PSA Offering Remote Learning Support

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PSA has been asked to offer remote learning support by the parents of our young athletes.

We have completed a survey and have sufficient responses to define what is wanted.

Who should attend PSA remote learning? Those with parents working or those parents who feel they want more for their children in help, friendships and physical activity than can be provided in the home.

PSA Remote Learning will be offered in two versions :

• 9-week students who have already notified their schools they will be remote the first 9 weeks
• 3-week students who must be remote the first 3 weeks of the school year. These students will be returning to school as soon as possible.
• PISD has opted for a 4 week remote start. Just sign up for the 3 week and we will add weeks at the same rate as you need them.

The elements of the program are different for each group as the survey indicates differences between the two groups:

• 9-week students are in for the long haul and possibly the whole year – they are primarily education focused
• 3-week students will be going to school as soon as possible and are focused on learning Remote Skills and getting proficient as schools will be closing periodically throughout the year. We will only extend this one time. We will not re-open this program later in the school year for safety reasons. This is intended to help in-school kids prepare for at home remote learning periodically during the school year.
• According to the FISD presentation, there will be differences between remote experiences in 3-week program and those kids opting for remote the first 9 weeks.

Both groups want to take advantage of physical activity as they have been home for most of the past 4 months.

Elements common to both groups:

• PSA Wi-Fi of 100MB bandwidth
• 150K sq. ft. of building space to allow good social distancing
• Counselors who are PSA trained
• Teachers (subject matter experts) for after the school on-line meetings.
• Help in login and meeting school requirements.
• Ratio of 1 counselor per 10 students
• Separate doors to reduce congestion
• Temperature testing
• Masks to enter but once in their POD they can be removed
• PODS are not intermingled
• Counselors are not rotated.
• Physical activity – possibly a coed league in basketball, soccer or VB for recess
• 7:30 to 3:30 daily on the same schedule as the school districts.
• PSA provides packaged snacks
• Parents provide lunch
• Time outdoors at the park

Buildings:

• Both programs will be at PSA1 on Preston Meadow because of zoom meeting bandwidth requirements.

Pricing:

• 3-week program is $900 with a non-refundable deposit of $250 with full payment before start of class
• 9-week program is $2100 with a non-refundable deposit of $250 to be applied to last 3 weeks.
• If you earned credits for Spring, they apply here. Check your account.
• Why the difference in pricing? Slight difference in days.

Age Groups:

• 3-Week program Grades 3-5 only. They will be together. We will take 20 in this program.
• 9-Week program Grades 3-6 only. Middle school will be segregated in the building. We will take 30 in this program.

Additional comments:

• IMPORTANT: We do not foresee movement from the 3-week program to the 9-week program as we are trying to keep kids in the same PODS to increase safety. When the 3-week is over it is over.
• We will NOT have drop-ins. This is a safety issue.
• Entrance into the buildings will be through emergency exit doors to reduce congestion and they will have their temperature tested before entrance.
• PSA Staff are the Directors of the Remote Learning Program and all are experienced PSA Camp Directors during the virus and the new protocols.
• We are working on a “best practices” guide for parents from parents whose children won “Grit Awards” from FISD and something similar in PISD.
• This is a new program for PSA. We are VERY familiar with summer camp as we have done it for 14 years. This is much more education oriented than summer camp. Communication with parents will be stressed. But we hope to make them convenient and quick.
• Parents MUST be involved before school to prepare the laptop and scheduling binder to allow the child to be quickly proficient at remote learning. We will send guidelines.
• Parents will have to prepare a handbook (we are defining) so that PSA staff can easily help your child during the startup of remote learning
• We will have limited capacity and once it is full, we are full forever.
• A waiver like summer camp this summer will be required to be signed by parents.
• We will not be offering a half day program as the costs are not linear and the synchronous portion of the school day does not lend itself to half day programs.

Safety:

• We are using the same controls we had for summer camp and were effective at our 3 buildings.
• Temp testing, no one in the building except students and staff.
• Isolation at home if exposed. We had 3 incidents this summer and they were all from exposure to family not at PSA. They were isolated at home and PSA parents notified.
• Notification to parents if we have an infection and our actions.
• The focus is on the POD so that the 10 kids in a POD are the only ones involved and not the entire school.

Parent’s responsibilities:

The communication with the school is to the parents therefore our coordination is through you.

Parents will be required to prepare the child for remote learning:

• Create a binder of all necessary information to get the child prepared for remote
• Laptop with bookmarks for math, reading, teacher and etc.
• Folder has passwords, login information and web addresses
• Schedule of events sent to you by School
• Guidance from the school
• All phone numbers
• Etc.

PSA will use that information to help the child login and get started every hour.

What is PSA providing:

• Adult supervision
• Course support
• Focus to get done every day
• Reporting back to parent on work accomplishment
• Wi-Fi
• Physical activity
• Motivation
• Friends in a safe environment
• Free up the parent to work