RMS April 28, 2020: Report Cards, Scheduling, More

Dear RMS Community,

Happy Tuesday!! I hope y’all are able to make some lemonade out of the lemons we’ve been served. Hang in there! We will get through this. Please see the important information below. 

Greg Wiseman

Principal, Renfroe Middle School

Important Scheduling Info for Rising 7th Graders

All rising RMS 7th graders will receive an email from Mr Wiseman this afternoon with a link to a google form where they can select the World Language of their choice for 7th grade; either Spanish, French, and now, German!! Please read over the form carefully, and have your child make his or her selections today, so we can complete the scheduling process. 

Important Scheduling Info for Rising 8th Graders

Historically, all rising 8th graders have had the opportunity to select one connection class they really want, and veto one connection class they do not want for their 8th grade year. This process is usually completed in homerooms, but for obvious reasons, we are completing this process online. All rising 8th graders will receive an email from Mr Wiseman this afternoon with a link to the google form. Please read over the form carefully, and have your child make his or her selections today, so we can complete the scheduling process. 

Field Trip Refunds

CSD administrators are working on a process to refund families that have paid for field trips that were cancelled due to this year’s school closures. We want to make sure this process is clean, efficient, and the same for each school. The refund process will be communicated broadly once finalized. Thank you for your patience.

Report Cards

The final report cards for the 2019-2020 school year will be available via Managebac this Friday. Parents will receive an email from Managebac when the report card is posted.

A Note from the RMS PTA

Teacher Appreciation Week is coming up on May 4th-8th this year. Although we have been away from school for a few weeks, we still want to show our teachers how much we appreciate all their hard work during the school year and during this distance learning adventure we’ve all been on.

PTA would like to start collecting money for teachers gifts this week. With the economy on hold, we know not everyone can contribute a large amount at this time, so there are 3 ways to show your love for our RMS teachers

1- Send a Thank You Note! - Email your THANK YOU NOTE to simmi.taylor@gmail.com 

2- Send a "We miss you picture"! Parents take a picture of students working virtually, If students would like to hold up a sign - Saying we miss you! We will have a day where pictures will be sent to teachers.  Send We Miss You Pictures to simmi.taylor@gmail.com

 3- Donations- Any amount is appreciated, there is no minimum to what you can contribute.  Donations will be sent via email as egift cards to the teacher!  

(RMS PTA PAYPAl info)

If you would like to join in on the Teacher Appreciation gifts or ideas, please contact PTA Hospitality Chair via email at simmi.taylor@gmail.com. Also, send donations online using RMS PTA PayPal link below. 

(RMS PTA PAYPAl info)

Thanks so much!

RMS PTA

Enrichment Opportunities

City Schools of Decatur has compiled K-12 enrichment resources that students can access from home. These websites and activities are designed to deepen understanding of various subject areas,  expand learning and promote critical and creative thinking. The site is organized by grade level and subject area. Families may access these challenging resources here.  

Decatur Parent Network Resource

The Decatur Parents Network is trying to support our parents during this very difficult time. Please click on the link below to our upcoming webinar, Parenting During a Pandemic, Part 2.

Parenting During A Pandemic, Part 2

Our event last month was very well received and we hope to continue to dialogue with parents. One particular focus this month is to encourage parents to support other parents who may be struggling (virtual). 

 April 16 RMS Covid-19 Community Update

Dear Renfroe Community,

I hope that everyone had a healthy and restful break. I apologize for this lengthy report, but there is a lot to communicate. Please take a moment to read over the following updates on the updated CSD school calendar, RMS teaching and learning, RMS grading and RMS communication. I know many students want to retrieve their belongings from their lockers. We will have an answer to how and when that will happen as soon as possible.

Thank You.

Greg Wiseman

Principal, Renfroe Middle School

2019-20 School Year Calendar Update

The Board of Education voted at their April 14 meeting to end the school year students on May 22, instead of May 29.

At all grade levels, the month of May typically includes several days for large-scale assessments, such as GMAS and MAP, as well as numerous special events. With the elimination of such assessments and events this year, those days are no longer needed. Therefore, the CSD administrative team proposed and the Board voted to approve this change.

