New York State Education Commissioner Betty Rosa visited the Schenectady City School District to welcome back students, staff, and administrators on Wednesday.
Rosa toured Pleasant Valley Elementary and Schenectady High School with Superintendent Anibal Soler. Soler says it's good to feel the excitement of a return to normalcy.
“Just doing school, like the way we used to do school, letting kids gather, letting kids be celebrated, letting our teachers, you know, teach without any rules and restrictions,” Soler said.
Rosa says rebounding from two years of COVID interruptions holds promise for educators and students alike.
"I think it's the, focusing on obviously, having the students reconnecting with both their sense of wellness, their academics, getting, readjusting to being in, you know, back in school, but more importantly, thinking about the kind of projects and kind of work that they want to do in terms of engaging, you know, what some of the classes, they were talking about, options, pathways, different things that they're going to be considering for the future," said Rosa.
Soler says COVID hit the district hard.
“I think there's obviously an impact that we all saw with this isolated virtual learning kids at home, you know, teachers trying to work miracles through a computer screen," Soler said. "And I think the reality is we've got some ground to gain, I think we saw some of that being gained this summer. We had our largest enrollment of summer enrollment in Schenectady history, we had almost 1600 Students voluntarily participate in summer enrichment. So I think that's starting that that work. And I think for us, we have to think about our extended day programming, what are we doing with kids? How are we extending our school day? Having our teachers kind of go back to some of the basics, you know, the algebra, the writing the reading. Some of the things that we know, were missed without having that direct contact. So we got work to do.”
Rosa says she was particularly impressed by the high school's student-faculty relationship.
"I love the energy of the superintendent, the principal, the assistant principals, overall, just the level of excitement about being back with their children," said Rosa.
Soler says the school district has come a long way since he arrived on the scene in July 2021. He’s grateful Rosa came to visit.
“You know, we really changed the narrative of Schenectady, we're an urban community," said Soler. "We're really trying to, we have this concept of Schenectady rising and trying to change the perception of urban education, trying to redefine our kids experiences, try to make some relevance to it. So for her to choose us out of 700 and some districts that she could have easily chosen, I think, lets us know that they're listening in Albany, they're paying attention to some of the work that we're doing. So I think it's a complement to our staff, our students, our administrators that, you know, the Commissioner wanted to see and take a quick peek at the work that we're starting to do in year two.”
Soler says the district has prioritized student safety.
“What we know is our parents send us their most prized possession every day," Soler said. "So we've got to do everything we can to try to create that environment. Nothing is 100% foolproof, but you know, we've increased cameras, we've increased physical safety personnel, we've added school counselors to every elementary, we didn't have school counselors in every elementary school, before I got here. Now we have that. So we're adding layers to try to create proactive approaches to safety and security and climate.”
Rosa had this message for teachers, parents and students:
“Enjoy this is the joy of learning, the joy of you know, for teachers is the joy of teaching for students is the joy of learning, because this is, the, you know, this is the pathway that's going to support you and for students," Rosa said. "This is these are the brushes that teachers give you to paint your future and your tomorrow.”
The new school year brings relaxed COVID guidelines from the state. New York Governor Kathy Hochul said in August preemptive testing is over and masks are not required.
“The days of sending an entire classroom home because one person was symptomatic or tests positive — those days are over," said Hochul. "We've been through that experiment. We're no longer gonna be sending kids home, keeping them away from that essential experience of being together in a classroom."
