Important Message from Dr. Cain
March 25, 2020 ~ To all WSD Administrators
Good Evening,
Dear WSD Admin,
After meeting today with the leaders of the St. Charles County Department of Public Health, we have made a decision to extend the closure of all schools in the Wentzville School District through April 24 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. All school activities, including athletic and extracurricular practices and competitions, are also canceled during the extended District closure.
Thank you for all you are doing and will continue to do in the coming weeks. I am so very impressed with your flexibility, professionalism, and willingness to help throughout this unprecedented time. A few items you need to know:
We will continue to pay our employees. Employees will have revised expectations for performing work during the extended closure that are different from our emergency closure. We will be sharing new staff responsibilities in the coming days. Please review the FAQs for Employees for extended closure guidance that will begin April 6. This is a living document that will be updated and discussed at our Administrator meeting.
Because we are expecting employees to work as needed, the use of leave (sick, personal and/or vacation) will resume April 6 throughout the closure. There are laws regarding the requirement of employee use of leave during this time; guidance will be shared at our Administrator meeting.
Decisions regarding who needs to report to work (remotely or on-site) during the extended closure and planning for sustained employee compensation and care will be discussed at our next Administrator meeting as well. In the interim, please do not ask any employee to report to work on-site without permission. It is not our intention for people to be in buildings, however, we recognize specific employees may need to be on-site to perform certain tasks.
We are working to identify the individual needs of students and families and how we can best try to address those.
Continued Learning Plans will begin on March 30th as previously shared. Additional details were shared today by Teaching and Learning and we are considering a window of time for teachers to come in next week to pick up anything additional they may need for the extended closure.
Curtis Cain, Ph.D.
Superintendent