Dear Gardner-Dickinson families,
I have had several parents ask me about arrival and dismissal times for the new school year. I would like to share some information to help families make the decision whether to drive their children to school or use bus transportation.
Gardner-Dickinson will open its doors at 8:00 a.m. for all students with teachers in all grades ready to receive students in their classrooms.
We currently plan to run two separate bus runs in order to pick up 378 students and ensure students are socially distanced.
The first run would drop off students at 8:00 a.m. Buses would then go back out and pick up the remaining students who would be dropped off at GD at approximately 9:15 a.m.
Originally, we thought that we would do the first run for K-5 and then the second run for grades 6-8 as we do in the afternoon, but may now look into busing according to families so that siblings can sit together. We want to do whatever we can to get as many students in the building as close to 8:00 a.m. as possible.
Now, if many families plan to drive their children to school, the second bus run would not take nearly as long or perhaps we could eliminate the second bus run altogether.
If we have many families driving their children into school, as we are hoping, then we will need to set up a staggered drop off schedule to accommodate the traffic. We will be giving families a specific drop off time that will ease the traffic flow and eliminate the need to make multiple drop offs. This will be done by last names and not by grade levels so that families make only one trip to GD.
For example, if 100 families are driving, we will take that list of families and ask the first 40 families with last names A- F to drop off at 8:00 am. The next group of 40 would drop off at 8:10 a.m. and the next at 8:20 a.m. until everyone is in the building. The only group that I would ask to come last, around 8:30 to 8:45 a.m., would be kindergarten and Pre-K so that we can use the extra time to get them safely from the cars to the classroom, which we all know will be a job in the beginning.
Classroom teachers will use from 8:00 to 9:15 a.m. each morning, as they wait for their entire class to arrive, to work with small groups of students, review material, remediate, provide enrichment, use computer programs, or read independently. Content area class at the elementary level will not start before everyone arrives (approximately 9:00 a.m.) and the first period at the middle school will start at 9:30 a.m.
These exact times are subject to change but I hope this gives a little more insight to how we are trying to start the day.
We anticipate that students in K-5 are dismissed at 2:30 p.m. and students in grades 6-8 are dismissed at 3:17 p.m. as we have in the past. Pre-K will dismiss between 2:00 and 2:30 p.m.
Thank you and please do not hesitate to contact me if you have questions.
Sincerely,
Dr. Mary Yodis
Principal/Interim Superintendent