I hope that you have enjoyed your summer vacation and that your family is doing well. Mrs. Turfe and I have been working hard over the past few weeks to organize the start of the school year. Unlike the spring, we are hoping to make your child’s “school” experience more engaging and more rigorous. We are meeting with teachers later this week for professional development and to discuss other vital components of the school year. We will continue to update our families with information about the start of the school year when those details are finalized.
Under normal circumstances, we encourage parents to stay involved and work with us to support their child’s academic, social and emotional development. We recognize that in order to be successful in school, children need support from both the home and school. We know that a strong partnership with you will make a great difference in your child’s education.
I would like to give you a number of updates regarding school this fall:
- If you have opted your child into the Virtual Learning Program, the district will be sharing information with each participant soon.
- Student schedules will be made available to parents through ParentConnect on Thursday, August 27th. If you are unable to access your ParentConnect account, please contact the Bryant Office at (313) 827-2900 and somebody will help you with username and password information. A student can also access his/her schedule through StudentConnect.
- Since all students are starting the school year on-line (Virtual Learning Program or Remote Learning Program), learning expectations for students and parents have been crafted. These expectations will help define how school will on-line school will look for students. Please click on the links to read and please review these expectations with your child.
- In order to make the school year a little more rigorous and beneficial for our students, we have created a daily schedule for students and teachers to follow. This will help teachers deliver daily lessons to students and coordinate other important instructional activities (small group work, one to one work, parent communications, etc.). Briefly, teachers will be using a video conference tool (Zoom) to deliver instruction for your child each morning from 8:15 – 11:10 a.m.; student attendance will be taken. A more detailed explanation will be given at a later date regarding Learning Labs and other supports for students.
- The kitchen at Bryant will be open and serving food to students during the school year. At this time, they are scheduled to provide breakfast and lunch for students using a curbside pick-up model one day each week. When dates and times of this service have been finalized, we will share that information with parents.
- The district has purchased a learning management system called Schoology. When this tool is fully implemented, all stakeholders will be able to access daily lessons and other important information from one spot. In addition, we will be using Zoom for video conferencing which will provide a much needed layer of security for our learning community.
- Tentative schedule for the first week of school (August 31st – September 3rd) is as follows:
| Date | Schedule for students |
| Monday, August 31st | First day of school. Students will follow their schedule and meet with their teacher through a video conference call (Zoom). |
| Tuesday, September 1st | 6th grade students will pick-up materials (math workbook, literature book, etc.) from school using a drive through pick-up model. This will take place from 8:30 – 11:30 a.m. 7th & 8th grade students will continue to follow their schedule and continue to meet with their teacher through a video conference call (Zoom). |
| Wednesday, September 2nd | 7th grade students will pick-up materials (math workbook, literature book, etc.) from school using a drive through pick-up model. This will take place from 8:30 – 11:30 a.m. 6th & 8th grade students will continue to follow their schedule and continue to meet with their teacher through a video conference call (Zoom). |
| Thursday, September 3rd | 8th grade students will pick-up materials (math workbook, literature book, etc.) from school using a drive through pick-up model. This will take place from 8:30 – 11:30 a.m. 6th & 7th grade students will continue to follow their schedule and continue to meet with their teacher through a video conference call (Zoom). |
Starting Tuesday, September 8th, teachers will be meeting with students during live virtual lessons using Zoom. More details will be shared with the Bryant community as we get closer to this date.
If you have any questions regarding the school start-up plan or anything else, please email me at denisoa@dearbornschools.org or Mrs. Turfe (Assistant Principal) at turfef@dearbornschools.org.
Mr. Denison, Principal