 9:00am-10:00am Middle School: August 4th 10:30am-11:30am Upper School: August 4th 1:00pm-2:00pm
We know that based on your particular family dynamic and/or health concerns that many of you expressed a hope that a remote option would be available to you in the event that we chose to open with face-to-face instruction. Each division has worked on a modified remote option that works best for their age groups. Given that our faculty will be on campus with students during the day, please understand that this accommodation will not be identical to the remote instruction that took place in the spring when the entire campus was shut down. If you are interested in this option for your child, please use the link below to register your request by August 5th: While many of us may crave certainty about our school year, it is important to understand that it is quite possible that this term will entail stretches of in-person instruction with shifts to remote. Furthermore, we will continue to adhere to the Governor's recommendations and will shut down school and shift to remote instruction if he makes that decision. This is just one example of our need to approach the year with a mindset rooted in flexibility and adaptability. We are prepared to operate successfully in either mode.
I hope that you have taken the time to review our health and safety protocols that were posted on Monday. I want to thank Mandy Deckard, our newly established School Nurse, who has been an invaluable resource as we developed our protocols. We will need the full involvement of the school, student body, and parents to ensure that these measures are successful. Numerous measures in place go beyond the standard recommendation, such as plexiglass dividers of students desks (most schools invested in dividers for faculty desks and reception areas but not student desks), the current CDC recommendation for a fever-free (without medication) return to an environment is 24 hours, our policy is set at 72 hours, and cloth face coverings for Grades 1-12 are required indoors at all times, regardless of social distancing beyond 6 feet.
As I write this letter, we are also completing our fourth week of summer camp that has been safe, fun, and free of COVID-19. We realize that safety measures are designed to mitigate risk, not eliminate risk. Running a camp with 75 students may be different than a school of 575, however, this summer experience illustrates that safety measures can be thoughtfully implemented.
Critical work will also take place this year beyond our preparation for the operation of school. On August 10th, all faculty and staff will return to campus for our pre-week meetings. A key component of that week will feature two professional development workshops led by Dr. Candice Hargons who has worked in the past with our faculty, staff, and Board on cultural competency training. You also may have read the interview with Dr. Hargons in the July issues of the Chevy Chaser and Southsider magazines. Dr. Hargons will facilitate training built around the topics, "Teaching during an election and a double pandemic" (COVID-19 and social unrest).
Through our ISACS Self-Study and Re-Accreditation process and our recently completed strategic plan (Vision 2030) we have reaffirmed our commitment to and prioritized our work focused on issues related to diversity, equity, and inclusion. This commitment extends to educational programming, enrollment, and hiring. I am pleased to announce that each division will have leadership on this front; Georgia Henkel (Lower School), Chaka Cummings (Middle School), and Cathy Bilberry (Upper School) will serve as our Coordinators of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. Next week, they will be reaching out to introduce themselves and share some resources for this essential work.
In closing, it is worth remembering that the Sayre community is defined by a series of shared values—our Mission, our Core Values of Wisdom, Integrity, Respect, and Compassion, and our newly established Safe at Sayre protocols all represent principles that guide our actions. Our choices both on and off campus send the message of how closely we are adhering to those values. Social media seems to be ever present in our lives and written postings and images can either affirm or deteriorate our community values. Posting images or hosting events outside of school that don't adhere to our health and safety protocols undermine our efforts to operate school and can create a feeling of extreme unease among those who are attending or working at school. These are trying times. Let's commit the best of ourselves to living up to the principles that have distinguished Sayre. We are all in this together.
Be safe. Be healthy. Be Spartan Strong! Stephen Manella Head of School CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE: This email message, including any attachments, is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure, or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message. (859) 254-1361 • 194 North Limestone Street • Lexington, KY 40507 |