COVID-19 (Coronavirus)

March 20, 2020

Good evening Tapestry Families,

All the important and useful advice about personal protections and community behavior will settle soon into a habit as our Tapestry community and the world around us faces up to a dangerous moment, together.  All the same, it is my hope that all of you are well and doing your part to practice the collective actions that our government leaders are encouraging—stay home, stay calm and wash your hands, for one.  (For more details on the ways you can take precaution and stay healthy, visit our website here.)

However, my intention is not to bring new news to you in this particular communication. The Tapestry Compass Leadership Team, and our incredible instructional, administrative and counseling teams will continue to keep you informed about the mechanics of the calendar, what we think is best for kids and what actions we are taking in this unusual time.

As we learn more and more each day, as we develop our best responses, and decide on the most desirable outcomes in adapting our schools’ work plans to be a school community of real-world learning experiences which prioritize intellectual, social and emotional growth, by other means, we will keep you informed and up-to-date.

As we begin to implement our continuation of instruction plans and distant working protocols, it will be trial and error. Education can be messy, ask any veteran Tapestry teacher, so count on degrees of imperfection as we do our best to make these recent obstacles as positive as we can for your children.

Meanwhile, I would like to pause for a moment and acknowledge and reflect on the incredible work of our schools’ teachers, leaders and staff on their herculean efforts this past week in the face of a sudden interruption of normalcy that is fair to say brings up deep and diverse feelings among us all. I have never been so proud of our community and their efforts.

As we develop and continuously refine our learning plans for your children, our school’s vision of equity and inclusion are at the forefront of our minds as we are strategizing and making decisions. As you all know, we are crew, not passengers. For our teachers, today, Crew means that they are practicing ‘physical distancing with social connection’.  Our grade-level teams are still meeting regularly and talking about the best interests and particular needs of their individual kids, our instructional coaches are continuing their plans to work with teachers who want to master their craft as professionals in the field, our teachers are teaching and our leaders are leading. Our facilities staff is working on maintaining our beautiful spaces and our food service staff is working tirelessly to provide healthy meals to healthy brains.

If Buffalo is the city of good neighbors, then I’m convinced those in the Tapestry community are those key friends and players that act as the glue that keeps the neighborhood together.

I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else in the world right now.

I’ve heard from so many of you about how you are doing, how your families are coping and how you are receiving the work of our school.  Please keep sending in those encouraging words, and please share them with your children’s teachers and principals as well.  As we tend to say to your kids, kindness goes a long way.

Remember that you are not alone.  Please reach out to us and each other during these trying times.  We are all in this together.

We are crew.

Sincerely,

Eric Klapper

Executive Director