WELCOME BACK TO SCHOOL 2022-23
Welcome to the 2022-23 academic school year. Once again, we enter August hoping our school year won’t again be impacted by events out of our control and with the fervent hope of a more normal school year focused on academic learning. Although I know of no impending mandates regarding the wearing of masks or mandatory vaccinations, the mandatory isolation periods for staff and students who test positive for COVID will likely remain problematic, especially with a continuing shortage of substitutes and the most recent surge in the latest variant.
We do know we will face continuing controversies over a variety of national and local cultural and political issues. On each of these matters, we will continue to try our best to craft collaborative solutions that follow the law while building consensus. As we debate the issues and find common ground, the good news is for the first time in a long time, if ever, we do have the benefit of considerable new funding available to address student needs both in terms of social and emotional support as well as learning loss mitigation. As a result, we now have more summer support programs in place, including in collaboration with the Boys and Girls Club, YMCA, and the City of Paso Robles. We similarly will have a wealth of expanded after-school opportunities in the coming year. Newly-hired Community Communication Specialist, Monica Silva, has been publicizing these programs, which we will be evaluating at the end of the year for continuation or elimination. Please enroll your children in all which meet your family’s needs and help us to make them effective as we debate which to continue long term and which to sunset.
We also hope for continuing broad support of our three core academic goals of Early Literacy, Algebra Readiness, and English Language fluency. “Paso Reads”, our initiative with the goal of every student reading at grade level by the end of third grade, will always be our Number One priority. All the research and common sense support the critical importance of all students reading at grade level, which remains our most important of goals and the key to long-term, continuing success. This comprehensive effort to promote literacy, especially before Grade 3 when kids make the critical transition from “Learning to Read” to “Reading to Learn,” is our preeminent goal, and we hope to see evidence of it throughout our school system and into the community. We hope to see kids reading throughout their entire day, taking books home for family libraries, school and other offices distributing books, and parent volunteers reading to targeted students. Literacy experts were already working with teams at each site last year, and preliminary results have been very encouraging.
Although core academics will always be our first job, we also strive in Paso Schools to offer a balanced curriculum with specific career pathways to ensure we meet the district’s primary mission of producing graduates who are college and career ready. We also desire to publicize and expand, if warranted, our numerous physical fitness and athletic programs and to participate in the Visual and Performing Arts at all grade levels. Making students at earlier grades aware of these opportunities and for kids at younger ages to see the connection between what they are learning and their future is also a renewed priority. Each June, I note the inexplicably large percentage of graduating seniors who apparently have opted NOT to be involved in athletics, performing arts, clubs, career pathways, and the like in the senior section of the yearbook. Each and every student finding something here in school that fits their personal interests and possible career or college goals will help each kid to see the relevance of their schooling.
I assure you we have a dedicated staff committed to improving the truly exceptional educational offerings already afforded the students of Paso Robles, and we always look to improve and expand how we connect to and serve our students and community. Please contact me at (805) 769-1000 or [email protected] with any questions, concerns, or suggestions. Welcome to the new school year. May it be Paso's best year yet.