Requesting Clearance for Return of Student after Exposure to Covid Positive Case
If your child has been exposed to a person that has been diagnosed with Covid, they will need to be cleared by the FCHD before returning to school. Please do not send them to school without this clearance. In order to assist parents, we wanted to share the process for requesting vaccinated students to return to school after exposure. Currently the clearance today has been happening quickly.
If your child is fully vaccinated, please complete the COVID Contact Vaccination Verification survey. Sharing your child’s vaccination status will help the health department expedite your child’s return if your child meets the criteria.
The admin team still appreciated parents completing the form to report exposure to the school so we can track clearance for your child.
Complete Parent Check/In Survey form here.
REPEATED INFORMATION BELOW
Principal's Message
I hope that you and your family had a wonderful holiday and time together. This time has been a time of family and togetherness that we all needed. I'd be remiss if I didn't also share that I realize so many of our families were touched by Covid over the holiday break. Chances are you knew someone who was sick or cared for a loved one in your own home. This forced families to delay family get togethers and make last minutes changes to plans. As the surge of Covid impacts our community, we must take care in returning to school.
We look forward to having staff and students return to school on Monday. I look forward to the buses rolling in and all the fun that kiss n ride brings each day. I expect our kiss n ride to be fairly busy once again and with the sidewalk construction ramping back up, it will be a time to bring our patience and making sure we don't arrive in pick up line until 3:30pm.
Safety Precautions with Reminders
We have many precautions in place across the school and will continue to be diligent with safety measures including:
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Outdoor lunch - As weather allows (above 45 degrees with no rain or wind - a bit of sun helps too) we will continue outdoor lunch with the support of our amazing team of lunch volunteers. I can't thank this team enough for their consistent support!
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Universal Masking - All staff and students will properly wear face masks unless eating or drinking or outdoors with appropriate spacing. We do encourage student outdoors to wear masks when playing closely with friends.
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Social Distancing - Students are distanced as much as possible. Snack time is alternated for students and students should bring individual water bottles to and from school each day. PLEASE label water bottles.
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Visitor Protocols- Visitors are limited in the building. We are tightening our visitor protocol to limit visitors and exposure possibilities while transmissions rates are high in our community. As previously shared, parents may contact the office to communicate needs and our wonderful office staff will support. We encourage you to call before you come to the building to see if we can assist you virtually or over the phone.
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Late Arrivals - late students may enter door one and our office staff will check them in. A parent does not need to walk children in but may walk to the door and our staff will greet your child and ensure they get them to class.
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Early Dismissals - Dismissals need to occur before 3PM unless in case of emergency. We encourage you to use the PUP to enter the early dismissal and we will have your child ready for you. You are welcome to call our office if you need to pick up your child our office staff will have them ready at door one when you arrive.
Chesterbrook's Plan for Support of Staff and Students
As we return it is inevitable that staff will need to be quarantined if they are ill. When possible, if classroom teachers are well enough but cannot be in the building, they will be allowed to support instruction (creating lesson plans and responding to student work) with a sub in the classroom to drive the daily plan. At this time, teachers who are working from home will not be teaching live virtual lessons. As we need to think outside the box, if we have teachers working from home they may be used to check in and work with quarantined students that they do not directly teach. This really depends on a variety of factors, so we ask for your patience as we work on supports of staff and students. One thing to know is our Chesterbrook staff believes that ALL Chesterbrook students are OUR students and we will do all we can to support our community.
It is also expected that students will be out at times if they are sick or paused from instruction. While we hope to limit this, it is part of the course we have to travel in the coming weeks. Administrators will work with teachers to develop a support plan as quickly as possible. Please know that it takes time to create a support plan and it will look different than a synchronous day of instruction. FCPS has shared the expectation is that by day 3, a full plan will be in place for a quarantined student. At Chesterbrook our teachers have readily been able to get a plan into place very quickly. If more students and staff are impacted, the timeline may lengthen. We ask for your patience and greatly appreciate your support.
