Oxford High School

Dear OHS Families,

We wanted to send out a tentative transition plan before our upcoming telephone town halls.  We are seeking input from our parents and will be working with OHS staff before finalizing our transition plan back to school. In the last few weeks, we have been working with several outside groups with extensive experience on trauma and returning after a traumatic event.  We intend to provide more specific details for many of the topics below in the near future.

Our overall goal is to safely and slowly transition our students and staff back.  There is no true timeline or playbook for each student, but we will have continued help from trauma experts and mental health agencies. We understand every student and staff member is at a very different place in their own healing and ability to return to academics.  Our first focus is to improve, then maintain the physical, social, and emotional well-being of our students and staff.  Our second focus is to slowly integrate academics back into our plans and schedule.  We know there a wide range of our students’ immediate desires and abilities to engage in academics.  Therefore, we are working on plans to differentiate the academic rigor for each student. 

Currently, there is extensive renovation work being done inside of OHS.  The work is anticipated to be done before the end of January.  Our building will be back to its original state, but you will see many upgrades, including new carpet in each classroom and the hallways, new paint throughout the hallways and several new welcoming full wall graphics.

Schedule to Return

It is important to get our students and staff back together as soon as possible.  With our desire to do this and the high school not being completely ready for us yet, we have worked together with the middle school to use their building for two weeks this month.  We have created an alternating hybrid schedule with OMS staff and students and are currently planning for half-days for OHS students at OMS on January 11, 13, 18, and 20.  We will follow our normal half-day start and finish times.  You will be receiving more details, including bell schedules in the upcoming days.  We will be providing students with optional asynchronous assignments when they are not in-person for the remainder of the 1st semester.  OMS students will be attending in-person learning on the days OHS students have optional asynchronous activities.  During the week of January 24, we are planning to transition students back to OHS for the last week of the 1st semester.  As a result of our transition back, we have moved the start of the second semester to Monday, January 31.  Please see the attached calendar to help illustrate January's schedule. 

Supports/Safety & Security

We strongly encourage all of our families to attend a Zoom Parent Workshop presented by Trauma Specialist Dr. Henry at 6pm and 7:45pm on Thursday, January 6.  An email will be sent with the Zoom invitation to join the workshop prior to the meeting on Thursday.

We are planning three Open Houses for our students and parents before students arrive back at OHS on January 20 & 21 from 6 – 8 pm and Jan. 22 from 10 am – 2 pm.  This will give our students and parents an opportunity to walk the building and may help with their transition back to OHS. We will have many trauma and crisis mental health experts on site supporting students and staff during our transition back.  We understand each student may be at a very different place in their readiness to return.  We will also have an additional presence from the Oakland County Sherriff’s Office during student arrival and throughout the school day.   Students will be receiving clear backpacks when they arrive back and they will be required for use during our transition back.  We will have a new process for student arrival and a process for athletes and performing arts students who have may additional gear/equipment.

First Semester Grades

We are planning for no (required) additional student assignments for the remainder of the first semester.  However, we will be encouraging students to engage in as much academic coursework as they can when arriving back next week.  We’ve received this guidance from trauma experts as students continue healing and reforming previous routines. Students will have an opportunity to complete recent outstanding coursework.  Students will also have an opportunity to improve their current grade if all current assignments have been completed.  We are cancelling 1st semester exams.  We have drafted tentative plans for first semester final grade options, but we will be sending out official grade options for 1st semester after gathering input from parents and staff this week.

Second Semester and Transfers

We have recently sent out a form for parents to complete if they are considering transferring their student(s) to OVA.  A high school counselor will reach out to those families in the coming days to discuss their options. This has helped us plan and prepare, however, an official transfer request form will be sent out in a separate, upcoming communication.  For the Spring 2022 semester only, we will be allowing current seated OHS students to enroll in OVA courses and work from home while remaining an OHS student.  (This is different than the previous two school years).   If parents/students choose this option, they must maintain this academic plan for the full second semester.  Students can also transfer to our Virtual Academy and be enrolled as an OVA student.  We understand there may be a population of students we have to slowly integrate back in-person for the second semester. Therefore, if an individual wants to commit to coming back in-person but find it difficult, we will work with them during the first few weeks of the 2nd semester until they feel comfortable.

We understand there is a lot to digest in this communication.  Please know you will be receiving future, separate communications with more detail for our first two weeks at OMS, first week back at OHS, 1st semester grades and 2nd semester transfers.  Thank you for your patience and support.