July 17, 2020
Good Evening RCS Community,
A message from Dr. Hearne
Dr. Hearne here to provide a response to the new guidelines jointly released today by the State of California Public Health Department and Governor Newsom. As you all know, one of my favorite words during this time is “pivot.”

Based upon Governor Newsom’s press conference today, the California Public Health Department has added an additional guideline to meet so that RCS students can return to campus: schools are only allowed to reopen for in person instruction if Alameda County has not been on the County Data Monitoring list for the past 14 days.  

Currently, Alameda County has been on the County Data Monitoring list for five days. Fourteen days after it is removed, RCS students can return to campus! With exactly one month before our first day of school, please join me in prayer, asking for the COVID-19 cases across the world, and especially those in Alameda County, to be healed by God’s miraculous power.

For those who wanted to start on campus, this is a minor setback. For those who are planning on using the Online Zoom Option, everything is the same.  As I emailed on July 14, 2020, RCS is ready with a four phase plan:
  • If Alameda County is off the Monitoring list by August 2, 2020, then RCS will start the school year in Phase Two, with students either on campus all day on August 17, 2020 or online via Zoom. 

  • If Alameda County is not off the Monitoring List on August 2, 2020, then RCS will start the school year in Phase One, with all students doing virtual education on August 17, 2020, and will pivot to Phase Two as soon as Alameda County has been off the Monitoring list for 14 days.  Another possibility for Redwood Christian Elementary ONLY that RCS is pursuing, is to apply for a waiver that could be granted by the Alameda County Public Health Officer to allow in-person instruction on our elementary campus, despite Alameda County being on the Monitoring List.

The “Rebuilding RCS” plan is in place, following the guidelines from the CDC , the State of California , and Alameda County . The Faculty is set to return to campus on August 3 to begin their PreSeason in preparation for both Phase One: Virtual Education and Phase Two: Small Cohort Classrooms. Beginning next week, we will email out one section of the plan at a time and begin to host Facebook live and/or Zoom sessions to answer questions.

With other schools having recently announced only online education for the start of the school year, RCS has seen an increase in new student applications. Please let your friends and family, who might be considering RCS, know that we are almost filled to capacity and only a few seats remain available in the RCS cohorts for each grade level.

In order to help RCS begin planning for the number of students on campus and the number of students for the online via Zoom, please click below and let us know which option your family is currently leaning toward for the start of school.
In Christ,

Al Hearne II, PhD
Superintendent