Howell Public Schools Update

Press release from Howell Township:

March 31, 2020

Dear Howell School Community,

As we have begun our third week of remote learning, we find it an absolute necessity to
thank our Howell Township Public Schools families, students and staff. Without your
efforts, adaptability, and resilience, none of this would be possible. These days, now
turned to weeks, are trying for the most patient of us. The consistently high level of
communication, collaboration, and sharing of resources between different groups has
truly made an untenable situation much more tolerable.

The primary mission of the school experience remains open. Even with the most
current information available to us, predicting beyond the week at hand is nearly
impossible. The decision to open or close school facilities is less and less in our hands.
We are confident that together whatever decisions are made in the coming weeks,
Howell Township Public Schools will be ready to adapt and meet our next challenges.
While our staff continue to work with students, support families, and provide resources
to those most in need, the administrative teams and instructional coaches continue to
adjust our Remote Learning Plans. While most of these revisions are for our staff, you
can view updates to our plan and any other COVID-19 updates at our COVID-19
Updates webpage. As the amazing efforts of our educators shift toward teaching new
content within the various curricular areas, we would like you to be mindful of a few
things:
● Teaching is a deeply personal act that is built on the relationships between a
teacher and a student
● Learning, and therefore teaching, is highly contextual. What is said during the act
of teaching and the process of learning is relevant to that moment. If heard in a
different setting, those statements could be interpreted out of context and
therefore misconstrued
● The remote classroom is still a learning environment. Since that classroom may
be entering your living room, we all need to work together to protect the
confidentiality and privacy of our students and staff.
● Based on the above, we are requesting that you do not record or take pictures of
video conferences; and please do not “live stream” video conferences to
personal/private social media accounts.

Assuming there are no changes from this point forward, our plans will cover us through Spring Break, which begins April 9. This next phase of our Remote Learning Plans, which would run from March 30 to April 9, will feature more interactive, assignment based model leveraging a variety of different web-based and district owned digital tools. Now that we are well inside of our remote learning experiences, the lessons will more explicitly focus on keeping pace within our curriculum. Some curricula have been adapted to compensate for scope and pacing changes due to the pandemic needs.

All lessons will be cognizant of varying access needs, as well as - and as always - the varying learning needs of each student. We would like to remind you that during this remote learning period, we are operating under the policies that govern home instruction. Please see the guidelines below for expectations for the teaching and learning experience.

In following the above guidelines, we will be able to provide needed variety to the learning experiences and play a vital role in keeping your children engaged with their learning while they are at home.

We will continue to communicate with you about our Remote Learning Plans and other
supports we can offer you.

Be Well,

Joseph Isola
Superintendent of Schools

Additional Info...

This press release was produced by Howell Township. The views expressed here are the author’s own.