Laura Smith <Ismith@district106.

net>

A letter from Ms. Magruder - MESSAGE SENT

1 message

Ms. Magruder <wwebserver@district106.net>

Fri, Jan 15, 2021 at 6:48 PM
To: undisclosed_recipients@district106.net

The below email message has been sent to 702 parent email addresses.
Recipients: Parents of the students of the following grades: -1,0,1,2,3,4
Also Emailed: sgriesbach@district106.net
Also Emailed: Elementary School Office
Also Emailed: Administrators

Ms. Laura Magruder,Principal

LaGrange 5850 Laurel Avenue
7 LaGrange, IL 60525-7018
Highlands
Elementary School 708.579.6886
www.district106.net
Empowered ° Dynamic * Engaged. #106learns

January 15, 2021

Dear Highlands Families:

Happy New Year! We hopethat this letter finds you and your family healthy,
well-rested from the break,
and ready to embrace 2021. Weare very excited to have our students back
and look forward to
creating meaningful learning experiences for each student.

As we navigate educating students during this time of COVID, we are continual

ly trying to balance the
management of in-person learning opportunities alongside the spacerestrictions
that cap our classroom
capacity.

We readily acknowledgethat the A/B scheduleis not optimal for students and
families and the
synchronous learning at home presents challengesfor all students. While mostof
our students,
however, have adapted well to this newinstructional model, it has becomeapparent
to us that a very
small number of our students are demonstrating significant struggle.

Recognizing this fact, we asked the staff in December to identify individual

students having specific and
observable needs warranting consideration of further in-person attendance.
Wealso considered
hardships shared by families with us while engaged in the A/B schedule. Based
upon staff
recommendations, we invited a minimal number of students to attend five days
a week. Because of
limited capacity, we were only able to accommodate our most significantly impacted
learners.

You mayfeel that this is unfair, but we have done our best to make this accommod
ation only for the
Significant cases and based on the information shared by families. This decision was
not made lightly.
In retrospect, it might have been best to communicate our thinking to all families before
moving forward
with these students.
We recognize the desire of many to have students in-person five days per week; we also acknowledge
spacelimitations factoring into such decisions creates a senseoffrustration. While it is not our wish to
create discord among our families, we need to consider individual student’s unique learning needs and
use Our space as efficiently as possible.

As wecontinue to move forward, we are working as a staff to come up with ideas for ways we can bring
students into the building five days a week. While 6 foot social distancing prevents us from having all
students in the classrooms together, we are looking at a variety of ideas to create a learning experience
whereall students are at school. We are also very hopeful that the vaccine will begin to be more widely
available and that the COVID positive counts will continue to decrease. Our eyes continue to survey
the road ahead, with the goal of having all students with us for greater in-person instruction as soon as
possible.

In the meantime, we recognize that every learner and family have different needs within the COVID
experience. If there is anything you would like to discuss with us, please let us know. Wearein this
experience together and want to.work on waysto create solutions within our current constraints.

Sincerely,

Ms. Magruder

Principal

Highlands Elementary School

Note: You are receiving this message because your email address is associated with a student at
LaGrange Highlands SchoolDistrict 106. To adjust which email addresses are associated with your
student, contact the schooloffice.