Notice of 2021-2022 Instructional Plans
Greetings Southwest Local Families,
This letter is to notify you of our instructional planning for the 2021-2022 school year. For the 2021-22 school year, we will be providing instruction to students in our traditional face-to-face model. There will not be a virtual option for families next year, with the exception of our invite-only Wildcat Academy for credit recovery purposes at William Henry Harrison High School.
We have struggled this year to pursue our mission of academic and social growth for all students in the virtual model. While we had a handful of students who were able to find success in virtual education, the vast majority have not. We have witnessed academic gaps grow wider in the virtual model, students becoming more and more disengaged and disconnected from their peers and their school community, and both failure numbers and truancy numbers have skyrocketed as a result. Virtual education is not where we excel. It’s in the daily face-to-face interactions with our students, teachers, and administrators where strong relationships are built and solid academic foundations and high expectations for our students’ success are established. We have demonstrated throughout the school year that we can operate safely to provide in-person instruction for our students where all health and safety protocols are strictly followed. We know that in-person instruction is what is best for student learning, and we have been working extremely hard all year to make sure we were able to keep our schools safe and our doors open.
Thank you to all the families who have shown tremendous support to our staff as we worked through the most challenging year of our educational careers. We are very hopeful that next year will be back to business as usual, where we will continue to see our students flourish both academically and socially and accomplish amazing things. For those that have been virtual part or all of this academic year and are feeling disconnected or behind academically, please know that there are opportunities this summer for summer bridge and intervention work as well as for social interaction with other students and staff. We are also working to build time and structure into our schedules for next year for targeted intervention for our students to help them recover from any learning loss due to the interruptions COVID-19 has caused.
Wishing you and your family an enjoyable Spring Break – it is a much needed one, indeed!
Sincerely,
Corinne Hayes
Assistant Superintendent, Southwest Local Schools