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Dear 6-12 Parents and Students,

Hello all.  I hope this email finds you well this weekend.  I have taken most of Friday evening and today reflecting and working through many scenarios for our schedule next week, specifically with midterms and pushing into the 3rd quarter.  Continuing in the hybrid schedule poses several new challenges for our students on Monday and Tuesday.  Students anticipated having a block schedule and now we are staying in a 7 period day.  Preparing for a full day of midterms, projects and papers is problematic and not a productive use of time for our students.  Many students also anticipated taking finals in the building for all their classes.

The last two months of schedule changes along with a current rise in local Covid-19 cases have stress levels in a heightened state.  Next week revolves around much uncertainty.  All aspects of our academics are important to everyone, but I also want to make sure it is fair, reasonable, and centers around the least amount of distractions.  This is not the case at this time in the year.

For these reasons and others, I am CANCELLING midterm exams for all students.  Teachers will use midterms as a template to work with students summarizing and reviewing the first semester and the most important content.  This will allow our teachers and students to concentrate on learning, which is the most important - setting these assessments aside for the 1st semester.

Teachers will provide feedback and support for planned projects and papers that could be a grade for the 3rd quarter. We will not ASSESS students for a grade Monday or Tuesday, prior to the 3rd quarter.

Again, while we know that midterms can be a valuable metric for measuring student growth at the midway point of the year, our decision to cancel midterms this year does not need to detract from the learning and feedback opportunities that midterms provide.

Moving forward, we hope this will be a new beginning for a successful 2nd semester while we continue to focus on the learning of all students in all modalities.  

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me at Scott.Amstutz@kirtlandschools.org. 

Thank you, stay safe and have a great weekend,

Mr. Scott Amstutz
 6-12 Principal
 Kirtland Local Schools
 Twitter: @MrAmstutz