Poteau Daily News

Apr
10

2020

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Property of OPS News Tracker and members of the Oklahoma Press Association.
 The Edmond Sun
Apr
18
EPIC assisting schools,
DOC with Distance
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Learning options
OKLAHOMA CITY — As distance learn-
ing has begun for all Oklahoma public
schools, EPIC Charter Schools announced
it is providing several Oklahoma school
districts and the Oklahoma Department
of Corrections (DOC) with free staff devel-
opment regarding distance learning.
After the State Board of Education
required distance learning of all public
schools for the remainder of this school
year, EPIC announced it would offer sev-
eral free distance learning tools to
Oklahoma public schools, including two
hours of staff development. Several dis-
tricts responded positively to the offer and
EPIC reiterated today its willingness to
help in any way it could any Oklahoma
school that requested it.
EPIC staff is working with DOC to
enhance educational opportunities for
inmates by providing access to curricu-
lum and staff training on technology like
Zoom.
“We don’t know how long our state and
federal governments are going to recom-
mend or require social distancing to pro-
tect public health,” said EPIC
Superintendent Bart Banfield. “We under-
stand many schools are having to get a
crash course in distance learning from
Property of OPS News Tracker and members of the Oklahoma Press Association.
both a faculty training perspective and a
student engagement perspective. We want
to help in any way we can. We are in this
together, and it’s never been more impor-
tant for our country that all facets of our
public education system work coopera-
tively.”
In addition to free staff development, in
the last week, EPIC also publicly posted
on its website (https://epiccharter-
schools.org/distance-learning-for-tradi-
tional-schools) the following free
resources:
• EPIC Ed: Academic lessons for each
core Oklahoma Academic Standard that
can be delivered via Zoom or Google
Hangouts, including practice and assess-
ment resources. A mobile-friendly version
of the website also has been made avail-
able for Oklahoma teachers or parents
without internet connectivity in their
homes.
• Educate Without Walls: A Powerpoint
presentation to accompany two hours of
free, interactive staff development or as a
standalone resource.
• Online Teaching Help: A repository of
best practices and online resources creat-
ed by EPIC teachers with demonstrated
success in distance learning.