Hello Ram Families,

It has been an extremely tough week for our students and staff and not how I wanted the school year to start. We see a significant uptick in student absences in our buildings. We are also seeing increasing positive cases of Covid. Many staff have also become ill, and the availability of substitute teachers is declining rapidly.

To attempt to slow down and hopefully stop this sudden increase in student and staff illness and Covid cases, I am requiring that all students, staff, and visitors to our schools wear a mask beginning September 7, 2021. I know this is not what any of us want. I have consulted closely with our board of education, health experts, and neighboring school districts and will continue to do so. I understand the arguments for and against masking. My goal is simple, I know a mask may slow this down, and I know wearing a mask will help to keep us learning in person. I want to be clear that I will do anything possible to prevent us from going to remote learning. It is not an option that any of us want.

I will be monitoring our student health and Covid status daily. Every two weeks, I will review our trends; we will remove the mask requirements if our illness numbers trend down. Likewise, if our illness numbers remain where they are now or trend up, we will keep masks on and reevaluate in two weeks. As soon as we can take the masks off, we will.

I know this is not what any of us want right now, but we have overcome before and can pull together as a school and community and do it again. Masks may keep us in school and save students and staff from quarantine if exposed to Covid.

Thank you for doing your part to keep our schools open.

Eric D Landversicht

Superintendent