Newsletter: May 4

Dear Parents,

Thank you for your patience this week as we have had to adjust center operations due to cases of COVID affecting three children and one staff member across three classrooms. At this time only two households are affected so we do not have to report the cases to the health department at this time.

While we understand that this is a stressful time for all of us, your flexibility and understanding helps alleviate a portion of the stress. For that we are grateful.

As always, we thank you for using the tools that we have - masking, testing, and vaccination (if eligible) - to help protect the vulnerable people within our community.

Please continue reading for all the updates regarding this latest exposure.

Test-to-Stay is in FULL EFFECT

For those children who were exposed last week, we have implemented our Test-to-Stay procedure. This allows children who are in quarantine to remain in care, provided that they remain symptom free AND test negative daily. This is the first time that we have put this procedure into practice.

Hopefully it helps us achieve our collective goal of keeping people healthy AND keeping kids in the center.

Classrooms are SELF-CONTAINED and Extended Hours are PAUSED

We have gone back to self containing our classrooms and limiting the movement of staff between rooms through the end of quarantine for the current cases. That date is May 9th.

Extended hours are temporarily on pause to prevent possible spread during the current cases of COVID.

If we have no other cases attached to the current cases, we will resume our team approach and extended hours on May 10th.

Masking Update:

While we shared earlier this week that COVID cases are on the rise in the county, the transmission rate remains low. We are going to adjust our masking policy to be more in line with the recommendations of the County Health Department.

These changes are in effect when there are no COVID cases attached to the center. When there are COVID cases, such as right now, our policy is:

STAFF: Universal Masking indoors and outdoors when around any people who are not members of their houshold.
CHILDREN:
- attending a classroom where no members have been exposed to covid:
  - Indoors: Mask Strongly Recommended
  - Outdoors: Mask Optional
- attending a classroom where there was an exposure to COVID and any student is attending as part of our Test-to-Stay program:
  - Indoors: Universal Masking for ALL members of the classroom
  - Outdoors: Mask Strongly Recommended

When we DO NOT have a COVID case attached to our Center:

INDOORS:

STAFF AND ADULTS: Universal masking indoors when in the presence of unvaccinated individuals who do not reside in your household.
CHILDREN: It is strongly recommended that all unvaccinated children and all children who come within 6 feet of unvaccinated children over the age of 2 years old, wear a mask indoors. This recommendation is inline with the CDC recommendations due to the overall level of risk in our population (people over the age of 65, unvaccinated children, pregnant women, and people with weakened immune systems)
- Virginia state law allows parents to choose not to have their child masked at any time. If you choose not to have your child masked, please communicate that with Common Ground.

OUTDOORS:

ALL: Masking outdoors is optional for everyone

As a note to all of this, we are working on a color code system for the center to help us ALL understand what level of exposure the center has had. Hopefully this will help all of us!

State of the Childcare Industry

Common Ground has been very lucky to not be hit as hard as some other child care centers, but we are not immune to the struggles of the industry.

Pandemic stabilization funding has allowed us to continue to operate with the increased supply costs, staff costs - necessary to keep groups separate during school hours, but it has dried up for the time being and federal legislation aimed to offset parent costs has yet to pass.

We share this because we refuse to sacrifice the quality of our program and are committed to providing fair and livable compensation for our teachers. Tuition alone does not fund the program that we provide. While we are priced comparable to the market, the rest of the market underpays and undervalues their teachers.

Teacher Appreciation Week is HERE!

Fairfax County has proclaimed that it is officially Early Childhood Educator’s Week! Of course, we know that ECE’s are Teachers, so of course that makes sense to all of us.

Remember, the best way to show your teachers that you support them is by donating to the bonus fund. We have budgets for half of the planned bonus, but rely on parents and donors to make up the rest!

So far this week, we have done the following for our AMAZING teachers:

bagels on Monday
Starbucks on Tuesday
lunch from Cava today

We have more treats planned for the rest rest of the week too! You can share your appreciation this week with your kind words, a card or hand made something from your kiddos!

WELCOME BACK MR. ZACH!!!

We are so pleased and excited to tell you all know that our beloved Mr. Zach has come back to us just in time for SPRING WEATHER!! He has stepped back into our classrooms without missing a step. While his absence was brief, it felt like a lifetime in our hearts, so make sure to say hello when you get the chance!