Dear Parents/Guardians,
As we plan for the reopening of schools for fall 2020, we recognize that we must adhere to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines for health and safety. Therefore, we are working to develop educational programming that first and foremost provides access to instruction for all of our students. The Manheim Township School District’s instructional plans will seek to be differentiated, based upon the Pennsylvania Department of Health’s red, yellow, or green status for Lancaster County.
As part of our planning process, we are working on a transportation plan that allows for social distancing and regular cleaning of our buses and vans in between student runs. Presently, the guidance that we are being given from the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE) is putting significant restrictions on the number of students that we may transport on buses at one time (for example, we may be restricted to one student per seat on our buses). Therefore, we are seeking information regarding the intentions of our families with regard to transportation preferences.
Please complete this very brief survey (linked at the bottom of this letter) to indicate your anticipated student transportation plan for this fall, assuming that we are permitted to host instruction in our school buildings. Please respond to this survey to the best of your current knowledge. Your response here will not be considered a “firm and final” decision on your part; rather, it will help us with our planning for instruction for the coming school year. If you have multiple children in the district, please respond just one time with the transportation preference that is most favorable to you.
We plan to solicit your input a second time in early-August, potentially asking you to make a more firm commitment regarding your transportation plans for the new school year. For now, sharing your best intentions with us will be sufficient. Please know that this situation is constantly evolving, and we will continue to update our community throughout the summer via additional communications from the district. However, this initial information will be a tremendous help to us as we plan for instruction in the new school year. Thank you for your timely response (by Friday, 6/19/20, please) to this request as this information will be critical to our planning for the safe return of students to our campuses in August.
Sincerely,
Manheim Township School District’s Department of Curriculum & Instruction
***Please select the following link to participate in the survey: Parent Transportation Survey Link***