Announcements

In the event that more than 30% of students at a grade level are interested in returning for in-person instruction, we will allocate in-person spaces based on the following criteria:

• We will prioritize students who are in the bottom ⅓ of each grade in reading and/or math.
  (Tier 1 – both, Tier 2 – reading only and  Tier 3 –  math only)
• Within these tiers students will be further prioritized as follows:
  • Students who are experiencing homelessness
  • Students with IEPs
  • Disengaged Students (<70% attendance)
• If there is availability after we have prioritized the groups above, we will include siblings (unless siblings fit the criteria above). If there is not availability, siblings will get preference on each grades waiting list (1st in line after students that want to return and fit the academic criteria)

Students who do not meet any of the academic criteria and do not have siblings to meet the criteria will then be considered if space is available.

At this time we’ve chosen not to include Middle School Academy for two reasons. First, due to the age of our Middle School students, students are more able to engage and complete their work using computers, etc. that are required in a virtual setting. Second, because of the way our Middle School program is structured, having some students in-person and other virtual would not allow for us to sufficiently provide the instructional support needed and we will have had to substantially reduce the time of instruction for students. We do not believe that is the right decision and would not result in stronger learning outcomes for our students.

Please complete this survey by January 14. As noted above, we are not able to guarantee in-person spaces for all students at this time. However, we hope to be able to have as many students as possible.

We will send communication to all families no later than January 29 indicating whether their student has an in-person seat available or is on the waiting list.

Students will come to school Monday through Friday. We believe that stability and consistency are important. As such, we are prioritizing having students at school every day of the week.

The school day will start at 9:00 a.m. Arrival and breakfast will begin at 8:30 a.m. School will run until 2:30 p.m.

Unfortunately, given health and safety requirements that prohibit us from mixing student groups, we will not be able to run our before and after school program during this time.

Yes, all students will have a daily health screen survey that they must complete. This daily survey can be completed at home prior to coming to the school building or at the school building when your student arrives. The survey will be checked upon your student’s arrival to school. Regardless of whether you completed the survey at home or at school, we will be taking temperatures of all students prior to entering the building. 

If a student does not pass the daily health screen, they will not be permitted into the school building that day and may need to follow additional health guidance.

We have implemented many new health and safety procedures for students and staff. See below for some of the policies and procedures in place:

• Daily health screening for students and staff with temperature requirement via SchoolPass App
• Weekly COVID-19 testing of staff by medical professionals 
• Social distanced arrival, recess and dismissal procedures 
• PPE requirements by academy:
  • ECA
    • Surgical Masks (all-day except when eating) 
    • Face shields
    • Long sleeve scrub jackets
  • ESA
    • Non-medical grade masks (all-day except when eating)
    • Face shields (optional)  
• Student mask requirement ( all-day except when eating & napping)
• Socially distanced arrival, dismissal, recess and bathroom Procedures
• Individual student materials kits to be used daily 
• Single cohort breakfast and lunch procedures
• On-site access to COVID-19 rapid testing for symptomatic students
• COVID-19 isolation room 
• Designated bathrooms by grade and academy 
• Socially distanced seating to accommodate the max. occupancy of 11 students
• PPE kits in each classroom containing masks, hand sanitizer, gloves tissues, wipes, etc. 
• Individual materials kits for each student
• Daily cleaning of desks and Chromebooks using provided PPE materials
• Classroom air purifiers
• High touch surfaces such as knobs cleaned frequently by custodians 
• Social distance floor markers
• Building sanitizing stations
• Building access restricted for visitors and non-in-person instructional staff

Yes, all students will be required to be fully up to date on their immunizations. If a student is not fully up to date on immunizations, they will not be able to return to in-person instruction.

As a result of re-opening for in-person instruction, It is almost certain that your student’s teacher will change — whether your student comes in-person or remains virtual. Due to some staff returning to teach in-person while others remaining virtual to teach, we’ll have to rotate class rosters in all ECA and ESA grades. While there is a chance your student may retain their current teacher, it is unlikely.

While the school calendar will remain largely unchanged, there have been a few changes. See here for the full, updated calendar. See below for a summary of those changes:

• Removed February 3rd professional development (PD) day. This will now be a regular school day for students.
• The week of February 8th will now be professional development for our staff in ECA and ESA. As such, school will be asynchronous for those students that week.
• MSA students will also have asynchronous days on February 11th and 12th to allow for Family Teacher Conferences and staff professional development.
• End of Quarter 2 Family Teacher Conferences have been moved from February 16th to February 11th.
• March 15th is now a day off for students and staff.

Please note that given the changing situation related to re-opening for in-person instruction, the academic calendar may again need to change if we are unable to reopen as planned on February 16. We will communicate any additional changes as soon as possible, if they occur.

Ingenuity Prep is using the CDC indicators and thresholds to inform our ability to re-open safely on February 16. The key indicators we are monitoring indicate risk of transmission in schools and community spread, which impact a safe in-person instruction environment. We will reopen (and remain open) unless both of these thresholds are true:

1. The test positivity rate for D.C. is > 5% (7 day average) for 7 consecutive days 

                                                   AND

1. There are > 20 new cases per 100,000 people (7 day average) for 7 consecutive days

We will be using data shared by the D.C. Department of Health that can be found at: https://coronavirus.dc.gov/page/reopening-metrics.