Although students’ school year will end sooner, staff will continue to work their full work calendar. For teachers, this means they will have about a week of additional time to close out their classrooms for the current year, prepare materials for their next teaching assignment, and participate in essential professional learning that was deferred by the current disruption. Additionally, staff will spend the time to reflect on what did and did not work well with remote learning: this will help us better serve students in the event of a future long-term closure.

Teaching and Learning

We will continue to provide instruction based on a 4-day rotation with the 5th day, Fridays, designated for check-ins and support. While school is in session, students are expected to complete assignments. Student learning for the remainder of the year is important and will impact their preparedness for their class and grade-level next school year. Students who are unable to complete work for reasons related to access and/or personal or family illness should communicate with their school. RMS will:

• Continue providing weekly plans by Monday morning. 
• Focus on essential content and the social and emotional well-being of students.
• Increase our efforts to offer a minimum of one face-to-face session with teachers per week. This may be video lessons, small-group live meetings, or one-to-one live meetings. Students cannot be required to be online at a certain time, therefore sessions should be recorded so that students can access the session at a later time. Various grades and subjects cannot be held to the same expectation. However, all teachers are encouraged to maximize face-to-face interaction.

Grading

Grading and promotion guidelines were developed in accordance with Georgia Department of Education guidelines including: 

• Students should not be held back in their expected progression – graduation, advancement to the next grade, etc. – as a result of the COVID-19 school closures. The state has granted the necessary flexibility to make this possible. 
• Students should not be penalized for circumstances over which they have no control. 
• Every possible effort within health and safety guidelines should be made to ensure students demonstrate minimum proficiency to complete course requirements. 
• RMS will issue progress reports at the end of April. These grades will be based on work completed in the third term prior to the March 12, 2020 school closure. These grades will represent the final grades for students for the third and final grading term (unless a student is not passing). Connections (not including Health and Personal Fitness) grades for the third term will be N/A, since students were only enrolled in those classes for two weeks prior to the closure.
• 8th grade students currently taking Health or Personal Fitness will have the opportunity to officially complete these classes, since these courses are requirements for high school graduation. Students that do not adequately complete the coursework will have to take Health or Personal Fitness in high school in order to graduate. 
• Students not meeting minimum requirements for course completion will be offered personalized opportunities to meet the minimum requirements within the online environment. More details on this process will be shared with affected students and their parents.
• Students are expected to complete work until the end of the school year. Work will be assessed and feedback will be given to students. Learning for the remainder of the year is important and will impact their preparedness for their class and grade level next school year.

Communication

Two weeks into on-line learning, we have all been adjusting to our new roles as best we can. Teachers and administrators continue to reach out to students and families to solve technology issues and to ensure all students are engaged as best as they can. We collect this data each week and do everything we can to engage all learners. Teachers, administrators, counselors, and social workers are supporting students and families in this effort.  We will continue to do so for the remainder of the school year. 

Teachers have been improving their lessons and communicating with students as best they can in this new environment. As they learn this new way of teaching, they are tweaking and adjusting as they go. It’s been like building the airplane while it’s in the air.  RMS teachers are ramping up their efforts to provide more video recorded lessons and opportunities to meet with small numbers of students to check in and answer questions. Please encourage your child to take advantage of these opportunities.

From Mr. Wiseman

Happy Monday Renfroe Middle School!!

Since today is the first day of our new academic schedule, I wanted to reach out to y'all to remind you of a few things.

Our 1-stop resource for all RMS Distance Learning information can be found here. It is an evolving website for parents and students to get the information you need to successfully navigate the world of distance learning at Renfroe. PLEASE BOOKMARK THIS PAGE and refer back to it for more updates.

RMS teachers started to post mandatory, new learning for students today. Teachers will post the week’s work no later than 8:00 AM every Monday morning. 

