Herbert Carter Global Community Magnet

This week in Discovery has been a blast so far!

9/1/20 Today, Marion School District received notification that 5 students have been confirmed as positive for COVID-19. None of the five have been on any MSD campus during their infectious period. As a result, no staff or students have been exposed or identified as a close contact. The campuses affected are VPA, HCGC, and MJHS, however, three of the five cases are virtual learners and the remaining two cases have not been on our campus since we began school on 8/24/20. For the privacy of all students and staff, Marion School District will not be sharing any personal information publicly. All of the cases have been reported to the Arkansas Department of Health. We remain firmly committed to providing a safe environment and will follow the guidance provided by the Arkansas Department of Health, CDC, and Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. -- Kelly Fogleman, BSN, RN, NCSN School Health Coordinator 870-739-5140 (office) kfogleman@msd3.org

Attention all VIRTUAL learners! Please see the attached flyer regarding ID and paperwork pick-up at HCGC.

Greetings Patriots! In response to a growing number of requests from parents- the Marion School District would like to clarify the process for students that initially signed up for the virtual learning option- who at anytime desire to transition to face-to-face, in-classroom instruction. This can be accomplished in 2 easy steps. Step 1 - Go to the main office at school where your child is registered. If you have a school provided device, bring that device and charger with you, turn it in and complete a Device Return Form. Step 2 - The school secretary will then add your student to the list of students returning to face-to-face instruction and a class schedule will be provided to you and your student can immediately return to in-class instruction As always thank you for your continued support of the Marion School District.

I just wanted to pass on this guidance from Dr. Dillaha from the Arkansas Department of Health: Arkansas Department of Health State (ADH) Epidemiologist Dr. Jennifer Dillaha recommended that Arkansans wear face masks that fit pretty closely to the face and consist of a minimum of two layers of material in order to reduce the puffs of air that can go through or around the mask. Dr. Dillaha said masks with valves are not effective because the valve focuses a stream of air and does not prevent respiratory droplets from making it outside the mask. If individuals choose to wear neck gaiters or bandannas, they should double-them up because the second layer of material will offer added protection. MSD will not police types of masks worn by faculty/students, as long as the mouth and nose are covered, per MSD policy. However, please consider using a mask with at least two layers of material and with no expiration valve to best protect others! Lastly, remember masks should be treated like underwear... KEEP THEM CLEAN AND CHANGE THEM DAILY!! Kelly Fogleman, BSN, RN, NCSN Coordinated School Health Coordinator 870-739-5140 kfogleman@msd3.org

If you have not filled out the free/reduce lunch application for the 2020-21 school year, please do so now. It's now available at https://bit.ly/38joQnt Everyone should apply today. Even if you have chosen the MSD online learning option, your child is still a district student and your eligibility counts. If you've already applied for the 2020-21 school year you do not have to reapply. Thank you for your support of the MSD Child Nutrition Department.

Already showing her leadership skills! Mrs Hughes was so proud to drive by and see her HCGC baby doing her chores 🌎❤️🧹

Getting to know each other while social distancing! Way to Go 5th Grade!

Hello Patriots! The Marion School District phone system is currently experiencing technical difficulties. Your phone calls may or may not make it through to our buildings today. Please be patient as our technicians are working diligently to correct this problem. Thank you for your continued support!

We appreciate your flexibility and understanding during these uncertain times. We are working to navigate the changing data and guidance on what our schools will look like for the 2020-21 school year. The health of our students, staff, and families is our number one priority. These pages will be updated regularly to keep everyone informed on what we’re doing as a district to combat the effects of COVID-19 (Coronavirus). We continue to closely monitor reports and information shared by the Arkansas Department of Health and the CDC regarding COVID-19, and we are in contact regularly with health officials from the city and county. We know that the COVID-19 pandemic has raised many questions regarding how the district will start for the coming school year. We have created these web pages to help provide context to our decisions as we prepare for the 2020-2021 school year. The information here will be updated to reflect changes as they are made. https://bit.ly/32iREcV

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Good evening Patriots! If you missed your device pickup this week you have another opportunity tomorrow morning from 7am to 10am at the Patriot Arena parking lot. Students must be accompanied by a parent or legal guardian. See you there!

Looking for your child’s bus stop? You can search it on our website. Simply go to www.msd3.org, then click Menu. Under District Departments, click Transportation, and the Find My Bus Stop. Type your address and select your students school to see when and where your student can expect to meet the bus each day. You can also click the following link: Infofinderi.com/ifi/?cid=MSD3BBH7VFUW

8-21-20: Weekly COVID-19 Update Staff reported positive for COVID-19 this week: 1 Staff quarantined due to exposure to COVID-19 this week: 1 Students reported positive for COVID-19 this week: 1 Students quarantined due to exposure to COVID-19 this week: 0 Total staff positive for COVID-19 since 7/24/20: 12 Total staff quarantined due to exposure since 7/24/20: 14 Total students positive for COVID-19 since 7/15/20: 7 Total students quarantined due to exposure since 7/15/20: 10 For the privacy of all students and staff, Marion School District will not be sharing any personal information publicly. We remain firmly committed to providing a safe environment and will follow the guidance provided by the Arkansas Department of Health, CDC, and Department of Elementary and Secondary Education -- Kelly Fogleman, BSN, RN, NCSN Coordinated School Health Coordinator 870-739-5140 kfogleman@msd3.org

Happy Friday Patriot Nation: The attached graphic is a screening process that parents need to conduct on their child each day prior to coming to school. All of our facutly and staff are looking forward to see you starting Monday! GO PATRIOTS!

