In an effort to maintain quality communication and transparency with the community please see some updates below from the school board.
• Election Day is November 3rd. In order to support community voting and make voting as safe as possible for everyone, voting will be conducted in the HMHS gym this year. Due to the number of people using the school campus, this will now be a remote learning day for all students. Learning packets will be provided in advance for those elementary school students that need them.
• There are some additional changes to the Hinsdale School District 2020-2021 school year calendar. In order to give the staff proper time to prepare for the start of the school year, with the challenges of combined in class and remote learners, two of the scheduled teacher workshop days were shifted to the start of the year before classes began. Due to this change, March 15th and May 28th are now regularly scheduled class days for all staff and students.
• With the end of the first quarter approaching, we have learned that there will be a high number of students shifting from remote learning to in class participation. While we are thrilled that these students and their families are confident in our preparations for in class learning, this does require that we make some changes to accommodate many additional in class students. To allow staff the proper preparation time to manage this new shift in remote and in class learner percentages, and also to allow for extended proper deep cleaning of our school to keep them safe for all, Friday’s will now be an early release day for all students. HMHS students will be dismissed at 12:20 and HES students will be dismissed at 1:00 on Fridays beginning October 30th.
• The school board has created a policy to offer clarification on what the protocol would be should there be a positive COVID-19 test result within the school district. Learning will immediately be switched to remote for all students and staff for a minimum of 10 school days. The school board and administration will then work closely with state officials to determine when it is safe to return to in class learning. Communication with the school community would be a high priority should a switch to remote learning due to a positive test result were required.
• Due to extreme caution, there has been a high instance of students and staff absenteeism as people quarantine or receive COVID testing to ensure the safety for the school community. This is not due to actual COVID cases, but the policy put in place that anyone exhibiting any possible COVID symptoms follow these protocols as a precaution. To date, there have been no positive COVID cases within the school community. If at any time the absenteeism of students, staff, or administration reaches a level that negatively affects the ability to ensure the safety of all and provide quality education to our students we will switch to remote learning until we are confident that attendance is at appropriate levels. This determination would be made by school building, elementary or HMHS, and may not necessarily affect the entire district.