For now, RMS teachers will NOT be providing real-time, synchronous lessons. They do have the ability to video record and post lessons to Google Classroom. In addition, teachers will be able to "meet" with small groups of their students in real-time to answer questions and to clarify concepts in a small setting. Look for more on this from the individual teachers as they roll this out.

Our priority now is to provide accessible and meaningful work for students to engage in, while we ensure all students are safe, healthy, connected, and have all the materials and equipment they need. For now, assignments will be checked formatively, while summative assessments will occur later.

All assignments will be communicated via Google Classroom, a shared Google Doc, or via Gmail. Students: CHECK YOUR SCHOOL EMAIL EVERYDAY.

Have a great week of distance learning!

Greg Wiseman

The Following Schedule is When Students Should Work on Their Assingments

Daily Expectations for Students

• Complete assignments daily or weekly depending on the teacher’s directions. The assignments are mandatory and, where indicated, will be graded.
• Submit assignments by the due date.
• Check school email regularly.
• Maintain academically honest behaviors.
• Use teacher office hours as a time to ask questions.

March 26 RMS Covid-19 Update 

VIMEO MESSAGE LINK HERE!

Dear RMS Students and Parents,

The March 25th CSD update on the instructional expectations of teachers, students and parents moving forward, can be found here. It’s important that all parents and students read this March 25th update.

The purpose of this eblast is to give you more Renfroe-specific details related to the March 25th update and what parents and students can look forward to. 

Beginning Monday, March 30, RMS teachers will begin posting mandatory, new learning for students. Teachers will post the week’s work no later than 8:00 AM every Monday morning. The following schedule is when students should work on their assignments and when the teachers have office hours:

As you can see, each teacher will prepare two days worth of lessons/activities per week. Friday is reserved for students to work, finalize assignments, and connect with teachers and one another about assignments. 

Please click here for the RMS Master List of teacher office hours. Save this link for future use.

For now, RMS teachers will NOT be providing real-time, synchronous lessons. This type of teaching and learning may occur in the near future. Our priority for the next two weeks is to provide accessible and meaningful work for students to engage in, while we ensure all students are safe, healthy, connected, and have all the materials and equipment they need. For now, assignments will be checked formatively, while summative assessments will occur later.

All assignments will be communicated via Google Classroom, a shared Google Doc, or via Gmail. Students: CHECK YOUR SCHOOL EMAIL EVERYDAY.  

Chromebooks

Renfroe sent home over two-hundred Chromebooks with students. If your family is in need of a device to engage with distance learning, please contact your student's homeroom teacher or grade-level counselor. We will make every attempt to hook you up.

For families that do have a CSD Chromebook, we understand that technical issues may arise. Please consult this document for basic "getting used to a Chromebook and general troubleshooting" advice. If your Chromebook difficulty persists, please ask your student's teacher to "submit a ticket." A member of the CSD Information Services staff will contact you directly to try to resolve the issue.

Internet Access

We’re aware that some families do not have reliable internet access at home. We do not currently have hotspots to loan to students to support at-home connectivity. However, families have several options from area telecoms. Note that most of the time-limited offerings have a start date of March 13, an end date (subject to extension) of May 13.

• AT&T [more info on their response]
• offers Access from AT&T, an inexpensive internet access plan.
• temporarily eliminated most data limits for their internet service customers.
• Comcast [more info on their response]
• made public "xfinitiwifi" public hotspots freely available
• announced that their Internet Essentials service is free for new users for 60 days.
• temporarily eliminated data camps on home internet service
• Sprint [more info on their response]
• eliminated mobile data caps for 60 days
• added 20GB of hotspot data for mobile users at no cost for 60 days (coming soon -- applies to customers who currently have mobile hotspot on their plan and customers who do not currently pay for mobile hotspot).
• T-Mobile and Metro by T-Mobile [more info on their response]
• eliminated mobile data caps for 60 days. 
• added 20GB of hotspot data for mobile users at no cost for 60 days.
• Additionally, AT&T, Comcast, Sprint, and T-Mobile signed the “Keep Americans Connected” pledge not to terminate any home internet service for failure to pay bills within the next 60 days, and to make Wi-Fi hotspot service available to customers. 
• Using a cell service provider other than the ones listed above? Most cell phone providers enable options for phones to serve as hotspots to provide data connections to other devices, and several service representatives have notified us that cell service providers will ease barriers and costs to enabling this feature. Availability varies by cell provider and phone, so contact your cell service provider for additional information.

