Hey team,
Time has become very wonky and weird, hasn't it? It seems to me like it was just yesterday and forever ago that we were packing up to prepare to leave for State and then suddenly we were all tossed into the world of online learning and we lived from moment to moment trying to figure out what to do with all of our end of the year traditions, graduations, and life in general and now here are we about a month out from returning to our classroom - I say return, but I think this is going to be a new experience for all of us.
The struggle continues on for many of us - COVID cases continue to sprout up in our students' lives and in our own lives and households. It is still very much a weird and unprecedented time and this school year already promises to be a complicated beast but I can't wait to hear all of your success stories and the adventures we will still have this year.
Our students are ready to return (most of them) and our parents are ready for us to take them back (most of them) but much of this upcoming school year still remains a little mysterious and hypothetical. Before I get into the hypotheticals let me tell you what I know to be true..
I have been told that all of the refund checks have been sent out to schools and should be received soon. I also know that our District Festival this year is going to be a virtual affair - I think that most District Festivals will end up falling into that category and, in fact, many of our events will be virtual this year. I know that FTC has already decided to go virtual and I think that FATE will be virtual this year as well.
What I don't know is what that virtual festival will look like - I have been given no guidelines or instruction about that yet. More information should be on it's way to me mid-July and our board meeting (which will be a Zoom meeting) is in August. Last year our district information meeting was the first weekend of September (September 7th) so that would make this year's meeting on September 5th. All signs point to that being a virtual meeting too - I'll get some guidance from up the ladder on how to handle that but I imagine it will be a sponsors Zoom and a Student Zoom.
I wish I had more solid information for you but these are the things I know so far to be true and how I understand it will all take place. We currently have our District Festival scheduled for November 12th to 14th (with FTC being the weekend before that). I think since we won't be traveling and it will all end up being virtual we may have a little more flexibility about changing dates since we won't be at a literal location (but again, this is all theory at this point).
I'm going into this year just as anxious and scared as the rest of you (or maybe you're all more confident and brave than me, I'm okay with that, too) but I know that once we get in the room where it happens and we're surrounded by the kids we do this for, everything should fall into place - it may be a new weird and unexpected place where nothing has ever fallen before, but it will be okay, we'll get through this.
I am attaching the Guidelines for reopening that have been shared by our parent organization the EDTA. Please look them over, they seem to be quite well written and achievable. I forwarded a copy of them on to my principal and admin team at school so they know what my plan will be, I encourage you to do the same. This is also a great resource to share with concerned parents and students so they can see that we have a plan and we're not going into the school year under the false pretense of "EVERYTHING IS NORMAL!" We, as we always do, adjust and change as outside forces dictate. This is one big year of "yes, and..."
I'm also attaching the One Act moratorium list. I have no idea how one acts will work for the district festival. I have a number of theories and ideas on how to make the IEs work but the one acts make my brain hurt. I know the higher ups have been looking at the recent virtual ITF festival as a template and guide for how they want to handle the District festivals but, again, I'll share more details when I get them.
Thank you all for everything you do and continue to do and welcome to the new frontier, folks, let's go meet it (masked) head on and put on a show!
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Jason BlanksDistrict One ChairFlorida State ThespiansFort Walton Beach High SchoolSponsor, Troupe 01-4967email: JasonBlanksD1@gmail.comcell: 850-441-0447