Dear District 204 Community,
At the August 3 Board of Education meeting we had the opportunity to present information on our Revised Return to School Plan. Thank you to the community members who watched the livestream and to those who provided public comment.
I shared with you last Friday that this was not an easy decision to make, but it is one that I believe will best protect our students, staff and their family members, while providing an opportunity to return to learning. As a community, now we must focus on creating an excellent learning environment for our students to begin their school year.
Here are updates from tonight’s meeting:
- We proposed the first day of school will be September 3, 2020. The Board of Education will vote on a revised school calendar at the August 10 meeting.
- To date, we have 58 percent of our students registered for school. We strongly encourage you to complete your online registration so we can finalize student schedules and create class lists. In ParentVUE, there is no longer an option to select A/B/C Schedule or Online Academy, as all students will start the year remotely with teachers and classmates from their own school.
- High school students who had limited electives in the Online Academy now have full access to the classes in their schedule, including Advanced Placement courses.
- The state announced a condensed schedule allowing some traditional fall sports to continue, while moving others to the spring. District 204 will follow state guidance in this area.
- We are working with community partners to provide options to support families with child supervision needs.
To learn more about what went into this decision and how the fall remote learning will be different from the spring, I encourage you to watch the video and view the presentation slides from tonight’s meeting. The video is available on our YouTube channel and the presentation slides are available here. We also have an updated FAQ section at www.ipsd.org/ReturntoSchool.
We will present further details, including addressing services for students with special needs, at the August 10 Board of Education meeting. If the answer to your question is not available on our website, I ask for your patience as we continue to update the information. I look forward to the August 10 presentation and sharing further details of how we are working to support our students and families as the school year begins. Thank you for your continued support.
Sincerely,
Dr. Adrian B. Talley
Superintendent