Parent Check In/Survey
In an effort to support any questions you may have and be ready for our opening on Monday, you are invited to share any concerns or questions with our administrative team so we can be proactive in our return.
Complete Parent Check/In Survey form here.
With Appreciation and Gratitude,
Stacy Kirkpatrick, Principal
COVID Diagnostic Testing this Weekend
FCPS is offering additional diagnostic testing Saturday, January 1 and Sunday, January 2 for symptomatic staff and students. Please note that the location has changed to South County High School. Testing will take place from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
This testing should only be utilized by students and staff who are symptomatic, and want to know their health status before returning to school or work. Please note that this testing is not mandatory to return to work or school.
Scheduled appointments will not be available; however, you must register for an account in advance. The building will not be open for use so please plan accordingly. Updates regarding capacity limits will be posted to the FCPS Twitter account and as an alert on the homepage of the FCPS website. Students should be prepared with their ID number.
FCPS Shares the Following Updates with Covid Protocols
The Fairfax County Health Department (FCHD) will contact close contacts through email ONLY. This change in process has been implemented due to the high volume of cases to ensure contacts are provided guidance in a timely manner. Via email, close contacts will be provided information regarding quarantine, testing, and the vaccination survey.
The week of January 3 will be used to collaborate with the FCHD and revise our COVID response process in light of CDC’s revised guidance on isolation and quarantine. During this time (January 3-7), the existing timeline for isolation for COVID positive individuals (10 days) and quarantine options for close contacts (14, 10, 7 days with a negative test) will continue to be used. Updates will be provided to principals as soon as possible. If there are extenuating circumstances or specific concerns raised by a family, those concerns should be addressed on a case-by-case basis.
CES Admin ask that parents complete the Check In form if you have a positive case, close contact exposure of have questions so we can support any needs in our community.
Longfellow Middle School - Rising 7th Grade Curriculum Night
Update: Now Virtual Event
Longfellow Middle School is excited to invite you to the Rising 7th Grade Curriculum Night on Tuesday, January 11 from 6:00pm - 8:00pm – ONLINE – see below for Zoom webinar link! This night will be full of information about Longfellow and the transition to middle school. In addition, our website will be updated by January 10th with all information you will need regarding academic advising and the transition to middle school. Recordings of the event will also be posted on January 12th. If you have any questions that you hope to get answered at the event, please take time to complete this form. We look forward to seeing you online!
Join Zoom Meeting https://myfcpsk12.zoom.us/j/92936403700
Meeting ID: 929 3640 3700
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Meeting ID: 929 3640 3700
New Year, New Computer Restart
We encourage all of our students with computers at home to restart before returning and make sure to return to school with a fully charged laptop.
FCPS has been pushing many new updates and security patches to school laptops to ensure new policies, filtering and the most recent version of applications are in place. It’s important that students restart their laptops. A shutdown and then powering on is not the same as a restart. Please RESTART by selecting the (1) Windows logo, clicking the (2) power icon, and selecting (3) Restart from the window options.
Upcoming Dates
Monday, January 3: Students Return to School
Tuesday, January 4: COVID Screening for Select Students at CES
If you DO NOT wish to continue having your child tested weekly, you should use this link to withdraw your consent. If you would like to provide consent for your child to be added to the weekly COVID testing, please provide consent here.
Wednesday, January 5: School Spirit Day - CES School Spirit wear Day
Thursday, January 6: Three Kings Day/Epiphany celebrated
Tuesday, January 11: Rising 7th Grade Curriculum Night (Longfellow) *Virtual
Friday, January 14: Spirit Day - Movie/Book Character Day - no full face covering masks or inflatable costumes.
Monday, January 17: Student Holiday (MLK Jr Birthday)
Thursday, January 20: End of Quarter (2 hour student early release)
Friday, January 21: Student Holiday (Teacher Workday)
Monday, January 24: Student Holiday (Professional Development Day)
YEARBOOK ORDERS - Order Your Yearbook Today
2021 FCPS Student Calendar Quick Glance
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