REPORTS TO THE BOARD

Teaching and Learning Report

To: Michael Green

From: Asha Riley

Date: April 8, 2021

Re: Teaching and Learning Report

Emergency Waiver Procedure Changes

The emergency waiver program is intended to help prevent students from being unduly impacted by unforeseen disruptions to coursework and assessments resulting from an emergency or disaster. The waiver program will:

• Give districts the authority to waive certain credit and graduation pathway option requirements for individual students who were unable to complete graduation requirements despite a good faith effort on the part of the district to help the student meet the requirements.
• Provide for a waiver of the hour or day requirement for private schools for the 2020-2021 school year; also states that the instruction hour requirement for private schools with an online education program is deemed met.

The waiver allows LEAs (school districts, charter schools, and tribal compact schools) and private schools to waive certain credit and graduation pathway option requirements for graduating students on a case-by-case basis.

• The waiver does not apply to local graduation requirements. Districts have the authority to waive their local requirements. By adopting resolution 2419, we would be replacing the procedure currently outlined in policy 2418. This would ensure any requests received any time prior to graduation will be considered.
• Students awarded the waiver must have demonstrated preparation for their post-secondary plan according to their High School and Beyond Plan.

It used to be that the state facilitated the waiver process, tracked the formal requests, and approved or denied them. This new waiver option now delegates both authority and responsibility for the process to the local school district.

In preparation, we have established a process and a record keeping tool that complies with the state requirements. This includes: 

• An analysis of every senior students’ status
• Communication plan for any and all students who qualify, provided in their home language
• The creation of a panel with at least one counselor,  educators with expertise in trauma-informed instruction and culturally responsive education, and if appropriate, special education, instruction for multilingual/English Language learners to review and make recommendations to the district concerning any decision to decline a waive.
• Making and noting “ good faith efforts” of  the district
• Ensures we follow the limitations of the waiver
• Assurance equity in administering the emergency waiver. The district shall disaggregate waiver data by student subgroups for analysis to ensure no particular group was disproportionately impacted.