Dear Central Office Leaders,

As many of our educators and students are returning to schools for in-person learning, we are excited to also plan for a return to our administrative buildings. We know that working in our offices will look different than we are used to, but in order to best support our schools, it is important to offer our central office team members access to our administrative buildings.

As we shared in yesterday's Our DPS Weekly, our COVID Conditions dashboard currently has two indicators in the red zone. Our health partners have shared that the increase in COVID in Denver is almost entirely attributable to increases at colleges and universities in Denver. Based on this, we are cautiously proceeding with our planned dates for reopening elementary and secondary schools, as well as our administrative sites.

We continue our commitment to a safe reopening, and we are still working closely with our local health experts to monitor changing conditions related to COVID-19 -- and making adjustments to our plans as needed.

Extended Leadership Team (ELT) members will be expected to schedule into their respective buildings for in-person work at least some of the time beginning Oct. 14, and all other central office team members will have the opportunity to return beginning Oct. 28.

We recognize that our leaders know how to best support their teams and the nuances of navigating in-person versus remote work for your team specifically. The scheduling process offers a framework for the logistics of scheduling in-person work, while allowing our cross-functional administrative reopening team to ensure we are following health and safety guidelines.

Over the next two weeks, the scheduling team will be reaching out to each division to go over the process for developing a schedule for their team for in-person work at an administrative site. The administrative reopening team will provide details on which workspaces are available and access to a scheduling tool created specifically for each team to develop their own schedule.

We also want to continue to put our Students First, and for our teammates who work at the Emily Griffith Campus, that means prioritizing the students in the Emily Griffith Technical College and High School and the Downtown Denver Expeditionary School to ensure they are able to go to and from school while following health guidelines. With that in mind, there will be designated times when central office team members are able to enter and exit the EGC building. We will share those details with ELT members to consider as they make return plans for their teams.

As a reminder, the maximum number of staff we can have on any floor at any given time is 50% of the workspaces on that floor in order to meet distancing requirements. Also, all team members must complete a health screening every day prior to coming to a worksite.

Please reference these resources for additional information:

Next Friday, Oct. 2 is the last day to nominate those who have gone above and beyond during the 2019-20 school year. If you work with a person or team who inspires you, please take this opportunity to celebrate and recognize them for one of these awards:

For questions, please email Our_DPSValues@dpsk12.org.

As Team DPS prepares to work exclusively in Google (Microsoft will be uninstalled Dec. 11), we know some teams may require continued access to Microsoft products. For this reason, directors and above (only) may request to temporarily extend the usage of Office products for team members.

If someone on your team needs an exception, complete this Exception Request Form by Sept. 30 and provide detailed justification addressing the criteria found here, a list of which Office products are needed, and the individual(s) who need licenses.

For additional Google transition information and resources, visit The Commons.

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