Join our team!

We were very happy to see Dr. Fenter’s smiling face last night at MST’s device pickup. Glad you’re feeling better!

8-19-20 The Marion School District received notification of a confirmed positive case of COVID-19 concerning one of our student-athletes in the MJHS Football program. Health Department officials will determine the appropriate action for the student-athlete. The positive student-athlete was last on campus on 8/18/20. The facility and equipment have been properly disinfected and no closure of facilities are required. For the privacy of all students and staff, Marion School District will not be sharing any personal information publicly. We remain firmly committed to providing a safe environment and will follow the guidance provided by the Arkansas Department of Health, CDC, and Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. -- Kelly Fogleman, BSN, RN, NCSN Coordinated School Health Coordinator 870-739-5140 kfogleman@msd3.org

UPDATE: Pandemic-EBT Assistance for Families Whose Children Get Free or Reduced Lunches The federal Food and Nutrition Services under the U.S. Department of Agriculture approved Arkansas’s plan to provide Pandemic EBT (Electronic Benefits Transfer card) assistance to families with additional grocery costs as a result of school closures. For each child enrolled in the National School Lunch Program, a family may receive a one-time benefit of $319, which is the value of the average cost of a school meal ($5.70) multiplied by the number of days missed in March, April, and May. This is not a cash benefit but rather a card that families can use at any grocer that accepts Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits. The Arkansas Department of Education worked with local school districts to obtain lists of student names and addresses for those participating in the program. Below is an overview of benefits provided to-date, initial and ongoing challenges and solutions, and a timeline of the program. Overview The Department of Education submitted a list of about 306,000 students that received free or reduced priced meals. The total benefit amount issued for Pandemic EBT was approximately $99,224,950, which is paid entirely with federal funds. Of those eligible: • 101,999 children were in families that already participate in the traditional SNAP program. o DHS already had addresses for these families in our eligibility system. o The additional $319 per child was loaded to EBT cards starting June 29. • 205,000 children were in families that are not participating in the traditional SNAP program (or who were in SNAP but the address at the school did not match the address in their SNAP case). o Because these families are not in the DHS SNAP eligibility system, the Department of Education got lists with the latest available address from schools, and DHS used that list to mail out EBT cards. o Cards began going out on July 9. o 151,000 of these cards have been activated. Challenges and Solutions Because this is a program that has never implemented in Arkansas prior to 2020, there have been some challenges both at the outset and ongoing that we have or are working to overcome. • Initial Challenges and Solutions o Change of Address – For many of the families who were not SNAP participants, the addresses were months old, and it is likely that many had moved without notifying their schools or DHS. By the time DHS provided the list of addresses to the vendor on June 25, it had processed 3,000 address changes but not all address changes submitted were able to be processed by that time. o Length of time to distribute initial benefits –There are only a small number of vendors that create and mail out EBT cards across the country. That meant that once DHS submitted the names and addresses on June 15, the vendor first had to mail out cards for other states that were approved before Arkansas. This delayed the mailing of cards by two weeks and resulted in DHS changing dates for distribution of benefits. • Ongoing Challenges and Solutions o Eligible children not on list – Since we issued benefits on June 29 for existing SNAP clients and July 9 and 17 for non-SNAP clients, families have reached out to say they either received Pandemic EBT for some but not all eligible children OR that their child is eligible but did not receive Pandemic EBT benefits. To address this, DHS is working with the Department of Education, which is in turn working with school districts, to confirm eligibility and issue cards for these families. o Large volume of emails asking about card status –Because of the delay in issuing benefits, the need for address changes, and the issue related to eligible students not being on the list, we received a large volume of emails from families and are behind in processing them. To address this, DHS is pulling staff from other areas within the agency to help quickly process emails and determine what action, if any, needs to be taken. We expect to process all the remaining emails within the next two weeks. o No return address – The vendor hired to mail out the EBT cards for non-SNAP families failed to include a return address on the envelopes. To date about 26% of these Pandemic EBT cards have not been activated. This week, we will ask families to promptly activate their cards as we will soon de-activate all cards that have not been activated and then re-issue them with correct addresses. New cards will be issued between now and September 30, which is the federal deadline for issuance of P-EBT benefits. The vendor, not the state, will incur the additional cost to re-issue the P-EBT benefits. If a family has not received a card for a participating child or otherwise needs to contact DHS about P-EBT, they should email pebt@dhs.arkansas.gov. As noted above, we are dedicating additional staff to process and respond to emails to address client issues and concerns more quickly.