Republic School District Families and Employees,

Like other districts across the area, and across the nation, we are seeing an increase of illness in our district, specifically with our employees. Because of this we wanted to provide the following updates:

• Republic School District’s goal is to host in-person learning, if at all possible, as we feel this is the best way to meet our students’ academic and social needs.
• One of the most important ways to keep in-person learning occurring is to have substitutes (teachers, nurses, bus drivers, etc.) available. Currently, our substitute fill rate is below 50% of the positions open. This means we are pulling paras, aides, learning specialists, administrators, etc. from their regular duties to fill these vacancies. 
• If you or someone you know is interested in subbing, WE NEED YOU!!!! Visit https://penmac.lpages.co/penmac-education/ for details.
• If we are unable to host in-person learning the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education has granted school districts across the state 36 total hours of AMI (Alternative Method of Instruction) learning. This means for illness or inclement weather we have the option to host virtual/remote learning, if needed. AMI days would include independent student learning with school Chromebooks (assignments posted on Canvas or Google Classroom) and/or paper packets per classroom teachers. Once these 36 hours have been used, traditional “no school” days would have to be used and potentially made up at the end of the school year to obtain DESE’s required 1044 annual total hours of school being held. It is possible that we would use a mixture of both AMI and “no school” days should the need arise. 
• We hope to be able to give our families and employees as much advance notice as possible if we need to implement an AMI day. However, please note that this could possibly be implemented with little notice. Therefore, we encourage families to go ahead and make alternative arrangements should they need to be quickly implemented. STRIPES 360 will be available on a limited basis for currently enrolled Tiger STRIPES, TEENS and PALS families.
• PLEASE do not send your student to school if they are not feeling well. We ask that everyone complete a morning “wellness check” using the graphic below. We must all do our part to help mitigate the spread of the various illnesses we are seeing in our community. 

Thank you in advance for your flexibility as we continue to navigate the impact of illness on the school year.

Sincerely,

Josey McPhail

Director of Communications

Republic School District