Dear BCS Students/Families,
We hope you are staying safe and healthy – goodbye 2021, hello 2022! Please take care.
Here are some updates:
- Reminder there is no school from Fri 12/24 to Fri 12/31. No work will be posted on Google Classroom and teachers will not be checking email.
- Today we had approximately 5% of our students present in-school and 28 staff members absent. A big shout out to our in-person team who came to work this week, ready to go for any students who needed a safe space in school despite risk of exposure.
- Students who were absent because of health and safety concerns should continue to check in with their crew leaders and submit their work in Google Classroom. You will get the daily phone call about absence. This happens automatically – the phone call is associated with Pd 2 in-person attendance. Chloe, in the attendance office, then marks the absence excused with a code in the DOE database ATS. The phone call will still happen. Please know that attendance is not a factor in promotion decisions or in HS applications.
- We emailed out regarding 10 positive cases in the last 48 hours. What we are seeing here at BCS is happening city-wide. The decision to close schools is not one that individual principals can make. Only the DOE can close schools. We continue to escalate our concerns to our Supt and the DOE Situation Room, emphasizing the need for a systemwide pause to assess the rapid spread of COVID in the city at this time.
- Please continue to limit your exposures during this time. If you have any symptoms, please stay home and get tested to stop the spread. If you test positive, please email Scill@bcs448.org with your results.
- The best protection we have right now is proper masking and vaccination (plus the booster if you’re eligible)! We have almost 75% of our students fully vaccinated at this point, and we know many of our Grade 6 students will shortly add to that total since they were just newly eligible. Please get vaccinated!! List of sites: https://nycvaccinelist.com/ and https://vaccinefinder.nyc.gov – get your booster before 12/31 at a city-run site and get $100.
- School is set to resume on Mon 1/3/2022 – stay tuned to your email for updates… We await news from our new mayor and new chancellor about how they plan to re-open schools safely in January. We bid farewell to outgoing Chancellor Meisha Porter and thank her for her service to our students and schools – she helped us open full in-person learning in Sept and we are grateful.
- We strongly recommend that you get tested before you return to in-person school. Free testing (including mobile sites): https://www.nychealthandhospitals.org/covid-19-testing-sites/
Stay safe, BCS!
Take care,
Scill, Imani, Tracey