Title I Meeting is on 1/12 & 6pm (remote)
EMS will hold its annual Title I Meeting on Wednesday, 1/12 at 6pm. Principal Sabrina Westdijk will present on a range of information, including what it means to be a Title I school, how the district and EMS use Title I funds, your rights under Title I, and more.
The meeting will be remote, and will immediately be followed by the January remote EngageEMS meeting from 6:30-7pm. Follow up communication will be sent next week with a remote meeting link. We hope to see you there!
COVID-Related Updates
Please provide a mask for your child daily
EMS, and BSD in general, is struggling to keep up with the day-to-day demand for face masks. All students must wear masks as a condition of attendance, but there is a significant number of students who arrive each day requiring a mask from the office, or asking for a replacement mask over the course of the day. On a typical day, we distribute 25-45 masks – and our resources for purchasing additional masks are rapidly dwindling!
PLEASE send at least one face mask with your child each school day, and ideally 1-2 extras to allow for a mask change (such as after indoor PE). If every family that can send their children with masks does, EMS will be able to continue to provide masks to students who truly need them.
COVID Practices Update
To echo a message that Superintendent Tom Flanagan published last week, please be aware of the following practices and procedures:
Keep your child home if they are sick with any COVID-related symptoms or had a COVID exposure. This is not new, but we ask you to be extra vigilant now. If your student has any COVID-related symptoms, keep them home and continue to follow our procedures. This guidance applies regardless of vaccination status:
If you have one symptom that lasts > 24 hours, get a PCR test and return once negative and you are feeling well enough to be at school.
If you have two or more COVID-related symptoms for any duration of time, get a PCR test and return once negative and you are feeling well enough to be at school.
If you are a close contact to someone with COVID or if test positive for COVID, please follow Vermont’s new isolation and quarantine guidelines which have reduced the stay home isolation phase from 10 days to five days; we know this is different from the CDC’s recent guidance for schools but we will need to follow the Vermont Department of Health and Agency of Education procedures. Again, if these new procedures change, we will let you know.
Sign Up For Test to Stay and Response Testing. If your child is unvaccinated and identified as a close contact, they will have to quarantine UNLESS they are signed up for the Test to Stay Program. This program allows students to take a test each morning and continue to come to school during their quarantine period. We cannot stress this enough - if you would like for your child to be able to participate in Test to Stay, you must fill out the state-wide consent form AND a form for your child’s school ahead of time. This consent also allows for your child to be tested for COVID if they become symptomatic at school and need to be tested before returning. It can often take the state days to process the consent forms, therefore if you haven’t already, we strongly encourage you to visit our test to stay website and complete the forms today.
