Parent Communication, March 24 and March 25, 2020

Parent Communication, March 24 and March 25, 2020




 On Tue, Mar 24, 2020 at 8:55 AM Keith Snow <​ksnow1976@gmail.com​> wrote:
  Hello Mr. Burt,

   First, I would like to thank you for your leadership during the difficult and unprecedented time
   we all now find ourselves in. I am writing to you as a father of a student at WJJMS. I have
   been reading all of your updates with great interest and would like to weigh in with my
   thoughts, for what they’re worth.

   You have pointed out more than once that Governor Lamont has waived the 180 day school
   day requirement. You also note that April break remains in place at this time. What
   surprises me is that you go on to point out that, despite this, we remain on track to have our
   last day of school on June 15, as previously scheduled. If online learning begins on 3/26 as
   you plan, that will mean students will have missed 8 days of school due to the closure.
   Shouldn’t we at least make an attempt to recover as much classroom time for our students
   as we can?

   Regards,
   K. Snow

On Wed, Mar 25, 2020 at 9:04 AM Jeffrey Burt <​jburt@colchesterct.org​> wrote:
 Good Morning Mr. Snow,
 Thank you for sharing your questions. In general, we are all concerned about the long-range
 impact of this extended closure and are cognizant of the fact that the interim learning
 opportunities are really a stop-gap measure to ensure our students remain connected and
 avoid too much loss to their knowledge and skills (we refer to this as the "summer slide"
 between school years). As for the April break, it will allow for our instructional staff to refine
 their skills that they have essentially just acquired over the past eight days and plan for more
 instruction moving forward. Finally, there are contractual limitations on the number of days
 some of our staff are required to work and many of them were working last week, which is not
 the case on a usual snow day.
 Please let me know if you have further questions.
 Regards,
 Jeff Burt
 Jeffrey E. Burt
 Superintendent
 Colchester Public Schools
 127 Norwich Avenue, Suite 202
 Colchester, CT 06415
 860-537-7208
 jburt@colchesterct.org
 "We create innovative thinkers for a dynamic world."

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: ​Keith Snow​ <​ksnow1976@gmail.com​>
Date: Wed, Mar 25, 2020 at 9:34 AM
Subject: Re: COVID Update March 23, 2020
To: Jeffrey Burt <​jburt@colchesterct.org​>



Mr. Burt,

Thank you for your reply. I certainly acknowledge the complexity of this difficult situation. With
that said, I am hopeful that the BOE will at least explore the opportunity of adding some extra
days in June, assuming the school year does indeed resume. I would think that the teachers’
union should at least entertain the idea given the fact that students are not able to attend school
during an extended period and their contractual obligations seem to correspond to work days
where school is actually in session.

Regards,
K. Snow