Today, I am announcing that I will be retiring on June 30, 2020, after 25 years in adult education and the last seven serving as principal. This was long planned by me as an event to look forward to. I have enjoyed working with and being inspired by each of you. I will always cherish all the happy memories. What I failed to plan for was a global pandemic, which resulted in all the challenges we are now facing every day.
Last week, the Governor released a revised state budget, with deep cuts in all programs, including education. All school districts, including San Juan, have been struggling to keep up with the rapid changes. As a result, the transition process that was planned for to select the new adult education principal was changed to quickly bring in an experienced and knowledgeable administrator already in the district.
This was a wise choice and I have every confidence that you will give this person the support needed. I very much appreciate that the district leadership has demonstrated to us a vote of confidence in the value of our continued mission to serve the community.
Last week, I wrote on my FaceBook page:
Adult Education will take its share of the cuts but we will survive!
Together, educators will continue our mission to build and strengthen our community. Yes! We do expect to see adults returning to finish high school degrees. Yes! We do expect they want to learn English. Yes! We do expect that they will look for us to help them help their children to be successful in school. Yes! We will help them get the training and certifications they need to enter new employment or college.
Our adult education student base has been especially hard hit by the pandemic. Very few had employment that they could perform remotely, so most lost their jobs or are at least furloughed. Yes! They will come to adult education to improve their chances to find employment once again.
Stay strong.....Our community needs you.
Lynn Bartlett Principal Adult Education San Juan Unified School District (916) 971-7967
We understand that you likely have questions about what the start of our next school year may look like. While we cannot yet provide any specifics, SJUSD and SJTA are working on developing various school day scenarios along a continuum of models (full distance learning to hybrid distance learning with in-person learning to full in-person learning) in preparation for the next school year. While current social distancing and other health guidelines would not allow for full in-person learning, we know we should be prepared for all possibilities during this rapidly changing time while always keeping the health and safety of staff, students and families at the center of the planning process.
Through this process, both parties agree that regardless of the model in the fall, we will need to collect input from practitioners, administrators, students, and families to continue to refine and adjust our instructional program. Parents are currently being surveyed by the district and SJTA will be surveying members soon as well.
In any typical year, we may face challenges to get all students to reach mastery of all standards, however recognizing this unprecedented time, we believe that it will be even more challenging to cover all of the standards in 2020-2021 as we would during a typical school year. In an attempt to reduce stress and address this reality, while still trusting professionals and believing in professional autonomy, we have recently convened joint teams of practitioners and administrators to draft guidelines for ‘Essential Standards’ for each grade level and core academic content area. Within this work, essential standards represent the minimum a student must learn to reach higher levels of learning. In order for a standard to be identified as “essential” it would either be a power standard or building block standard that is necessary for students to master in order to be:
·successful later in the year
·successful in the next grade or course level
·successful across other domains or content areas
Another reason to identify the essential standards is to provide time for practitioners to focus on developing relationships with students this fall. While relationships have always been an important part of education, we anticipate relationships will be even more valuable as we head back to school into next year. The social, emotional and mental health needs of many students has increased during school closures. Our hope is that by identifying the essential standards you will have more time to develop and maintain meaningful relationships with your students.
Again, in San Juan, we trust practitioners and believe in professional autonomy, therefore these guidelines are intended to serve as a resource and practitioners should determine how they are used. The teams currently working on identifying these essential standards will be reaching out to various practitioners for input and feedback.
Melissa Bassanelli
Deputy Superintendent
San Juan Unified School District
Bill Simmons
President
San Juan Teachers Association
From: Lisa Welze <Lisa.Welze@rescue.org> Sent: Thursday, May 21, 2020 3:52 PM
Cc: Amy Watson <Amy.Watson@rescue.org>
Hi everyone,
I wanted to pass along some information about a couple of workshops that the IRC is hosting for SIVs. The workshops will be in Dari and are on the topics of Stress Reduction during Covid-19 and Parenting. Please feel free to distribute information to Creekside students.
Additionally, we have a couple of support groups we are starting up. They are for women who speak Dari – one is specifically for women experiencing DV and the other is a more general support group. If you have clients you would like to refer to the support groups, please reach out to Amy (copied). They will be starting in the next few weeks, with another group beginning sometime in June.
Thank you!
Lisa
Wellness Workshops
Parenting During COVID-19
5/27/20, 10:00am – 12:00pm This workshop will focus on support for parents and caregivers who are caring for children at home during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Mindfulness and Stress Reduction
6/2/20, 2:00pm – 4:00pm
This workshop will provide practical support in mindfulness, meditation practices, and ways to reduce stress.
OTAN has scheduled a number of online webinars and Office Hours for our adult education colleagues who are continuing to teach and support their learners. (All times below are PDT.)
Visit OTAN’s COVID-19 Field Support webpage that we are continually updating with relevant information for teachers, students, and administrators: COVID-19 Field Support
OTAN Office Hours provide an opportunity to ask more detailed questions and get support on specific tools to use with students. You can sign up for these OTAN Office Hours at the California Adult Education Training Calendar:
Monday, May 25 – closed for Memorial Day
Wednesday, May 27 from 4:00 to 5:00pm
Friday, May 29 from 10:00 to 11:00am
On Tuesday at 1:00pm, Alisa Takeuchi will present Digital Resources for Beginning ESL Students v2.0. This webinar is a continuation of its predecessor with new websites and tools for English as a Second Language. This hands-on workshop will help teachers of Beginning ESL practice some easy websites and tools as a student, and they will also be shown how to start using the resources as teachers. You can sign up for this webinar at the California Adult Education Training Calendar.
