WEEKLY MESSAGE | 10.3.20
Hi all,
I hope you’re doing well. Writing with a few quick requests and some important updates:
Vote
Anti-Bias/Anti-Racist Focus
Reopening
This is our biggest fundraiser of the year raising vital funds, 10-15% of our entire annual budget, to support low-class sizes, an enriched curriculum and our amazing teachers. This year it’s our primary fundraiser since we can’t be in person for the Jogathon and Gala. We know the pandemic is impacting families differently so we ask those who can to really stretch to give meaningfully and invest in our students, teachers and school.
Thank you so much for helping to make Larchmont possible.
Go to lavote.net to get information on registration and voting options and please read up on the local races too.
As a diverse-by-design school, we have made deepening our work around anti-bias and anti-racist educational and institutional practices our focus for the year. Thank you for supporting our teachers and leaders as they work to increase equity and inclusion at our school and strengthen our students’ critical thinking skills to identify and root out bias.
We continue to hear new information and guidance from the County regarding reopening. The public health metrics related to COVID are thankfully steadily improving in LA. The County is allowing schools to start testing and meeting with small groups of the highest need students (special education or EL) for testing and services.
They’ve also just announced they’re allowing schools to apply for waivers to reopen TK-2 in hybrid. They’re permitting just 30 schools at a time to apply for the waiver and are prioritizing those that have the highest concentration of low income and high need students. Larchmont started in person one on one assessments for students with special needs this week. We are not currently planning to apply for the waiver or to begin with small groups. We are continuing the preparation and planning for campus readiness to reopen when it is safe to do so more broadly.
Please don’t hesitate to reach out with questions about any of this.
Thank you so much for all you do to make our school great!
Warmly,
Amy Held