COVID-19 Update

We are excited about welcoming our new and returning scholars to the first day of school on August 17, 2020! We have been working hard to ensure the health and safety of our scholars, faculty, staff and school community. In preparation for a great school year ahead, there will be some exciting changes:

Laptops: All scholars in grades 1 through 6 will be assigned a laptop that they will be able to use at home. There will be no additional laptop charge for returning students.

New Classroom Configuration: In light of COVID-19, we are reconfiguring classrooms so that each scholar will have an individual space rather than a shared table. We have purchased new classroom furniture for this purpose.

New Entry/Exit Protocols: We will be following the Center for Disease Control and state guidelines with respect to temperature checking upon entry and during the day. Guests, visitors, and employees will be subject to temperature screening as well. Guests and visitors will not be able to go beyond the Reception area. In addition, we will limit the number of guests and visitors allowed in the Reception area at one time.

Additional Cleaning/Sanitizing Protocols: AOS already had continuous cleaning protocols in place prior to COVID-19. This meant that the building was not only cleaned overnight but several times during the school day as well. We are implementing further measures in accordance with CDC recommendations and the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers standards and guidelines.

Lunch: We are working with our food service vendor to implement lunch procedures for the upcoming year.

Fully Online Admissions Process: We have made our Admissions process a fully online process so that we are minimizing the need to have guests/visitors inside our building.

New Parent Portal for Application, Enrollment and Tuition Payments: We are rolling out a new system that will make it easier to pay tuition, print records of Before and After Care payments and communicate with school departments via messaging. You will receive a link to set up your account on the portal.

Ongoing monitoring of recommendations and practices: Information regarding COVID-19 is changing daily. We have a team who is monitoring and implementing recommendations on an ongoing basis. We will communicate further updates during orientation. Orientation dates and times will be communicated at a later date.

We pray that all members of our school community have a safe summer. We look forward to being together again in August.

Dr. Stacy Lambert-Johnson
Director of Student Success

Dearest AOS families,

“Let my teaching fall like rain and my words descend like dew, like showers on new grass, like abundant rain on tender plants.” Deuteronomy 32:2.

This week at AOS is Teacher/Staff Appreciation Week. It goes without saying that AOS teachers are the hardest working, most dedicated, nurturing and committed educators I have ever had the pleasure of working with. I am sure you would agree that time needs to be taken this week to show them how much they are appreciated and loved. Room parents have been contacting parents to ensure that you reach out to your child’s teachers to let them know they are appreciated. Sending an e-card, email, or a small token of your appreciation is sure to brighten their day. Although the focus is on teachers this week, AOS also celebrates our support staff, the behind the scenes players. Please remember to acknowledge them as well.

Muffins for Mom/Donuts for Dads
We hope that you appreciate our efforts to engage our scholars in doing something special for our Moms and Dads this week. Today would have been our Muffins for Moms event and Friday, we would have celebrated our dads. Since we cannot be together, each grade level sent an activity for scholars to complete this week to express their love for their moms and dads. Enjoy!

Field Day
In honor of our annual field day event, scheduled for May 15th, the field day committee led by Coach Foster, will be sending out our unique plan for AOS At Home Field Day. The At Home Field Day is a nationwide effort sponsored by Openphysed.org to encourage all children to participate in field day. There will be no assigned academic work on May 15th. Instead, families will receive a packet of organized, fun events for scholars to complete at home. While this is an optional event, we hope that you will participate, take pictures of your scholar engaging in these fun activities and place them on Instagram using the hashtag #theacademyofscholars and #2020fieldday.

Spring Pictures
If you purchased Lifetouch Spring pictures, you will be able to pick them up Monday-Thursday next week, May 11-14 between 8am-12pm. Please call 678-632-6001 when you arrive at the electronic gate, drive ahead and remain in your car. A staff member will bring the packet out to you.

