Central Kitsap School District

School starts next week! Although teaching and learning will look different this fall, we couldn't be more eager to welcome students back.

Reopening Guide for Families in the Remote + In Person Learning Model
We know you have been waiting for more information about the upcoming year, and we appreciate your patience. You’ll find a full guide by clicking here. This guide includes details on remote instruction, grading, technology, expectations and more. Families enrolled in CK Virtual Academy will receive more information specific to that model later this week.

Daily Schedules: What to expect
A day of remote learning in our Remote + In Person Learning Model will include about three hours of time online, as well as independent assignments and activities. Please see our reopening guide (linked above) to learn more. You’ll be hearing from your child’s school with final schedules and class assignments.

• Teaching will be recorded, allowing you and your child to access the lessons when convenient for your family.
• The weekly plan will go out on Fridays for the following week so you and your child can plan for the week ahead.

Attendance Requirements
Regular attendance is required and is critical to your child’s success. In accordance with new guidance from OSPI, we will take daily attendance based on evidence of participation, not based on a specific time. Some examples include: logging into Google Classroom, interacting with teachers, or participating in a task/assignment.

Helping Students Adjust
The first day of school is Wednesday, September 2. Our focus will be on ensuring a smooth transition for our students. We will work with families to ensure our students have the devices and materials they need, and our instruction will center on building relationships and providing support.

With your help, we will make this fall a positive and productive return to learning!

Last Wednesday evening, we shared an update on our reopening plans. Since then, circumstances have changed. Today, we are joining several other school districts in our region to announce a difficult choice. We will begin the 2020-21 school year in a fully remote learning model for at least the first nine weeks. At that point, we will reassess the situation.

Unfortunately, COVID-19 cases are on the rise in our state and here in our community. As a result, the Kitsap Public Health District (KPHD) has now advised against opening schools for traditional classroom learning this fall (click here to view the KPHD letter). While we do recognize the importance of educating our students in person, our priority remains the physical health and safety of our students and their families, our staff, and our community.

We are determined to return to in-person instruction as soon as it’s safely possible. In the meantime, I want to clarify that this fall’s remote learning model is not the same model we experienced last spring. We have developed an improved, more robust remote learning experience that will have increased expectations for student participation, more consistency for delivery of content, and better feedback to students and families.

We know this news will affect our families in many different ways, and we know you will have questions. We’ve posted answers to some of these questions on our website; click here to take a look. We will continue to add to that list as we develop more answers. This change does not impact the other two learning models available to families. Click here to view our three options for this fall.

Please also take a moment and click here to watch a video from our superintendent, Dr. Erin Prince, to learn more about this announcement and what’s ahead for our district.

Last week, OSPI released a template for districts to use as we prepare to submit our reopening plans for the upcoming school year. This is a great tool as our five reopening work groups continue their planning efforts.  
 
Tonight, we shared our progress with the school board. Most importantly, we are now able to share additional details around each of our three options:  

1. Remote + In Person (Hybrid Model) – This model may begin as fully remote, based on current guidance from state and local health authorities. 

2. All Online (Pearson Connexus) 

3. K-8 CKSD Homeschool 

View our side-by-side comparison and details for each of these options below. 

While we are glad to share these new descriptions, we also know that there are still many unanswered questions. In particular, we are meeting with childcare providers to ensure our families have access to childcare.  

As we move forward with our planning efforts, we will continue to work closely with our state and local health agencies. The state Department of Health (DOH) released a new report last week. The report cautions that opening schools safely depends on continuing to reduce the amount of moving and gathering we do within our communities. According to DOH, working together to stop the spread of COVID-19 is "the only way we will be able to safely reopen schools in the fall.”

We will be in touch again following our next school board study session (August 5), which you are welcome to attend virtually. Or we will reach out sooner if we have new information to share. Thank you for your support. 

Learning Model Comparison

Download the Learning Model Comparison

Thank you for responding to our School Reopening Survey! The results are available now. Click here to take a look. As you’ll see, most families want their children back in schools for in-person instruction, and we’re working hard to make that happen. Many families also shared concerns about planning for childcare and other needs. We understand these concerns. As we plan for this fall, we’ll continue sharing details and updates so you can plan for this fall.

We are developing three options for families to consider:

1. Hybrid – This would allow students to receive as much in-person instruction as possible. Students would learn both in-person and online with a CKSD classroom teacher. It would feature a consistent schedule with specific expectations for instruction, online work, and teacher access/support. This model would function on a rotating basis, with students attending in person two days each week and learning online three days each week (about half our students would attend on each in-person day). We’ll provide more details about this option soon. In case of school closure, students would temporarily move to all-online instruction with Google Classroom, and no in-person instruction. In-person instruction would resume upon clearance from health authorities.
2. All Online (Pearson Connexus) – Students will complete 100% of their learning and assignments via Pearson Connexus, an online curriculum platform. A CKSD teacher will be assigned to each student. This home learning option will operate at the district level and will not be directly tied to an individual district school. Guardian support is necessary for younger students and highly recommended for older students.
3. Homeschool (Barker Creek Community School) – This learning option would be supported through our Barker Creek Community School with parent instruction, using traditional textbooks and resources provided by CKSD.

Our goal is to welcome as many students as possible back into our buildings this fall. The OSPI District Planning Guide provides specific strategies to help us achieve this goal with restrictions:

• Require cloth face coverings for staff and students.
• Check for signs of illness for all staff and students at entry each day.
• Practice physical distancing (six feet) within each group of students as much as possible, including spacing of desks.
• No field trips, assemblies, or other large gatherings.
• Cancel or modify classes where students are likely to be in very close contact.
• Limit nonessential visitors, including volunteers and mentors.
• Limit cross-school transfer for special programs.

We’ve been visiting each of our schools and reviewing our programs as we prepare to implement these strategies. As a result, the following actions will be suspended under the current pandemic:

After school activities
After school clubs
Indoor facility rentals
Outside groups
Pool use
School-wide parents meetings
Special performances
Tiny Trojans

We know you are eager to see our schools reopen again without these restrictions in place. We are, too! Until then, we will continue to comply with OSPI and Department of Health mandates in order to keep our students, staff, families, and community safe and healthy. 

We will share more about our plans for this fall after next week’s school board study session. To learn more about that meeting, please click here. Thank you for your continued support and understanding!