In the East Troy Community School District, we aim to empower and engage students in their learning. We know that learning can look different depending on the needs and interests of each individual. Our students come to us with varying levels of readiness, passions, backgrounds, and social and emotional needs.

That said, we continue to create learning environments that recognize these differences and the process of learning. Sorting and selecting students should never be embedded in our policies or practices. Rather, we must create conditions through policies and practices to support the learning of each child. This statement may never be more important than it is now, as we ensure students continue to learn during these unprecedented times and beyond.

As I have often stated, our focus is not on making students be good at school, but rather on allowing them to become good learners. It’s worth reflecting upon what we witnessed this past spring, when every school district had to quickly transition to emergency virtual learning. It became clear that students were truly reliant upon us for their learning.

Are we about compliance, completion, and conformity, which can lead to complacency? Or, are we about increasing student voice within their learning by assisting them with understanding what they are to learn, how they will know if they learned, recognizing how to seek feedback, and using feedback toward continued improvement? We must teach them how to select resources toward ongoing, improved learning, and to maximize the skill of self-reflection toward reaching their full potential. None of this can occur without aligning our current practices toward supporting these learning conditions, and thus increasing creativity, critical thinking, collaboration, communication, depth of content, and curiosity. Ultimately, we create learners—not students.

As A.J. Juliani and John Spencer state within their book, Empower: “Our job is not to prepare students for something; our job is to help students prepare themselves for anything.” This concept should affect everything we do, not because of the pandemic, but because we believe in creating learners and keeping learning at the center of everything we do.

As you are already aware, on Tuesday, July 21, the East Troy Board of Education approved the initial plan for re-entry for the 2020-21 school year. As this time, we plan on welcoming all students back into our buildings five days per week for in-person learning. There will also be a virtual option for families who request or require it.

Additionally, due to the fluid nature of this pandemic, we must be prepared for the possibility of future short- or long-term school closures. We continue to plan for an A/B model, through which students receive both in-person and virtual learning on different days of the week. Furthermore, we are preparing for the possibility that all virtual instruction may be needed at some point during the school year.

As we forge ahead for the betterment of our students, staff, schools, and community, we must anticipate the need to adjust our approach as the school year progresses. We may need to be adaptable when it comes to reducing exposure, mitigating spread, supporting the physiological and psychological health of our students and staff, ensuring empowered learning and high academic achievement, and providing equitable access and learning growth for all.

Thank you for your ongoing support of our students and schools.

Sincerely,

Dr. Christopher G. Hibner

District Administrator

Updated 8/1/2020