More Tech Help

For some tech advice from the RMS Technology Ambassadors, go here:

https://sites.google.com/csdecatur.net/rmstech

Support from Renfroe Counseling

Please click here to see their presentation.

RMS UPDATE: COVID-19, March 24, 2020

Please see www.csdecatur.net/covid19 for district updates

From Mr. Wiseman

Hi Renfroe Community,

I hope all of you are hanging in there.  It’s been nice seeing some of you outside as I walk my dog around Oakhurst.  It’s also been nice connecting with kids on email as well. I stopped in the school yesterday afternoon to check on things and it was a quiet, lonely place. I look forward to the day when the halls are teaming with teachers and kids again.

Please stay tuned for the details of how we're going to proceed with school work next week. Those details should be communicated in a few days. Thank you for your patience as we design a system that is equitable for our students, families, and teachers. Planning an entirely new way we “do school” takes a lot of work on everyone’s part. 

Support from Renfroe Counseling

Please click here  to see their presentation.

Need Help With Internet Access?

Need Help with Access?

For those without internet access at this time, Comcast has made "xfinitiwifi" internet free for new users for 60 days. To sign up, call 1-855-846-8376 for English, 1-855-765-6995, for Spanish or visit www.internetessentials.com.

Also, most cell phone providers have options for phones to serve as internet hotspots. You can call your cell phone provider for more information.

If you are unable to get internet access at home, please let your homeroom teacher know and we'll do our best to help out!

Meals for Students

Meal distribution will begin on March 18. The Nutrition Department will provide all students the option to pick up two meals a day from Decatur High School. These meals will be a cold breakfast and shelf-stable lunch. The program is open to all City Schools of Decatur students. We are unable to extend this meal service to siblings who are not CSD students, parents/guardians, or the general public. Meals will be available for pickup daily 9:00am-11:00am. Students may only pick up two meals (one breakfast and one lunch) per day and may not purchase additional meals. The CSD student must be present to pick up their meal. To avoid lines and to adhere to social distancing best practices, we ask that you take advantage of the full window for pick up. Families will not be allowed to linger after meal pick up.

All meal prices will remain the same as a typical school day and all approved free and reduced lunch applications will be honored. It is unclear whether this is something our students will take advantage of; we will evaluate this program throughout our closure to determine if participation is high enough to continue or require modifications.

Questions or Needs During the Closure

Please reach out to the appropriate counselor or administrator according to the table below.

The district has created a form to submit questions regarding COVID-19 so we can ensure we are addressing the things you want to know. Please submit your questions at http://bit.ly/CV19Q. We will issue updates at least once a day via email and our website (https://www.csdecatur.net/covid19) and our other communication mechanisms as more information becomes available.

COVID19 March 17, 2020

Please see www.csdecatur.net/covid19 for CSD district updates

Please see the RMS webpage, then scroll down to “Announcements” for each Renfroe-specific COVID-19 communication.

March 17, 2020

Dear RMS Community,

I hope everyone in the RMS community is well. It’s been hard getting used to our new normal, which seems to be changing everyday as we learn more about the pandemic we’re facing. Again, thank you for all the supportive messages we’ve received over the last few days. It is greatly appreciated. Also, thanks in advance for your patience and flexibility as we move forward. On behalf of the entire Renfroe staff, I just want to say that we miss you and we hope we are able to resume some kind of normal school day soon.  Working from home is not all that it’s cracked up to be. Please read below for important logistical matters.