PreK/6th Grade Celebration
Please save the date, May 21st and times: 9:00am – 6th grade and 10:00am – Pre-K. AOS will be hosting a drive-through celebration of our scholars. Parents are asked to decorate their cars and drive through the school’s parking lot as we honk our horns and cheer on our 6th grade and Pre-K scholars. We are asking everyone to be on time. Pre-K classes will be sent a specific time for each class. Please adhere to the time that is given.

Retrieval of Items from School
We will be developing and communicating a plan for parents/scholars to retrieve scholar’s items from the school before May 22nd. Just as the Covid-19 response is ever evolving, we know that the best laid plans ultimately stand a good chance of evolving as well. We will continue to communicate weekly to keep you informed.

Helpful Websites:
Multiple activities to keep kids physically active at home
Link

26 fun activities parents can do with their kids at home
Link

Blessings,
Stacy Lambert-Johnson
Chief Learning Officer

Dearest AOS families,

We are in the homestretch! I hope that everyone is doing well in week 7 of quarantine. With Georgia partially open, let’s make sure we are being safe and doing everything we can to flatten the Covid-19 curve in preparation for the reopening of school for the 2020-2021 school year. Please rest assured that AOS is fervently working to map our re-opening plans. There are tons of details to work through, problems to solve and questions to answer. We expect to be ready to implement our re-opening as soon as we can following the recommendations and guidelines of the Center for Disease Control. That being said, readiness does not mean rushing. Hence the cancellation of Camp AOS this Summer. We are going to make sure our plans to re-open are done, keeping in mind the safety and protection of our AOS community. We will share details of these plans as soon as we can. In the meantime, please continue to stay safe by practicing social distancing and staying at home.

We look forward to the time that we get to see all of our scholars’ smiling faces again and are able to give them all big hugs! We will continue to keep you updated weekly on the latest AOS news and share special events to brighten our scholars’ days. Finally, we recognize that some of you have lost family members and friends while we have been separated from one another. We miss you and we grieve with you. Our hearts and prayers go out to you and your families. We will make it through this together.

Thank you to the parents who attended our seminar on Parenting in a Pandemic hosted by Clinical Psychologist, Dr. Wendy Bailey. Dr. Bailey shared helpful insights that were beneficial not just for coping during this Covid-19 pandemic, but for coping with life in general. If you did not get the opportunity to join us, you can view the recording here.

This week at AOS was Career Week. Thank you to the families who participated in the activities and shared their scholar’s hard work. Here are some who tagged us on Instagram using the hashtags #TheAcademyOfScholars #careerweek.

May 4th-8th is Teacher/Staff Appreciation Week! Room parents will be reaching out to share their ideas on how your scholar can show their appreciation.

Lifetouch Spring Pictures
All Lifetouch Spring picture packets will be sent to AOS. Once campus is open, we will let you know when you can retrieve your child’s packet.

Field Day
AOS Field Day is scheduled for Friday, May 15th. Scholars will get the opportunity to participate at home in field day events. Our field day committee chair will be providing more information to come.

Graduation
We are working on a special way to celebrate our PreK and 6th grade graduates. Save the date, May 21st.

Helpful and Fun Resources for Scholars

National Geographic at-home science and social studies activities

Stories read by celebrities. Standards based activities are included with each story

Multiple activities to keep physically active

List of 30 virtual field trips

Blessings,
Stacy Lambert-Johnson
Chief Learning Officer

Dearest AOS families,

As promised, every week AOS will provide helpful information to assist our families during these trying times. This week’s focus is on children and how to parent in a pandemic. As adults, we understand the added stressors that we have endured due to the COVID-19 pandemic, social distancing and stay at home orders. However, do we know the stressors that our children may be experiencing? What can we do to help them cope and adapt to a new normal?

Join us as we discuss this and more in an informational session on Parenting in a Pandemic, with Psychologist, Dr.Wendy Bailey. Dr. Bailey is a Georgia Licensed Clinical Psychologist with over 20 years experience in Clinical Psychology. She received a Bachelor of Arts in Spanish and Psychology from Spelman College and a Ph.D in Clinical Psychology from Emory University. Dr. Bailey is a mother of 5 and a loving wife to her husband of 29 years. She is excited to host this session to provide helpful strategies that can assist parents in today’s climate .

