Superintendent Message

SAISD plans in line with state and local guidelines

Dear SAISD Staff: 

We are following closely the announcements put forth by our governor, as well as our county and city leaders, to ensure our plans to slowly and safely re-open are in line with their orders and recommendations.

There have been some questions about the county and city extending their Stay Home, Work Safe orders through June 4, pending city council approval. According to officials, our local orders are intended to be consistent with Gov. Greg Abbott’s statewide orders, which slowly reopens our economy and the return to public activities with a phased, common-sense approach. 

As has been the case so far, the public continues to be encouraged to avoid large gatherings and to wear masks in public. We support these efforts to behave responsibly and with consideration for others, and will continue to do so following our established safety protocols.

Most importantly, as a school district, we must follow guidance provided by the state and the Texas Education Agency. Their guidance and restrictions have shaped our plans regarding outdoor graduations, the limited number of individuals we are allowing in our schools at this time, how we safely handle the return of student items, and when we can launch summer programming. 

With the governor’s announcement earlier this week allowing limited summer programming starting June 1, we are even planning to have some high school students come to schools in June, in small numbers, for those who need extra assistance for CTE exams. 

Our plans also are to offer a summer program starting July 20 for small groups of students on-site. We will be developing the details of that offering over the next couple of weeks. 
 
Additionally, we will be offering online summer learning through our Digital Learning Playground platform, and there will be credit recovery over the summer for high school students.

Where there is a change as a result of local orders is how soon we will move forward with block walking to support annual student registration. We originally planned to start limited block walking, but will now pull back until later in the summer. Until then, we will still register students at our schools, as well as rely on Zoom meetings with parents.

As we get into July, and have a sense of the guidance and restrictions in place at that time, we will begin to look at a final wave of registration promotions in the neighborhoods in July.

Sincerely,
Pedro