Please be mindful of the main reason why school is closed next week: to facilitate social distancing in order to help mitigate and contain the spread of coronavirus. The CDC defines social distancing as avoiding places where people congregate, especially mass gatherings, and maintaining distance (approximately six feet or two meters) from others when possible.
I strongly encourage families to stay home or enjoy the outdoors. Taking your kids to indoor facilities such as the movies, malls, or other public places will not help in our mission to control the coronavirus and defeats the purpose of closing school. Although this is a new way of thinking for all of us, please do your best to make this a practice until normalcy can return.
Teachers will be reaching out to parents via email and/or students by Wednesday morning in order to maintain continuity of learning, if they have not done so already. Feel free to reach out to any staff member should you have any questions.
As of now, I am eagerly awaiting guidance from the State Education Department about the impact of school closings on the calendar for the remainder of the year. Gov. Cuomo said yesterday in a press briefing that the 180-day requirement will be waived, but no details have been provided yet. Currently, we have days built into our calendar for emergency closings. As of now I can tell you for sure that, assuming the current situation improves, schools will be open May 22 and May 26 (our two snow make-up days) as we will be using them in the coming week as emergency days. Any potential impact on the Spring Recess will be sent to you as soon as possible.
Thank you for doing your part in these trying times.
