Dear Kentfield School District Community,
I will start by expressing my gratitude to the incredible people who work for the Kentfield School District. They have displayed commitment, dedication, courage, vulnerability, ingenuity, flexibility, and grace in the face of this crisis. I could not be prouder to work alongside each and every one of them in our effort to facilitate quality learning experiences for our students.
Under the best of circumstances, the Kentfield School District strives to communicate effectively. In crisis, we know the importance of communication is amplified. That is why I hosted my first virtual Town Hall yesterday to find out what is working and what could be improved as we navigate COVID-19 together.
If you have not seen the new district portal for all things distance learning created by our invaluable IT director Andrew Korff, please take a look at distance.kentfieldschools.org
It is a one-stop-shop for guides, links, posts, the Bacich and Kent learning plans, and information from the beginning of this journey, way back in mid-March.
The District will continue its weekly updates – on Friday now instead of Thursday – which will have links to the principals and directors updates. At the school level, grade levels at Bacich are distributing their online learning plans weekly, while Kent is sending a daily email and student schedules are posted on the website. Teachers email, call, videoconference, and reach out in any way possible to connect with their students. School offices are busy making sure that students we may not have heard from are getting needed information. Amber Hatfield, our English Learner specialist, has personally guided dozens of students and their families in how to access our resources online and use their devices at home.
Links to family surveys for both schools are in the principals' newsletter articles. Please take time to respond with your family’s experience so that we may, as I said before, get better at this.
We are currently abiding by the shelter in place that ends May 1 – or May 3 – depending on your news source, and we may learn shortly that we won’t be returning to our campuses this school year at all. Either scenario will require us to make longer term plans than we thought we would have to, and we are already discussing these.
I will be in contact over Spring Break with any critical updates.
Liz Schott
Superintendent
lschott@kentfieldschools.org
