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Dear Colleagues:
As of this morning, at least 24 school districts in Kentucky are closed or are using non-traditional instruction (NTI) days due to illness, according to the Kentucky School Boards Association’s Twitter feed. I know most of you are struggling with higher-than-normal absentee rates among students, educators and staff due to a variety of illnesses, such as both flu and COVID-19.
I know you will continue to monitor this in your community and do what is best for your students and staff. As a reminder, districts have 10 NTI days they can use each year for occasions such as high absences due to illness. I know in-person instruction is best for most of our students, but there are times when we cannot help having to close due to illness.
Also, please continue to remind your families and staff that flu and COVID vaccines are still available widely across Kentucky. Getting these vaccines, encouraging people to stay home when they’re sick and encouraging thorough and frequent handwashing are good ways to keep these illnesses from spreading further.
KDE’s Deputy Commissioner Thomas Woods-Tucker, Chief Communications Officer Toni Konz Tatman and Director of Policy Meredith Brewer and I were in Texas last week for the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) Annual Policy Forum. I was on the panel about student and staff well-being with colleagues from Ohio and Michigan and what I head from them was similar to what we’ve experienced here in Kentucky.
The last two years have stressed our students, our families, our staffs and ourselves. None of us walked out of the COVID pandemic unaffected. And beyond COVID, in the past year Kentuckians also have experienced the trauma of severe tornadoes in western Kentucky and flooding in eastern Kentucky. In both of those instances, we worked with the state Crisis Counseling Program and Disaster Case Management Team, our affected superintendents, the Department for Behavioral Health Developmental and Intellectual Disabilities, crisis responders and more to focus on ensuring that each community’s basic needs and social-emotional needs were being met before ever even mentioning getting back to academics. We knew it would take relationships, empathy and systems of support to get people back on their feet and that’s where we focused our energy.
Here at KDE, we are firmly focused on how we can help you and your schools address the sometimes overwhelming social-emotional needs that are in your district. We know that people have to have a sense of well-being to perform their best academically, and we’re committed to helping you in any way that we can.
And finally, prior to the start of the CCSSO conference, state chiefs were asked to share a short 30-second video on how COVID funding was having an impact in their state. You can watch all of the short videos on the CCSSO YouTube channel. My video, along with the New Jersey Acting Commissioner Angelica McMillan can be found here. There are so many great examples of how districts and state education agencies are using the federal money to help overcome the unfinished learning brought on by the pandemic.
Thinking ahead to our next Superintendent’s Webcast on Nov. 15 at 2-4 p.m. ET, we would like to elevate stories of impact from your school district. Please send us (email Toni Konz Tatman, chief communications officer) a 30-60 second video (landscape view on your phone is fine!) of you answering the following prompt: I knew our COVID recovery efforts were having an impact when ...
We plan to share compilations of these videos during future Superintendent Webcasts and on KDE’s social media channels.
Kind regards,
Jason E. Glass, Ed.D.
Commissioner and Chief Learner
Free Professional Development for Teachers
Funded by a grant from the Library of Congress Teaching with Primary Sources program, the National Council for History Education (NCHE) announced the second year of a series of free professional development opportunities designed to support K-12 teachers. This year's theme is Rural Lives in Context. The series includes:
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Asynchronous Learning: From Dec. 1, 2022, through March 31, 2023, registered teachers will self-pace through two online courses: the Library of Congress’ 6-week module course, “Teaching with Primary Sources Basics,” and the Right Question Institute 4-week module course, “Teaching Students to Ask their Own Primary Source Questions.” If you do not have a lot of experience using primary sources in your classroom, want to learn about the Library of Congress’ collection of sources and/or want to add to your toolbox of strategies using primary sources, this professional learning is highly recommended.
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Online Colloquia: Registered teachers will participate in three online synchronous Saturday professional development sessions led by historians, educational specialists and master teachers. These sessions will be held on Feb. 25, April 15 and May 6, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. ET and will focus on a variety of topics related to Rural Lives in Context. During this time, teachers also applying for the onsite colloquium will identify a community partner to assist them with their public history project. NCHE is happy to assist if needed.
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Onsite Colloquium: Fifteen teachers (preference will be given to K-12 teachers in rural schools) will be selected to travel to the University of Oklahoma along with their community partners on July 15-16. During this two-day learning experience, teachers and community partners will build civic connections and develop a plan for their students to create a public history project in their own community. In addition, there also will be planned tours for seeing public history in action. Teachers will receive a $750 stipend to defray travel costs and up to $750 to support their community project. The application deadline is March 17. For application consideration, teachers must have participated in the Online Colloquia.
Support will be provided throughout all phases of this project with built-in additional collaboration opportunities with other teachers and the NCHE staff. Additional information about the program and registration links are available on the NCHE webpage.
For more information, email Shashawna Williams, the Kentucky Department of Education’s Rural and Low-Income Schools consultant, or call (502) 693-6590.
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