Extended School Year is in its second week and both students and teachers are practicing some of the techniques the district can expect in the fall.
About 60 students are attending ESY this summer. The purpose of ESY services is to assist students in maintaing the sklls at risk of regression or for students with disabilities to attain the critical skills or sufficiency goals essential to the students’s continued progress.
Careful consideration has been given to our GMSD students who are enrolled in these services. The ESY team, led by Assistant Superintendent Sarah Huffman first needed to identify additional candidates for ESY.
Many students’ routines were altered by the pandemic and there was additional interest in this summer.
Her team also opened up a line of communication between families and staff allowing them to ask questions and make suggestions about the best interest of their children. The result? The district is leading learning activities for its highest number of ESY students (62) in its history.
ESY will opened its doors on June 29 and will continue through July 23 so that classroom teachers have a chance to set up their new rooms and attend professional development trainings that accompany the start of the school year.
The district has hired additional staff for ESY to execute the new safety protocols.
Staff members undergo a detailed health check each day they arrive and are given options for PPE (including face sheilds, gowns, masks, partitions, facial coverings, and cleaning supplies).
“We’ve learned so much about the types of PPE that teachers are gravitating towards,” said Huffman. “It’s certainly helped with planning for the 2020-2021 school year in regards of what we order more of.”
In addition to PPE, the staff has been trained how to perform the new cleaning procedures and conduct health screenings.
Teachers have have created resources for students to better understand the new procedures in the form of visual stories and illustrated guides.
