Dear BK Parents and Students,
What a challenging two weeks it has been for our community, our state, our country and our world. Our first Just in Time Communication on Monday, March 16, seems like months ago as so much has evolved and changed since that day. Thank you for your feedback, questions and prayers.
As this is the last Just in Time Communication before we begin the first day of virtual learning on Monday, March 30th, we thought we would provide an update on each of the five goals that we set for the uncertain period we entered two weeks ago and that are guiding our decisions and actions:
- Prioritize the health and well being of our faculty, staff, students, and greater community.
- Continue to provide a great education for all students via virtual learning
- Maintain the strong sense of community we have here at Bishop Kelly
- Find ways to acknowledge, appreciate, and celebrate members of our community
- Deliver predictable, daily communication to our entire community
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GOAL #1: Prioritize the health and well being of our faculty, staff, students, and greater community
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As you are aware, Idaho Governor Brad Little issued a stay-at-home order for all of Idaho yesterday, requiring everyone in the state to self-isolate at home if possible through April 21. The order applies to all citizens, not just those who are sick. Healthcare workers, public safety workers, and other "essential" workers may still go to work, and people will be allowed to leave their homes to obtain or provide essential services. Governor Little also ordered the closure of all dine-in restaurants in the state, although drive-through and delivery will still be allowed. "Non-essential" businesses like gyms, bars, salons and convention centers must be closed.
K-12 Education is considered an “essential service” under this order, which means that BK employees are “allowed” to leave the home to go to work. However, under this order, we are modifying our original workplace expectations for our employees. During this three week stay-at-home order, we are encouraging all employees to work from home, unless the nature of their work requires them to be on site OR if they have a strong preference/reason to work from school. Should they come to BK to work, we require that they maintain social distancing of 6 feet or more from fellow employees and remind them to continue to practice good hygiene of washing hands, etc. in order to prevent the spread of this virus.
We are also very concerned about the mental health and emotional well being of our students as this is a difficult time for students who are usually very active and connected, both in person and through social media. We must do a good job in safeguarding not just the physical health of our students, but also their emotional and psychological health. We know that with the stay-at-home order and using on-line applications more for virtual learning, screen time will go up. We as educators, in partnership with you, their parents/guardians, need to set expectations for respectful behavior among our students online. Our standards are very clear -
no cyberbullying
. There will still be disciplinary consequences for cruelty towards others – whether in grading (since it will be tied to their online education) or in administrative actions. We say this now because it has come to our attention that some BK students have been using social media platforms to be crude and hurtful to others during this spring break.
Acting with kindness and respect is so important, especially with the added stress of these uncertain and challenging times we are in.
Please work with your sons and daughters to remember bullying is not a healthy practice and not aligned with our BK Way value of “A Safe and Caring Place”!
On a very positive note, students vaping in BK restrooms and parking lots has significantly decreased the past two weeks. We think it may be due to our efforts around education and our poster campaign. :)
Finally, as we continue to navigate these challenging times, it is important to stay focused on those things that we can control and to try not to get stressed or anxious about all those things that we cannot control. We can all control our attitudes, our following the guidance/ recommendations of experts, the time we spend on online and in social media, how much news we watch and we can focus on the important things in life. We cannot control the actions or motives of others, the predictions of the future, or the amount of toilet paper available in the stores. In times like these, let us be reminded of the serenity prayer and say it often:
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can,
and the wisdom to know the difference
.
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GOAL #2: Continue to provide a great education for all students via virtual learning
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With the soft school closure on Monday, March 23rd, we will now be delivering virtual learning through April 17th at a minimum. Our teachers, counselors, student services and IT teams have worked incredibly hard and collaboratively the past two weeks to prepare us for this, building on the investments we have made as a community over the past 8 years in 1:1 devices, Schoology, Google Apps for Education, professional development and our IT infrastructure. As a reminder, here are the things you need to know for Monday, March 30th, when virtual learning starts:
Watch this short video on BK Virtual Learning Logistics:
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Our daily schedule will follow our established
2019-2020 Planning Calendar
.
You will notice that we’ve linked our Virtual Bell Schedule within this document for easy reference. As we go through this, we will not be afraid to adjust our bell schedule if it’s not working well for students and for teachers. This is our plan to begin with, but flexibility and adaptability will be key. Here is the virtual learning schedule for week 1 - March 30 - April 3:
Virtual Learning Schedule
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Expectations for our Students
On a daily basis, students will log into Schoology before 9:00 am and check the Announcements page for schoolwide announcements and the daily schedule.
Upon reviewing the announcements, students will proceed with attendance at each class for the day. The first task each day will be for the student to go into the “attendance” discussion for accountability purposes.
Activities following that will be outlined by each teacher within each schoology course.
Virtual Instruction
Teachers will use a mix of live (synchronous) instruction/ interaction through Schoology Conferences as well as providing asynchronous content and material for students through the Schoology Learning Management System (LMS).
Other tools may be required for special tasks, but the primary technology tools for delivery will be Schoology.
How to contact counselors and student support services
Counselors and student support will all be available during our virtual learning time period. The preferred way of contacting your counselor is via email. Depending on the nature of the question, counselors will follow up with an email, phone call or 1:1 virtual conference.
Counselor/ Student Support Contact info
How to access BK IT Services
Here at BK IT we realize that this transition is a nerve racking one for many of us. We have fielded several questions and concerns regarding the process of going to an online virtual learning environment. We have answered many of the questions you likely have at the bottom of the BK website or at:
https://bishopkelly.freshdesk.com
.
