Jun 15 school board meeting & Return in Fall presentation

[Anonymous]

https://go.boarddocs.com/vsba/fairfax/Board.nsf/files/C3YV2Q6BF307/$file/SBWS_June%2015_2021_FINAL.pdf

This is the presentation. There are some details on the number of kids who dis-enrolled during the 20-21 school year (and how many have re-enrolled -- about 30% so far). Also includes details on the number who applied for and were approved for full virtual '21-22 school year. There will probably be around 125 high school students doing virtual. Around 400 students in all of FCPS. That's not a lot... and I doubt that they can have full classes of just virtual kids... but who knows.

Also includes recommendations for grading policies for next school year.

They are looking to add more time for professional development by either having an early release day every month, another no school day added every quarter, or hiring subs to cover for teachers who are doing Prof Devel activities.

[Anonymous]

I understand that VDOE and FCPS require a lot of training for teachers, but have they considered asking how much PD that they already do is fluff and getting rid of that?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I understand that VDOE and FCPS require a lot of training for teachers, but have they considered asking how much PD that they already do is fluff and getting rid of that?

They are proposing one additional early release per month for PD. Page 30

[Anonymous]

Also, sounds like they are waiting on CDC guidance for mask rules.

That's going to be interesting!

[Anonymous]

50% rule stays......

[Anonymous]

50% rule?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:50% rule?

Grade inflation. No child can ever get below a 50% on an assignment. Even if they don't turn it in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:50% rule?

Grade inflation. No child can ever get below a 50% on an assignment. Even if they don't turn it in.

It isn’t inflation, nimrod. A 50 is still an F. It reduces an F to a 10% range the same as any other letter grade and ensures if a kid has one bad quarter their entire year isn’t unrecoverable.

[Anonymous]

for HS I hope for Asch Mondays, I think that gives a day to catch up on work, study for tests, doc appointments etc

[Anonymous]

MORE professional development? Ughhhhh. As a teacher (and a parent), this is not what teachers (at least at my school) want. The professional development is always Gatehouse created to fit whatever their new priority for the year is (because we apparently can’t focus on the same thing for more than a year or two) and has never once been helpful to my curriculum area. The teacher workdays are helpful for grading and unit planning w my colleagues, but I would much rather have students on ALL of the professional development days than listen to hastily prepared Gatehouse presentations. This is a waste of time and just leads to more childcare needs for parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:MORE professional development? Ughhhhh. As a teacher (and a parent), this is not what teachers (at least at my school) want. The professional development is always Gatehouse created to fit whatever their new priority for the year is (because we apparently can’t focus on the same thing for more than a year or two) and has never once been helpful to my curriculum area. The teacher workdays are helpful for grading and unit planning w my colleagues, but I would much rather have students on ALL of the professional development days than listen to hastily prepared Gatehouse presentations. This is a waste of time and just leads to more childcare needs for parents.

If they don't add extra time off, how else will they have time tell you the kids are behind and need to recover their learning loss?

Sorry just found the topics they need to address in professional development juxtaposed with suggesting removing more school time as hilariously ironic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MORE professional development? Ughhhhh. As a teacher (and a parent), this is not what teachers (at least at my school) want. The professional development is always Gatehouse created to fit whatever their new priority for the year is (because we apparently can’t focus on the same thing for more than a year or two) and has never once been helpful to my curriculum area. The teacher workdays are helpful for grading and unit planning w my colleagues, but I would much rather have students on ALL of the professional development days than listen to hastily prepared Gatehouse presentations. This is a waste of time and just leads to more childcare needs for parents.

If they don't add extra time off, how else will they have time tell you the kids are behind and need to recover their learning loss?

Sorry just found the topics they need to address in professional development juxtaposed with suggesting removing more school time as hilariously ironic.

Also let's spend $$ advertising that we have schools that we plan to teach kids 5 days/week in. To make it more effective let's plan to make one half day per month... that'll convince the other 74% of families to come back!!

[Anonymous]

They said that 5500 students transferred out of the district to homeschool/private school (half homeschool and 1/4 regular private and 1/4 parochial) and 1400 have re-enrolled.

It's less than I thought had transferred and less than I thought would return.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:50% rule?

Grade inflation. No child can ever get below a 50% on an assignment. Even if they don't turn it in.

It isn’t inflation, nimrod. A 50 is still an F. It reduces an F to a 10% range the same as any other letter grade and ensures if a kid has one bad quarter their entire year isn’t unrecoverable.

It's still inflation by setting a floor. What reasonable teacher is going to give a student who only did half the work or only got half correct the same score as someone who turned in nothing?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:https://go.boarddocs.com/vsba/fairfax/Board.nsf/files/C3YV2Q6BF307/$file/SBWS_June%2015_2021_FINAL.pdf

This is the presentation. There are some details on the number of kids who dis-enrolled during the 20-21 school year (and how many have re-enrolled -- about 30% so far). Also includes details on the number who applied for and were approved for full virtual '21-22 school year. There will probably be around 125 high school students doing virtual. Around 400 students in all of FCPS. That's not a lot... and I doubt that they can have full classes of just virtual kids... but who knows.

Also includes recommendations for grading policies for next school year.

They are looking to add more time for professional development by either having an early release day every month, another no school day added every quarter, or hiring subs to cover for teachers who are doing Prof Devel activities.

There will be virtual only classes. They might be mixed grade levels at elementary, but make no mistake: they will be all online. There will be no concurrent.