Dear LREI Community,
Updates:
Healthy Habits
-
We continue to remind students and adults to wash their hands, sneeze into tissues or elbows, not to touch faces, and to be generally aware of themselves and others. PLEASE join us in these efforts.
-
Stay home from school/work if you are ill.
-
Contact your healthcare provider if a member of your family is ill.
- We will be modifying some of our lunch service to make sure we are minimizing the ways in which kids pass along germs.
-
One of the best tools we have to fight this illness is our deepening understanding of how it is transmitted and how one keeps oneself healthy (see above) and a basic understanding of the tools that can be brought to this endeavor. The teachers have and will continue to explain this to students and to answer their questions in age-appropriate ways. Check out this list of “myth-busters.”
Travel
-
We know that many families have planned travel for Spring Break. We will be in touch near the end of the break with reminders of public health suggestions as to which areas when visited, will require self-quarantine. Do not hesitate to be in touch if you have any questions.
-
We know that many members of our community are required to travel for their professions. Please keep the school informed if your travel has resulted in exposure to the virus or if your health care provider has additional guidance for you and your family as a result of any business travel.
School Closure / LREI@home
-
If the public schools close, LREI will close. If the public schools stay open, LREI may choose to close based on the needs of our community.
-
The teachers in all three divisions are hard at work creating LREI@home. If LREI is closed we will be in touch with contact schedules for students in all three divisions. You will hear from the divisional principals in the next few school days.
-
If your family will have challenges accessing this online program at home for technical reasons, please speak with your child’s teacher, advisor, or any trusted LREI adult. We will work with you to find a solution.
I could not be more impressed with, and grateful for, the work of the teachers and administrators as we plan for this possibility. They are amazing, but you already knew that.
Communication
-
We will continue to send home at least one email per week. If the coronavirus news cycle continues at its current pace you will likely hear from us more frequently.
-
If LREI will close and before we begin LREI@home, we will communicate with you via email and a phone call to make sure we contact everyone.
A few thoughts on COVID-19 as it relates to LREI’s mission and your children’s education:
-
As we think about the possibility of closures and quarantine it is important to recognize the privilege that the ability to prepare represents. How well can one prepare when living paycheck to paycheck, if you don’t have a home, or if you rely on some form of assistance to feed your family? Preparing for quarantine is a challenge if missing work means missed pay or if you live in a multigenerational home or if your access to health care is tenuous at best. Who will have to go to work in order for many of us to be able to stay safely at home? As this virus challenges our institutions, the marginalized are only marginalized more, and those of us who can, should consider what we can offer our communities.
-
It is important, as we each can, to step back and be a bit clinical as we think about the coronavirus. If we can, we will see that there are some good lessons in this moment. There are statistics lessons, basic math lessons, geography, biology, virology lessons, and on and on. One way to make this situation less scary is to understand it. The situation will not be less serious, but at least we can know what the threats are. We can tell fact from fiction, serious from inflammatory, valid warnings from propaganda. Knowledge is power. Learning is the key. The adults must teach the children and each other.
-
We know so much more about viruses, sickness, and the human body than we did, let’s say, during the 1918 flu epidemic. We understand this particular virus to some degree and are hustling to learn more. We can draw on our knowledge of other illnesses and a deep store of knowledge that a hundred years of science has provided. That said, until medical therapies and/or a vaccine is developed we have to take care of ourselves and we may have to limit our activities in order to help our communities. We may have to sacrifice to support others. The most effective prevention strategies continue to be some level of community-mindedness, some level of understanding of our obligations to each other, even to people we don’t know. There is something inspiring in this. As far as the world has come the oldest strategy will make all of the difference – we must depend on each other, one and all. Thanks for having my back!