Please take a moment to look at the questions and solutions in the Virtual/Flipped Classroom section of the Knowledge Base.
On a side note, most of the systems / software that we will be using in the coming weeks were never designed to handle the amount of use the U.S. is placing on them now. We will be experiencing outages, slowness, and downtime (remember the “old days”). Please have patience and understanding.
Bishop Kelly IT will be available 8:00AM to 3:30PM M-F during our virtual learning. Especially the first few days after returning from Spring Break we anticipate significantly higher need. Please help us navigate this new territory by making sure to check our knowledge base for an answer to your question prior to sending us an email.
Parents / Guardians, please use your Student’s BK Google account when sending a request via email. Without that account your ticket may not be recorded.
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GOAL #3: Maintain the strong sense of community we have here at Bishop Kelly
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It has been amazing to watch our students, parents, faculty and staff send us their ideas about how to maintain our sense of community here at BK. Some ideas that have surfaced that we are planning to implement and some things we are doing as a school are:
- Without Sunday Masses at our parishes and daily Masses at Bishop Kelly, we are planning to stream live (with archive also available) our Chaplain, Father Vance, S.J. celebrating Mass on Mondays and Fridays at 8:00 am MDT on both BK's Facebook and Instagram pages. We will have our first Mass on Monday, March 30th. Also, Adoration and processions of the Blessed Sacrament are being planned and will be recorded.
- With so many activities such as sports, competitions, concerts, functions, etc. being cancelled, a junior here at BK, London Montalbano, proposed an idea to make the best of this situation. She wants to create a "Stay Connected" Campaign that could provide weekly challenges that students are welcome to participate in. This would be a fun and interactive way to stay connected while in isolation and it may give students just what they need during this uncertain time. Stay tuned for this beautiful way to continue building our community.
- Our student body officers will be recording via video the announcements daily and our Campus Ministers will be videoing our daily prayer. These simple touches will help our students stay connected and provide a sense of community.
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How about this example of our wonderful community? This morning, an anonymous BK student placed a rock that was painted BK gold with the words “We are BK strong +” written on it next to our St. Teresa’s Chapel!
- A BK parent and student arranged for us to meet with folks from Cisco/WebEx to discuss broadcasting a virtual student assembly of up to 1000 participants!
- We are committed to working with families in our BK community who are struggling with new and unexpected financial pressures due to losing a job or their income. It may be that a family’s small business is hurting, or a close relative is ill. How
- Can our BK community help? We would ask that you go to bk.org/donate and give to “tuition assistance”. We will use funds given during this period to set up a BK Angels Special Assistance Fund to support students and families in particular need during this challenging time. To our community members - parents, alumni and friends - who wonder how they can help, we encourage you to contribute what you can to this special fund to aid students and families seeking monetary assistance because of this crisis.
- Regarding BK’s financial situation, we must continue to operate as a healthy business. We have committed to pay all of our teachers, coaches and staff through the year and we have additional costs associated with providing a great educational experience now via virtual learning. Should you have a specific family situation you wish to discuss with us, please contact Joe Fehringer, our Business Manager, at jfehringer@bk.org or call (208) 947-1209. We want to help.
- We are not planning to refund activities fees as the season has not been cancelled and we are paying our coaches for the full season which the activities fees help to cover.
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GOAL #4: Find ways to acknowledge, appreciate, and celebrate members of our community
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We will be focusing on development of our plans (virtual and in person) for student events that acknowledge and celebrate our students, especially for our seniors in their final months of high school. We strongly desire to continue with Academic Excellence Week, Senior Retreat, Senior Mass, Yearbook signing, May 22nd Baccalaureate Mass and Class of 2020 Graduation on May 23rd. We shall see whether these are in person, delayed or virtual events.
We will also continue each Friday with our Knights of the Week where Bishop Kelly faculty and staff nominate students, and students nominate faculty and staff, who have demonstrated the BK Way attributes of Faith, Safe and Caring Place, Academic Excellence, Activities, Honor, Generosity, Community, and Partnership. Even though school is closed there are so many wonderful things happening even though we are not physically present to each other.
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GOAL #5: Deliver predictable, daily communication to our entire community
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This is our 7th Just in Time Communication since March 16th. Our next Just in Time Communication will be next Wednesday, April 1st, when we will provide an update on how the first two days of virtual learning have gone, hear from you and share what we have seen and learned. As a reminder, we have archived these communications and the FAQ’s that have arisen on our
Info for BK Families about COVID-19
webpage.
We hope you have had a wonderful spring break and have enjoyed the time with family (maybe for some too much time …) and please continue to take good care of yourselves and be safe and healthy.
Please let us know if you have any suggestions and/or additional questions by replying to this email. We strongly believe we will be a better school and a stronger community thanks to the efforts of so many through this crisis.
God bless,
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Rich Raimondi
President
Bishop Kelly High School
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Mike Caldwell
Principal
Bishop Kelly High School
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Opt-In for BK Emergency SMS Alerts
From time to time we will send out SMS notifications to parents for urgent reminders or other time sensitive items. Please be sure to opt-in for your respective remind group using the procedures below.
Text one of the following codes to the number "81010". Be sure to include the "@" symbol in your text.
@bkp2020
@bkp2021
@bkp2022
@bkp23
- Front Office: 375-6010
- Fax: 375-3626
- Business Office Manager: 947-1209
- BK Development Office: 947-1325
- BK Foundation Office: 323-4789
To add, remove, or change your email address, or to remove your name from our regular mailing lists, please contact Chrissy at
cbeckner@bk.org
.
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Bishop Kelly High School | (208) 375-6010 | www.bk.org
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