As you may have seen from the Governor's announcement today, all school districts in California are being urged to close through the end of the academic year to ensure the highest level of safety for our students and families. In support of the coronavirus mitigation effort, Ojai Unified School District, along with all Ventura County School Districts, has made the difficult decision to keep our schools closed through the end of the school year. Ojai Unified Schools will continue providing distance learning in lieu of in-class instruction for the remainder of the current semester.
We will continue to follow our current phased plan.
Next week, April 6-10, is spring break, with no instruction.
The following week, April 13-17, we will continue with our Phase 2 implementation with highly-recommended assignments, but no mandatory activities or attendance.
Beginning on April 20 we will transition to Phase 3 and full implementation of distance learning. We are still working through many of the details of this, and more information will be coming to parents and students before we launch Phase 3.
I am proud of our staff, teachers and administrators as they have navigated this situation with the utmost of concern for our students and families. We want you to know we miss you, and although our facilities are closed, our schools are not. Teachers are continuing to teach, and students are continuing to learn. We are just moving to a new way to do so.
Our highest priority is your child's needs, including meals, emotional wellness, and learning. Because of the nature of this crisis, we will continue to serve meals to our families over spring break on Monday, April 6th and Wednesday, April 8th from 11 am to 1 pm. For any needs you may have beyond these provisions, please communicate those via this Help form. We are here to help in whatever way we can.
One of the most difficult aspects of the closure is the disruption of long-awaited end-of-year activities, including awards events and graduation ceremonies. We have already begun exploring alternative ways to celebrate our students for their accomplishments.
If there's one thing we know about our valley, it's that during times like these we see the best in people. I'm confident that we will come through this together.
