9.18.2020 Parents Update - Return to site-based instruction September 28, 2020!

Good afternoon MMCA Families,

The Placer County Public Health Office has expressed a preference for schools within the County wanting to restart on-site instruction to do so with a 50% maximum capacity. In order to accomplish this and at least partially reopen physical school, we are going to be temporarily implementing a “Hybrid” model. By starting ‘Hybrid’, we will be able to stagger all drop-off / pick-up times and limit the number of students within a classroom to around 15 students or less. To help our families prepare and to give you at least 10 days notice for this switch, we’re publishing two documents today (embedded as images at the bottom of this note):

A four week Hybrid Schedule that begins ten days from now on Monday, September 28th with drop-off / pick-up times for each group, their lunch pick up schedules, etc.
An RSVP form for Before / During / Afterschool Care during this four week Hybrid Schedule

Hybrid Schedule details:

K-3rd and 6th Graders: This is known as an ‘AM/PM’ schedule. With our K-3rd grade students, we want to minimize screen time as much as possible with this age group, and we’ll be down to 1 day per week of Zoom-based lessons for this age group. Our 6th Grade classroom is our only classroom on campus with one grade level - we think we can differentiate our instruction within the AM/PM structure and minimize Zoom time. Our 6th Grade parents will get a separate note on Monday letting them know if their child is ‘AM’ or ‘PM’. PLEASE note the unique bell schedules for these grade levels.

4-5th / 7th-8th Graders: This is known as an ‘A/B’ schedule. On the three days 4th-5th / 7th-8th Graders are not at school, we will still be doing Zoom-based lessons with the students. On the days these students are at school, it's +/- their normal bell schedule. Within our upper elementary multi-grade level classrooms, an A/B schedule gives us our best chance to differentiate instruction and teach the broadest array of subjects.

With both groups, this will enable us to get about 45 hours of on-site instruction time during these four weeks - definitely less than ideal, but still 45 more hours than we’ve been allowed to do for the past six months, so we’ll take what we can get at this point.

Before / During / Afterschool Care during the four week hybrid period details:

We are going to offer our ‘traditional’ Before and After School child care options at the same rates as last year for any students physically attending school that day. Additionally, to help our multi-child and longer distance commuting families, we are going to offer a low cost ($10 for 4 hours) “during school” child care option for the AM/PM students. We are going to limit the size of any of the Before/During/Aftercare groups to 30 students maximum on a ‘first come, first serve’ basis. If these are care options you will need, please print and fill out the form below and either return it to the office or email it to dthorman@mmcharter.org.

Early next week, we’ll be sending A LOT of information about the upcoming return to site-based instruction. Like the past six months, I suspect the next six weeks will be a fluid situation, and we may need to adapt and change things as we go. We sincerely appreciate your flexibility and patience during these unpredictable, unprecedented times.

Have a good weekend all!

Brent