All interested participants should email their questions to Ms. Lambert-Johnson (sjohnson at academyofscholars.com) by 12:00 pm, Friday, April 24th.

Join us on Friday, April 24th at 6:30 pm using the following link from PC, Mac, Linux, iOS or Android: https://webinar.ringcentral.com/j/1487692177

Or via Telephone at (312) 263-0281 and enter Meeting ID 148 769 2177

Camp AOS Update
In an effort to do our part in keeping those in our community safe and preventing the spread of this devastating virus, sadly, we will not be conducting our summer camp, Camp AOS, during summer 2020. It is our hope that by continuing the practice of social-distancing through the summer months, we will help decrease the effects of COVID-19, allowing us to return to a greater sense of normalcy by the start of the 2020 – 2021 school year.

We look forward to seeing everyone back on campus to start the 2020 – 2021 school year.

Blessings,
Stacy Lambert-Johnson
Chief Learning Officer

Dearest AOS families,

I hope that you had a happy Easter and spent time reflecting on love, hope and new beginnings. I pray that everyone is staying safe, sane and sanitized as we get accustomed to our new normal and abide by the quarantine mandates issued by Governor Kemp and our local counties. I sincerely miss seeing our scholars’ beautiful smiles and getting their daily hugs. Please let them know that they are sorely missed and are in my daily prayers. The AOS staff wanted our “little angels” to know how much we miss them, so we worked on a special project. Please share our message with them. [Click on the image to view the Full Size]

In addition to the Ringcentral conference support and assistance that teachers have been providing to scholars and their famiIies, we will be sharing ideas to assist families’ social, emotional, physical, and spiritual needs during this difficult time. This week’s focus is on literacy and staying sane during quarantine with our children 🙂 . I’m sure that by now, you may be fresh out of ideas on how to keep your child engaged and still limit their screen/tv time. The following article from Forbes magazine has some ideas on how to keep your sanity and engage your children. In addition, I am including two links that offer free access to books, https://www.getepic.com/ and https://stories.audible.com/.

18 Tips on How to Cope With Children During Quarantine

Blessings,
Stacy Lambert-Johnson
Chief Learning Officer

In keeping with Governor Brian Kemp’s mandate regarding the closing of public schools and ban on large gatherings, The Academy of Scholars campus will remain closed for the remainder of the 2019–2020 school year. We will, however, continue our at-home learning program for the balance of the semester.

Each week through May 22, our teachers will continue providing learning assignments, offering timely feedback, and grading work so that this school year will be counted as a year of record in your scholar’s academic journey and meet all requirements of grade level. Our teachers also will be
available to provide academic support by phone to assist with at-home learning assignments. Phone conferences allow AOS to protect the sanctity of the time scholars interact with teachers while avoiding the security issues many schools have experienced using video conferencing. Read FAQs below.

Progress reports will continue to be issued reflecting scholars’ progress for the remaining quarters, with the final report card issued on the last day of the school year, Friday, May 22. Teachers will continue to be available from 8:00 am to 4:00 pm, Monday through Friday, to answer questions and address concerns. Please communicate with your scholar’s teacher directly if and when you need to.

The Good Friday holiday (April 10) and Easter Break (April 13 – April 17) will be honored with no at-home learning assignments from Friday, April 10 through Friday, April 17. At-home learning assignments will resume on Monday, April 20.

You will continue to receive weekly updates from your scholar’s teacher and regular communications from the school.

A message of hope in these trying times

He is Risen! Easter, as it did for the disciples, brings fresh hope into our life and situation. This year, with the COVID-19 pandemic, the message of hope and Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection is more significant than ever. As we sit and think about how life has changed so drastically in just a matter of weeks—social distancing, at-home learning, shelter-in-place orders, and the tragic news of death, economic devastation, and uncertainty—let us not forget the message of Easter: hope, faith in the future, and a new beginning. We wish all of our AOS families a blessed Easter!

Stacy Lambert-Johnson
Chief Learning Officer