Sincerely,

Greg Wiseman

Principal, Renfroe Middle School

Wednesday, March 18 School Access

Tomorrow will be the last time in the foreseeable future when students and families will have access to Renfroe Middle School. I need to stress that we want as few of you as possible coming to Renfroe Middle School tomorrow for the health and safety of my staff and your families. Other than medication, there are very few reasons why students and guardians need to come to school. Please come at the following times:

Medicine Pick up - 1:00-4:00. All others,

12:00 PM-1:30PM: Last names beginning with A-H

1:30PM-3:00PM: Last names beginning with I-P

3:00PM-5:00PM: Last names beginning with Q-Z

Please do your best to ensure you stay 6-feet apart from one another.  Only 10 people will be allowed entrance to school at a time. Please see below for specific scenarios.

Medicine Pick-up:  

Due to our uncertain timeline for school reentry,  ALL stored medication must be picked up by families from 1:00-4:00 tomorrow.  This includes prescription and over-the-counter medication. If you prefer not to pick up your child’s medication, please contact nurse Sinkfield by email to let her know.  We cannot guarantee that Renfroe will be accessible at a later time to collect this medication. If it is not retrieved at the designated time, it may be inaccessible for an undetermined amount of time.  Please take that into consideration when making your decision as to whether or not to retrieve your child’s medication. Legal guardians will be permitted to enter the school for med pick-up. No students permitted. If driving, please park in one of the spots in front (don’t pull up and park at the curb) and walk to the front door, where you will be let in. Come to the front office.

Student Personal Belongings: 

The rumor that lockers are being opened up and cleared out is false. If your student can live without what was left in a locker, then please leave what’s there and don’t come into school. Library books, notebooks, sweatshirts, can all stay there. Again, we want as few people in the school as possible.

Band and Orchestra Instruments: 

If you need to pick up a band or orchestra instrument, please email Ms Kraemer tonight at ckraemer@csdecatur.net. She will forward me the list of students to expect.

Chromebooks: 

Students should only borrow a chromebook if there is zero or severely limited access to an electronic device at home. Siblings sharing the family computer will work. Students will be able to receive and deliver information via their cell phones (like they already do) with their teachers.  If your mindset is, “It would be nice to have a chromebook home”, then you don’t need to pick one up. This is a “Need-to-have,” not a “Nice-to-have” situation.  Ask yourself if your child really needs a chromebook before coming.

If you must borrow a chromebook, here’s how to do it: Queue up to the curb in your car in the front driveway. Stay in your car. Your RMS child must accompany you. RMS staff will address each car as it pulls up to the orange traffic cone in the front. Bring your own pen to sign off if you do not want to share a pen.  Please be patient. 

Meals For Students

Meal distribution will begin on March 18. The Nutrition Department will provide all students the option to pick up two meals a day from Decatur High School. These meals will be a cold breakfast and shelf-stable lunch. The program is open to all City Schools of Decatur students. We are unable to extend this meal service to siblings who are not CSD students, parents/guardians, or the general public. Meals will be available for pickup daily 9:00am-11:00am. Students may only pick up two meals (one breakfast and one lunch) per day and may not purchase additional meals. The CSD student must be present to pick up their meal. To avoid lines and to adhere to social distancing best practices, we ask that you take advantage of the full window for pick up. Families will not be allowed to linger after meal pick up.

All meal prices will remain the same as a typical school day and all approved free and reduced lunch applications will be honored. It is unclear whether this is something our students will take advantage of; we will evaluate this program throughout our closure to determine if participation is high enough to continue or require modifications.

Distance Learning Starting Tomorrow

Students should be hearing from teachers soon, if they haven’t already. Students should check their school email and Google Classroom regularly for information and assignments. Students will have the opportunity to complete work and activities for 30-minutes per day, per class. Questions about specific assignments or tasks can be directed to the teachers during the “office hours” they post. All CSD teachers were instructed to begin providing students review and enrichment activities beginning tomorrow, Wednesday March 18th.  Thanks in advance for your patience as we roll this out for the first time.

Plans for work going forward

As teachers plan review and enrichment work and activities for the next seven days, they are also gearing up for a longer time period. Over the next several days, we will be working to make sure that all students have access to instructional materials in preparation for assigning mandatory work, beginning Friday, March 27th. By then, we will communicate how we will grade student work in the event of a closure that lasts beyond Spring Break.

