We believe all students must feel safe and connected in order to learn. In the current context of a global pandemic and deepening racial and socio-economic inequities, we commit to building partnerships with families and students so all students can thrive. We will work to ensure: 

• Students feel safe, connected, and engaged. 
• Learning environment reflects and leverages students' identity, culture, and home language(s).
• Students feel a sense of belonging, autonomy and competence as learners.
• Family partnerships facilitate learning transfer to and from home and school.

We believe that English Language Learners (ELLs) and Academic Language Learners (ALLs) can develop powerful language and literacy skills when teachers across subject areas integrate content learning with reading, writing and discussion.  Through the following practices, we commit to ensuring all students learn to read and that ELLs and ALLs develop language and literacy skills through regular engagement with complex text, academic discussion, and language-rich tasks across content areas:

• Teachers attend to diverse language needs in both distance learning and in-person context. 
• Explicit attention to language through before, during, and after reading routines.
• Regular and scaffolded opportunities to foster student talk and academic discussion.
• Daily instruction in foundational literacy (phonemic awareness, phonics and fluency) for all K-2 students and those still learning to crack code of reading.

We believe that all students, regardless of current skill or circumstance, can develop the academic, creative and life skills to become college, career and community ready.  Making this vision a reality in distance learning will require us to prioritize essential content and build practices that accelerate student learning to meet or exceed standards.  We commit to:

• Determine priority instructional content and emphasize depth over breadth
• Diagnose unfinished learning from the previous grade and embed instruction in prerequisite skills to support access of grade-level standards  
• Pull small groups to differentiate instruction, assessment, and feedback
• Utilize instructional technology to provide instruction and self-paced, adaptive learning for students.

We believe that all OUSD educators deserve continuous learning opportunities to sharpen their knowledge and skills and time to collaborate with and learn from peers. We have a renewed opportunity to teach in new ways and also reinvest in antiracist instruction.  The following practices will strengthen our collective efficacy and help us to eliminate historic inequities:

• Opportunities for both collective and self-directed learning including foundational and ongoing PD  in technology, content, anti-racist pedagogy, and language development. 
• Caring environments and supports to ensure adults have a sense of belonging, autonomy, and competence as learners.
• Time, data and support to build effective professional learning communities

The timeline below shows a high level overview of our focus areas for the start to our school year. These plans are subject to change, pending negotiations with our labor partners.