Dear OLL Families,
Thank you for your understanding as we’ve needed to modify the schedule due to weather conditions this week, and who knows if more to come. It’s a disruption to family work/home schedules and morning routines, not to mention loss of educational time in the classroom. Here’s some quick context to how they are made. The decisions are rarely “slam dunks” or easy to make, but we do our best to make the right call.
What factors go into them? These include conditions on the OLL campus (whether the parking lots and sidewalks are safe for students, teachers/staff, and parents); whether teachers/staff and families can safely travel to school from their homes; and the decision by Seattle Public Schools and neighboring suburban school systems after their analyses. First, of course, is that the overall priority is to ensure safety for all to get here and home, and it’s not only our local roads around OLL but outer-lying areas. We have teachers/staff coming from Snohomish County, Bothell, Edmonds, all the way to Queen Anne/Magnolia/West Seattle, plus we are expanding our footprint of where our students live - including Everett, Woodinville, Bothell, and elsewhere outside Seattle. We can't run without essential teachers/staff. So we need to take a fairly broad view, and the geographical consideration that, generally speaking, we’re a region full of hills that can translate to complex snow/ice conditions varying widely by neighborhood.
So, we appreciate your flexibility in navigating all this with us. We know changes can be frustrating, so please know these decisions are never made lightly, but with as much info available and as quickly as possible. Thank you. And I want to particularly thank Vickie and Jennifer Kush who make the extra effort to come in early to be here for those families utilizing Xcare in the midst of these events.
Looking ahead, please join us for the all-school
Catholic Schools Week kick-off Mass
at 9:30am on January 26, with our Open House and coffee/refreshments to follow in the school foyer. We believe Catholic education is a tremendous investment in the future of each of our students, and this Mass is a perfect way to start that week-long celebration.
Finally - please note: We will be conducting our next monthly emergency preparedness drill on Tuesday, Jan. 21, to practice our Lockdown procedure. This means you will receive a text message announcing the drill has started and another when it ends. No action is needed on your part.
Go Lakers!
Daniel P. Mullen
Principal