Starting Friday, March 27th, you can expect to see

• Students being assigned mandatory work in all of their classes
• Teachers assigning work that will be graded
• Some assignments that were paused last week picking back up where they left off

Starting Friday, March 27th, you should not expect to see

• Expectations for students to follow the RMS bell schedule from home
• Expectations that teachers follow the RMS bell schedule from home

Our teachers and our students are wearing many hats right now. Many of our teachers are not only teaching their RMS students, they're also homeschooling their own kids. Many are also taking care of family members in other ways. Many of our students have responsibilities to younger siblings and other family members during the day, as well. We will create a system that sets reasonable expectations of our teachers and students that gives all students rich learning opportunities.

COVID 19 UPDATE FOR MARCH 15, 2021

COVID-19 UPDATE FOR MARCH 12, 2021

Dear Renfroe Community,

I’d like to take this opportunity to wish you good health as together, we venture into uncharted territory with the COVID-19 pandemic. Today was the first day of school closures, but school and district administrators worked through the day to coordinate efforts to plan on many fronts as we prepare for the future. Thank you in advance for your patience, understanding, and flexibility. This is a very fluid situation, and things may change frequently. We will do everything we can to keep you abreast of how CSD and Renfroe are handling this pandemic.

If you haven’t done so already, bookmark this page. This is CSD’s webpage for COVID-19. All district-wide communications will be stored here. Please be sure to read through the district- wide communication that went out today.

Below are some Renfroe-specific Items:

School will Continue, at Home
Renfroe teachers and staff were already planning for remote learning a few days ago. Teachers are using the first three consecutive days of closure to finalize plans for remote learning. Beginning Wednesday, March 18, students will start receiving reinforcement and/or enrichment activities/tasks. If the school closure extends to and beyond Friday, March 27, a different set of guidelines for remote learning will be shared with students and families.
Teachers will communicate assignment specifics to students via their usual communication routes, including email and Google Classroom. School staff will work to complete access checks during the week of March 16th to make sure all students are able to access their coursework. Student work will be posted to Google Classroom and/or Managebac and parents can check in on their students' assignments using their students' access to these tools.
Teachers will hold at least two office hours a day to maintain consistent contact with students and families.

Medication Pick-up
If your child has medication stored in the nurse’s clinic, you can come to Renfroe Monday, March 16th, from 9:00AM-2:00PM. Please contact Nurse Sinkfield at tsinkfield@csdecatur.net  to make arrangements.

Student Personal Item and Chromebook Pick-up
If your child has items in a locker or classroom, they can be picked up Monday March 16th or Wednesday, March 18th. Students needing to check out a Chromebook may do so as well. To encourage social distancing, please adhere to the following schedule:

Monday, March 16
12:00 PM-2:00PM: Last names beginning with A-H
2:00PM-4:00PM: Last names beginning with I-P
4:00PM-6:00PM: Last names beginning with Q-Z

Wednesday, March 18
12:00 PM-2:00PM: Last names beginning with A-H
2:00PM-4:00PM: Last names beginning with I-P
4:00PM-6:00PM: Last names beginning with Q-Z

Students should enter Renfroe via the front door.  Students must not congregate while in the building and should plan to stay only long enough to retrieve their belongings. Chromebooks will be available in the RMS library. While parents may bring students to RMS, we ask that only students enter the building, unless medication or a Chromebook needs to be picked up. Medication must be picked up by a parent or guardian. Chromebooks can be picked up by either a parent or a student.

Who do I contact with questions?
All RMS staff will be working, either remotely or in person, during the closure. Any questions about specific courses should be addressed to teachers. If you have an administrative or counseling question, please contact the appropriate grade-level Assistant Principal, counselor, or me.  If your student is currently not feeling well, but needs materials retrieved from RMS, please reach out to the appropriate administrator. If you need any support or assistance in any way, please reach out to an administrator. If we cannot provide that support, we will work to connect you with help.

Be well.

Greg Wiseman
Principal, Renfroe Middle School