Dear Team DPS,
Thank you for your continued understanding and support as we’ve worked together to navigate the COVID-19 pandemic and offer the strongest academic and support experience we can for our students.
As we’ve seen across the nation, COVID-19 rates have been rising significantly in our community over the past several weeks. We’ve been monitoring the rates in Denver and within our schools with our trusted medical experts at Denver Health, as well as local and state officials, and have consistently kept the health and safety of our students and staff at the forefront of all of our decisions.
The high and increasing community spread of the virus is causing frequent disruptions to in-person learning and creating severe staffing shortages due to quarantines. We are close to reaching our breaking point and may find ourselves unable to both staff our classrooms as well as support the dual imperatives of following all of the contact tracing and quarantining that is so critical to health and safety, as well as focus on the academic and social-emotional needs of our students.
We are going to do everything we can to continue offering in-person learning for ECE-2nd grade and our center programs beyond next week. However, if we don't see any improvement in the community spread of COVID outside of school, we are not likely going to be able to sustain the staffing needed for in-person learning after the Thanksgiving break.
We need the community to help us by adhering to the public-health orders. Schools are essential to our well-being as a society and can only operate safely if the community and our city prioritizes them. Please help us continue to offer in-person learning by strictly following health guidelines and staying home as much as possible. Wear a mask. Limit socializing with people outside your home. Our students desperately need us to make these small sacrifices so that we don’t sacrifice their education.
Warm Regards,
Susana Cordova
