Thank You Again for Taking the Time to Engage in This Professional Development on Home Visits

May 17, 2022 Post a Comment

A annotation of thank you as we shut a challenging school twelvemonth

Posted June xviii, 2020

A head-and-shoulders photo of Superintendent Adams

To all members of the City School District of Albany community:

Every bit nosotros come to the finish of this very unique and often challenging school twelvemonth, I would similar to take a few moments to say cheers.

Cheers to the Board of Education for all of the leadership and support it has provided throughout the COVID-19 crunch.

Give thanks you to all of our administrators, faculty and support staff who pulled together to help our students and our families, and each other.

To anybody inside our system, thank you for your willingness to modify direction at about a moment'southward notice when we were forced to shut our buildings in March. We pulled together to completely rethink the style we do business – from didactics to food service to technology to maintenance and operations.

Your daily messages to students, school- and district-level communications, read-alongs, videos, parades and opposite parades, virtual promotion ceremonies and all of the other out-of-the-box ideas helped keep our students connected to school.

Who will ever forget "The Masked Dancer," the virtual field twenty-four hour period, the beautiful virtual rendition of "Don't Finish Believing" and the insightful daily Perspectives in Online Learning?

Thank y'all over again to our teachers, support staff and administrators for your commitment to our students and delivery of quality didactics. This work could not have been done without you.

Almost every aspect of our professional lives changed due to this pandemic, and I am grateful for the way we responded. No matter how we move forward under the precautions that are still so necessary due to this illness, we know that we will never be the same.

The times we are experiencing will be the subject of history and economic science and social lessons for generations to come up. The work we are doing every day is groundbreaking, and it will continue to be.

Out of necessity, aye.

But this crisis also has provided u.s.a. with the opportunity to think about all aspects of our work differently. It has allowed us to examine how we can have advantage of engineering science to be more flexible in coming together the needs of every educatee.

Null volition ever take abroad the demand for, and the value of, the personal connections that are so vital to the work we exercise. However, the inventiveness y'all have displayed in sustaining that piece of work remotely has been exemplary.

That is not easy, and you have been more than upwardly to the chore.

I likewise would similar to give thanks our students and families.

The pandemic has stressed all of us in every aspect of our daily lives. From an educational perspective, it took away the reassuring custom of a daily physical gathering at school and the condolement that came with that.

Suddenly, in its identify we had a lonely and sometimes isolated experience. Aside from the serious health concerns of COVID-xix, this may have been the biggest challenge of all.

Our students and families faced it with courage and resilience. I am grateful for that force.

I would like to limited my thanks to our community partners every bit well. Whether it was organizing a team of volunteers to support our meal distribution efforts, or altruistic thousands of bags to help us evangelize Chromebooks and render materials to our students, our community was there in our time of need. Every bit it always is.

I would like to give thanks all of the nearly eleven,000 Albany residents who returned ballots in this year'south very different budget vote and board election. I am thankful for the record-setting participation, and the overwhelming support. We are so very appreciative of the tremendous support of our community. We do not take that back up lightly as it is a direct indication of the confidence placed in our schoolhouse district to ensure that we are adjusting our program and delivery of instruction and support to see the needs of our students and families.

Finally, I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the collective efforts of our district leadership team. Each segmentation has been critical in the success of our transition to our online platform, and at present in the process of planning for re-opening in the fall.

I begin with our back up team in the Superintendent's Office: Paula Tibbitts, secretary to the superintendent, Tanya Bowie, board and commune clerk, Kahla Kuchta, administrative secretary for the Unproblematic Segmentation, and Brittany Pierce, administrative secretary for the Secondary Division. These women are the backbone for the astonishing work you are about to hear about.

I extend accolades to the pedagogy unit, comprised of Cecily Wilson-Turner, Ed.D., and Lori McKenna, for their leadership at the school and related department levels whereby all state and local guidelines were adhered to regarding the leadership of our edifice and departments to ensure that resources were allocated and utilized in the best interest of our students. Their leadership was unmatched through weekly bookish cheque-ins and daily updates to keep our administrators beside of the many requirements that needed to be met. They have been diligent in mentoring and working alongside our building leaders to coach them through the challenges of meeting the needs of kinesthesia, staff, students and families. They have been instrumental beyond the walls of the school edifice in connecting with various families who may demand additional wraparound support and connections to community services.

I acknowledge Karen Bechdol and the instructional supervisors. Without their commitment to professional person evolution and ongoing back up to our coaches and teachers, we would non have been able to sustain the delivery of quality education and resource materials sent directly to our families via mail and/or pickup at our nutrient distribution sites.

Many times, technology is just visible when things get wrong. In the City School District of Albany, Kent Baker has led our Assessment, Accountability and Technology Innovation Partitioning in a manner that put them in the spotlight as things are going correct. Under his leadership, we have distributed more than 3,600 Chromebooks to students who needed devices and more than 200 hotspots to households where there was no Internet support. His division has provided professional development both instructionally and technologically while maintaining a Aid Desk that responded to nearly 7,000 tickets for assistance during the COVID-xix schoolhouse closure. He has ensured that our board meetings, hearings, town hall meetings and budget vote were handled in an extremely professional manner. Kudos to bringing applied science into the "lite".

I also acknowledge Eileen Leffler, who has been on the job with securing grant opportunities during the COVID-19 crisis. Through her work we take been able to fund summertime school and provide learning opportunities that otherwise would have negatively impacted our budget. Her office is even more disquisitional equally we move forward with a limited budget. The grants nosotros secure will provide opportunities for our students where funding is limited. During this time, we have had to accost many concerns that impacted the well-being of our employees.

Matthew Petrin, our human resources administrator, has worked very closely with our legal squad to address these matters through labor management, civil service and partnering with each partitioning leader to ensure that the appropriate supports were made available for our teachers, back up staff and administrators. We all understand the stressors on our students and families; however, we must be hither to accept intendance of the grownups. Mr. Petrin worked with his team to reply to questions most COVID-19, healthcare, insurance, benefits and retirement to facilitate the processes needed.

To our newest member of Cabinet, Kimberly Rohring, deputy superintendent of business and finance, I express my sincere appreciation for accepting the monumental task of reorganizing the Business and Finance Sectionalization by restructuring the practices and processes in all areas of her supervision in a unmarried year. Her commitment and attention to detail in the areas of payroll and accounting, purchasing, facility management, food service and maintenance and operations has been a heavy lift. Withal, the revamping of the entire partitioning has put in place the necessary structure and accountability needed to ensure the organization operates in a fiscally audio manner. We know that we will need to go on to tighten our chugalug as we move forward, and with our enhanced checks and balances we can and nosotros will go on to implement quality programs in a fiscally sound mode.

Last but not least, the face behind the commune that makes united states of america visible in our customs at big -- Ron Lesko and the entire Communication and Operations Division. From every daily update, video, Perspective in Online Learning, website story, Facebook and Twitter post, flyer, mailer, postcard, SNN, bus shelter advertisement and more, the fourth dimension and attention to ensure that our commune is informing our public, engaging our families, and representing us for whom we actually are is outstanding!

These last few months have non been what any of us planned for. They have challenged the states and offered us new opportunities every single twenty-four hour period. Together, we have responded to the all-time of our ability and in the best involvement of our students.

I tin can think of no improve case of what it means to exist "All in for Albany!" For that, I am beyond grateful to all of you.