I wonder if they need guinea pig students that day to help test everything out. Has anyone volunteered to help? Ask the principals?

OP - you should include APS in the thread title since this is specifically for APS.

Another day off is tough but I'd rather that the teachers get some training on best practices instead of having each teacher reinvent the wheel. It will save more time overall. And maybe lots of headaches for the teachers who aren't as quick to flex to new teaching models.

That, of course, assumes that the training is beneficial and actually requires a full day. Hopefully teachers will be in the classroom and testing out the tools to work out the kinks.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hope the transition doesn't take too long, but I think taking ANOTHER training day is ridiculous. I've been hearing from ES and HS teachers that it's going to be hard to pay attention to the virtual students. I'm going to be livid if the virtual students get shafted during concurrent.

I'm OP and 1000 times this. I will be watching closely and if the virtual students are second-class, the principal and APS will hear about it. We chose virtual for the consistency, and because we could tell from the writing on the wall last fall that hybrid was going to be a mess. Our kids have done fine and have been learning since they have great teachers, this year hasn't been a wash in our house, so we decided to stick with what was working. Concurrent is going to totally upend that, and I'm furious. I know virtual hasn't worked for everyone, and they need to get hybrid figured out. We too want our kids back in school. APS has so totally screwed this up that families with no interest in the current hybrid model are getting hit.

If you have good teachers and DL has been working, I think it’s going to be fine. Good teachers aren’t going to ignore the kids at home. And remember that more than half the class is home every day. I completely understand and share your anxiety to some extent. But I do think it’ll be fine. I have confidence that my kids’ great teachers are not going to abandon or ignore them because they are DL.

Anonymous wrote:Which email was this? I got the one about health screenings but didn’t see this.

I was wondering the same thing so I just looked at the email again. It is part of the health screening update but for some reason, they didn't include the part about March 5th being a day off for grades 3-12 in the email portion of the message - only in the web version of the message. You need to click on the bottom where it says "To read the rest of the message, visit.."

Anonymous wrote:Which email was this? I got the one about health screenings but didn’t see this.

There is a link hidden at the bottom of that email. It was a poorly done email.

Anonymous wrote:I hope the transition doesn't take too long, but I think taking ANOTHER training day is ridiculous. I've been hearing from ES and HS teachers that it's going to be hard to pay attention to the virtual students. I'm going to be livid if the virtual students get shafted during concurrent.

I'm OP and 1000 times this. I will be watching closely and if the virtual students are second-class, the principal and APS will hear about it. We chose virtual for the consistency, and because we could tell from the writing on the wall last fall that hybrid was going to be a mess. Our kids have done fine and have been learning since they have great teachers, this year hasn't been a wash in our house, so we decided to stick with what was working. Concurrent is going to totally upend that, and I'm furious. I know virtual hasn't worked for everyone, and they need to get hybrid figured out. We too want our kids back in school. APS has so totally screwed this up that families with no interest in the current hybrid model are getting hit.

I hope the transition doesn't take too long, but I think taking ANOTHER training day is ridiculous. I've been hearing from ES and HS teachers that it's going to be hard to pay attention to the virtual students. I'm going to be livid if the virtual students get shafted during concurrent.

Which email was this? I got the one about health screenings but didn’t see this.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think APS needs to get hybrid running this year so they can work out the kinks for next fall. There is a good chance that schools may need to be hybrid in the fall and I don't want APS to wait to sort out how to reopen. We can't keep kicking the can on educating kids, like APS chose to last spring and even much of this year.

For my 7 yo, most of the year is already lost. She doesn't learn well via DL. Last spring APS didn't even try, so she lost more than a quarter of last year too. I don't want her to her to have a third school year that is critically disrupted by APS not having its act together to educate students.

+1. I agree that the disruption has to happen eventually to get back in the classroom. Let's hope by fall everything will be running smoothly.

+1 totally agree, figure it out this year so we are ready for next. This year is a wash.

Anonymous wrote:I think APS needs to get hybrid running this year so they can work out the kinks for next fall. There is a good chance that schools may need to be hybrid in the fall and I don't want APS to wait to sort out how to reopen. We can't keep kicking the can on educating kids, like APS chose to last spring and even much of this year.

For my 7 yo, most of the year is already lost. She doesn't learn well via DL. Last spring APS didn't even try, so she lost more than a quarter of last year too. I don't want her to her to have a third school year that is critically disrupted by APS not having its act together to educate students.

+1. I agree that the disruption has to happen eventually to get back in the classroom. Let's hope by fall everything will be running smoothly.

I think APS needs to get hybrid running this year so they can work out the kinks for next fall. There is a good chance that schools may need to be hybrid in the fall and I don't want APS to wait to sort out how to reopen. We can't keep kicking the can on educating kids, like APS chose to last spring and even much of this year.

For my 7 yo, most of the year is already lost. She doesn't learn well via DL. Last spring APS didn't even try, so she lost more than a quarter of last year too. I don't want her to her to have a third school year that is critically disrupted by APS not having its act together to educate students.

Yep. At least they are adding April 5 as asynchronous day. I’m guessing middle and high will use it to make up for March 5.

It's pathetic. I'm a parent and a former employee. The lost time for "training", the teachers who complain when they are treated exactly the way assistants have been treated all the time and the rabid, "open-now I know best" parents have made me wish we could move from this area.

This year is a wash.. I feel the same, OP. It's disheartening to feel like APS is going out of their way to make this a headache for families and an awful experience for kids. It really feels like they are putting the education of our kids dead last.

Did anyone else catch in the Superintendent's note yesterday that next Friday March 5th is also going to be a no-school day for 3-12th grade so that they can do even more concurrent training for teachers? Our principal has also already started messaging that they expect the first week or two of hybrid/concurrent to be very disrupted and impact instructional time and quality.

All of this so your kids can sit in a classroom on an iPad, eat lunch in a potentially unsafe scenario, and play in a 10ft square box, rather than at home on an iPad.

Venting and I know I'm going to get attacked but I'm so angry right now, mostly at APS for having so totally and completely screwed this up for the past year. Yes, also a bit for the families insisting that schools open no matter what, and are now claiming surprise at what the open schools are going to look like. More and more and more instructional time lost in pursuit of an option that is absolutely inappropriate for our learners in the upper elementary and middle school grades.