On Wednesday at 10:00am, Blair Roy and Susan Coulter will host Office Hours for Maximizing Moodle. The many features and resources available in Moodle can be daunting to new users. Join us to get one-on-one support, help, suggestions and just plain old encouragement in using Moodle with learners. Attending teachers will drive the session with their questions and needs. You can sign up for these Office Hours at the California Adult Education Training Calendar.
On Wednesday at 2:00pm, Debbie Jensen will present Student Success Online with 21Things4Students. 21Things4Students can assist teachers as they help their students succeed online. We will look at the 21 things as they apply to what we need right now to get our students up and running online. We will also take a look at the great site 21Things4Teachers that is available as well. You can sign up for these Office Hours at the California Adult Education Training Calendar.
On Thursday at 9:00am, Melinda Holt will present Google Drive and Docs. This workshop is for users who want to become more comfortable with Google Drive and Docs. Participants will learn to manage and organize files, upload other filetypes and/or convert to uploads to Google format, as well as sharing options and file permissions. A peek into some of the lesser known options within Google Docs will also be explored. You can sign up for this webinar at the California Adult Education Training Calendar.
On Thursday at 1:00pm, Drew Robinson will present Learning Upgrade’s Remote Learning Action Plan. Learning Upgrade has a plan to help you continue delivering education remotely without direct student contact. This webinar will train teachers to remotely self-enroll their students into Learning Upgrade's award-winning app, view class reports using the teacher LMS, and reward student achievement. Learning Upgrade will also feature their highly anticipated new Digital Literacy course which teaches digital literacy standards. You can sign up for this webinar at the California Adult Education Training Calendar.
Please contact us at support@otan.us or call our office at 916-228-2580 for more information! We are here to support you!
The OTAN Staff
Tuesday, May 19, 2020
OTAN has scheduled a number of online webinars and Office Hours for our adult education colleagues who are continuing to teach and support their learners. (All times below are PDT.)
Visit OTAN’s COVID-19 Field Support webpage that we are continually updating with relevant information for teachers, students, and administrators: COVID-19 Field Support
OTAN Office Hours provide an opportunity to ask more detailed questions and get support on specific tools to use with students. You can sign up for these OTAN Office Hours at the California Adult Education Training Calendar:
Monday, May 18 from 1:00 to 2:00pm
Wednesday, May 20 from 4:00 to 5:00pm
Friday, May 22 from 10:00 to 11:00am
On Monday at 1:00pm, Alisa Takeuchi will present Screencastify – Part 3. This webinar will review Screencastify tools and sharing for participants to practice. This will be a more hands-on session where participants will create screencasts to, potentially, be shared. You can sign up for this webinar at the California Adult Education Training Calendar.
On Tuesday at 9:00am, Melinda Holt will present More on Google Forms. A quick review of creating and sharing a Google Form will be covered and then more advanced topics will be addressed including: how to password protect a form, how to link form data to a Sheet, how to recycle (reuse) a form, validating question answers, and much more. You can sign up for this webinar at the California Adult Education Training Calendar.
On Tuesday at 4:00pm, Barry Bakin will present Quizlet in the Online Classroom. Quizlet allows students to study information via learning tools and games. Participants will not only learn about creation of card sets and features that are available to students using the flashcards to study, they will also learn about new features created to enhance distance and remote learning. You can sign up for this webinar at the California Adult Education Training Calendar.
On Wednesday at 10:00am, Blair Roy and Susan Coulter will host Office Hours for Maximizing Moodle. The many features and resources available in Moodle can be daunting to new users. Join us to get one-on-one support, help, suggestions and just plain old encouragement in using Moodle with learners. Attending teachers will drive the session with their questions and needs. You can sign up for these Office Hours at the California Adult Education Training Calendar.
On Thursday at 9:00am, Farzana Cassim will present Microsoft Word Online. This webinar will present ways to use Microsoft Word Online to format texts, use styles and themes, insert tables, pictures, and watermarks, change layouts, add borders, headers, and footers, and save your document to other formats. You can sign up for this webinar at the California Adult Education Training Calendar.
On Friday at 11:00am, Joey Lehrman will present ISTE's SkillRise: Upskill with Edtech. SkillRise is an initiative of the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE). In this presentation, we will provide a tour of SkillRise resources including a free upcoming online class starting in June 2020, the SkillRise framework, and media resources to help adult education organizations develop and implement sustainable technology implementation plans. You can sign up for this webinar at the California Adult Education Training Calendar.
Please contact us at support@otan.us or call our office at 916-228-2580 for more information! We are here to support you!
Today, I am announcing that I will be retiring on June 30, 2020, after 25 years in adult education and the last seven serving as principal. This was long planned by me as an event to look forward to. I have enjoyed working with and being inspired by each of you. I will always cherish all the happy memories. What I failed to plan for was a global pandemic, which resulted in all the challenges we are now facing every day.
Last week, the Governor released a revised state budget, with deep cuts in all programs, including education. All school districts, including San Juan, have been struggling to keep up with the rapid changes. As a result, the transition process that was planned for to select the new adult education principal was changed to quickly bring in an experienced and knowledgeable administrator already in the district.
This was a wise choice and I have every confidence that you will give this person the support needed. I very much appreciate that the district leadership has demonstrated to us a vote of confidence in the value of our continued mission to serve the community.
Last week, I wrote on my FaceBook page:
Adult Education will take its share of the cuts but we will survive!
Together, educators will continue our mission to build and strengthen our community. Yes! We do expect to see adults returning to finish high school degrees. Yes! We do expect they want to learn English. Yes! We do expect that they will look for us to help them help their children to be successful in school. Yes! We will help them get the training and certifications they need to enter new employment or college.
Our adult education student base has been especially hard hit by the pandemic. Very few had employment that they could perform remotely, so most lost their jobs or are at least furloughed. Yes! They will come to adult education to improve their chances to find employment once again.
