A Time to Disconnect

We are on the eve of the winter solstice in the Northern Hemisphere. The time of the year when the Earth is physically closest to the sun but tilted the furthest away. That means on December 21, the sun will rise in St. Johnsbury at 7:20 AM and will set at 4:11 PM, giving us a paltry eight hours and fifty-one minutes of daylight. It really doesn't seem like enough, does it? 

Add to this the reality of education and life in 2020, and, candidly, it may even feel darker. However, I offer that there is plenty to celebrate. 

I begin with our students and their families. School has not looked anything like it usually does. Despite some adults' worries, our students have worn their masks with fidelity and with pride, only occasionally needing reminders. Their families have juggled work, school, and life in a hybrid model designed to slow the spread in a building that, when full, is home to almost 800 people daily. Thank you for making this year work in St. Johnsbury. 

Next, I move on to our teachers. They have persevered, as this virus has upended everything they were taught about education. They made connections, reached our students, and found new and creative ways to teach while being physically distant from their favorite little people. Our teachers are proving again to be consummate professionals, adding integrity and honor to the word educator. 

I continue with our paraprofessionals. They have worked to find new and inventive ways to support our teachers and our students. Perhaps their work has never been more critical to our success as a school. Their work's selfless nature ensures that our students, sometimes our most vulnerable, feel the human connection that we know allows them to grow and learn. 

I cannot say enough about the individuals in Food Service. They have made it possible for our students and anyone eighteen and under to eat. These dedicated individuals have served our stomachs and hearts with the same consistency we have come to know and expect from them. 

The lack of superlatives continues to elude me when I think about our Facilities Staff. This year, in particular, they have redefined stewardship for me, as they juggled the reality of the pandemic with the bond construction and the increased protocols for cleaning our campus. These dedicated men and women do a thankless job regularly, and they do it in a way that should make our entire community proud. 

We could not do this work without our Leadership Team - our Principals, our Directors of Early Education, Finance, Learning Design, and Student Support Services. Their dedication to our students, faculty, staff, and community is evident in the thoughtful way they have approached the various directives around education in the midst of this troubling virus. Our conversations are safe places for disagreement; they are full of respect and often punctuated with laughter and compassion. None of the decisions we have made would have been possible without them. 

Finally, we are all guided by the public service of our Board of School Directors. Under the leadership of Mark Avery, these five individuals ensure that the mission is a reality for all of our students, not just written on paper. Their encouragement and support, along with thoughtful and persistent questioning about the impact on students, staff, and families, gives life to the policies our district enacts. 

With all this support, I am so incredibly proud that we have only had a handful of positive cases in our building, and none - not one - was a case of school transmission. The guidance and protocols have helped us maintain as much in-person learning as possible in these first three months. And we look forward to welcoming back all of our PK - 6 students in 2021 if the numbers in our county and our town continue to trend lower. 

With so much to celebrate, despite the lack of natural daylight, might I suggest one thing that we all commit to during the Winter Holiday Break? Disconnect. From work, at least. 

Yes, I know we will need to use technology to be in our loved ones' lives, given the requirement for physical distancing. So I don't mean like that. I mean, it's time to put work away. 

For most of us in education and the families we serve, work has been a constant since March. Even the summer did not feel truly like summer since there was so much uncertainty about our return. Now, though, we know what the first two weeks of January will look like. And we also know what school will look like beginning on Tuesday, January 19. 

So with all that, the gift I hope you can all celebrate with your loved ones this break is this: work disconnection.

Doctor's orders (wink). 

Photo courtesy of carriecolbert.com