We are overjoyed to welcome back our students and staff for the 2023-24 school year!
The Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine for children 5-11 years of age has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Center for Disease Control (CDC). This is the final approval needed in order to begin vaccinating this age group. We strongly encourage you to vaccinate your children to protect them, their fellow students, our school staff, and our wider communities. Children can get vaccinated at their doctor’s office, pharmacies, and vaccine sites across the city.
Here is a list of vaccination sites across the city.
The following resources provide information about the importance and safety of the COVID vaccine in children:
As of January 18, any home in the United States can order up to four free COVID-19 tests from the government. Please visit https://www.covidtests.gov or the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) site to order the free tests.
Testing sites in your ZIP code (including mobile testing sites) can be found here.
We are operating a food pantry for all KIPP NYC students at our High School located at 201 E 144th St, Bronx, NY 10451. It will be open each Friday at 10am between July 29 and September 2, 2022 (except for August 12). We will be providing meal kits with food for seven days’ worth of breakfasts and lunches. Students, their guardians or family members may pick up the kits; however, it is not available to non-KIPP NYC students and their families/guardians due to state regulations.
Click here to find a free meal location near you. Breakfast is served from 8-9:15am. Lunch is served from 11am-1:15pm. Free meal services are available through Friday, September 2.
The 300 summer meal sites include schools, community pool centers, and parks, including food trucks at three parks (Sara D. Roosevelt Park in Manhattan’s Chinatown, Holcombe Rucker Park in Harlem, and Rufus King Playground in Jamaica Queens).
No registration, documentation, or ID is necessary to receive a free breakfast or lunch meal. You can text “NYC Food” or “NYC COMIDA” to 304-304, and No Kid Hungry will respond with your nearest locations. You can also call 311 for nearby meal sites. Adults must be accompanied by a young person to pick up meals. You must remain on-site to eat hot meals, but can take pre-packaged cold meals to go.
Through the P-EBT program, all families regardless of income will receive $375 per child in food benefits to help cover the costs of meals from last summer. The money will be automatically loaded on P-EBT cards that eligible families received in the mail in 2020 or 2021. (Please keep your cards after the money is used in case the program continues after this round of benefits.) The benefits can be used to purchase eligible food items in stores that accept them and are available for at least 274 days from the date they were issued. You can check the Connect EBT site to see if your summer benefit was deposited. To learn more about P-EBT benefits or to replace a missing card please the NYS SNAP COVID-19 Information Page.
If you have misplaced a P-EBT Food Benefit card issued to your child[ren), you may order a replacement card by calling 1-888-328-6399. If your child(ren) received P-EBT benefits on a Medicaid card and you need to order a replacement NYS Medicaid card or select a PIN, go to otda.ny.gov for more information.
Once you have set up a PIN to access your P-EBT food benefits, you can check your family’s P-EBT food benefits balance by visiting www.connectebt.com or by calling 1-888-328-6399.
Community Food Connection (CFC), formerly known as the Emergency Food Assistance Program (EFAP), provides funding to more than 500 community kitchens and food pantries citywide. If you need food, you can get help today at one of New York City’s food pantries, which provide groceries to cook at home, or community kitchens, which provide hot meals. Need to find an active food pantry near you? Look it up with this interactive Food Assistance Map. In addition, you can download a list of NYC Food Pantries and Community Kitchens, or call 311 to find the locations nearest to you. Agents are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
KIPP NYC has arranged for all returning students to keep and use their KIPP-issued student Chromebook computer during the summer months. We are hopeful that providing access to the Chromebook and online learning platforms during the summer will enhance your student’s learning experience and support in preventing summer learning loss.
Your student either has been or will be sent home with their student Chromebook and an informational packet, which outlines best practices for care, troubleshooting, and more. Please refer to this tech packet for support, which includes solutions to common problems, answers to frequently asked questions, and troubleshooting steps to take for specific issues.
If you have any tech questions or Chromebook repairs, please complete this Tech Support Request Form.
Students and families should contact their schools directly to arrange returns of damaged Chromebooks.
New Students and Families – Get your Chromebook and KIPP NYC Login!
New students can pick up their KIPP NYC Chromebooks and KIPP NYC logins directly from their school campuses. Please reach out to the Director of Operations at your schools with any questions.
Visit the Clever portal and launch the new Canvas Learning Management System.
Video: How To Login To Clever
To connect with teachers for live video conferences, and learning sessions, follow the steps in this video.
The example below shows the process when using a Chromebook. Regardless of what device you use, you’ll use your KIPP student email to login to each service.
You can access a folder of helpful videos and guides broken down by program here.
Please find more information on the ESSER grants (CARES,CRRSA, and ARP) on theNYSED website.
For KIPP, we will be using ESSER funds to address the COVID-19 pandemic and its effects on our students, learning loss and the academic, social, and emotional needs of our students. Please find the ARP’s budget narratives and FS-10 for KIPP AMP here, which represents how funds were allocated and used across all KIPP NYC Public Schools. Para obtener una copia del plan, por favor mande un correo electrónico a [email protected].
For any comments/questions, please contact [email protected] or call us at 212-991-2610
Infinity ARP (ESSER III) FS-10A Budget Amendment
Infinity ARP (ESSER III) FS-10 Budget
Infinity ARP (ESSER III) Budget Narrative
Infinity ARP (ESSER III) Application
Academy ARP (ESSER III) FS-10A – Budget Amendment 002 – 02.26.24
Academy ARP (ESSER III) FS-10 Budget
Academy ARP (ESSER III) Budget Narrative Academy
Academy ARP (ESSER III) Application
20-21 FS10 – Bronx III ESSER I
Health and Safety Policies
Health & Safety Policies Summary 02.13.24
SY23-24 Health & Policies Summary (Students and Families)
SY22-23 Family Communication – Health and Safety
Masks are optional for students, staff, and visitors when inside KIPP NYC school buildings or outside on school grounds.
Anyone returning on Day 6 after a positive COVID-19 diagnosis or after having COVID-19 symptoms without testing is still required to wear a well-fitting mask at all times on school property through Day 10.
Yes, all students, staff, and visitors will submit a daily health survey prior to the start of each school day. Students, teachers, and staff should stay home when they have signs of any infectious illness and see a healthcare provider for testing and care.
Daily temperature checks will only be conducted for staff, students, and visitors that have not completed a daily health screen prior to arriving on campus. If a temperature check is required, anyone who has a temperature that falls below 100.4 will be able to enter the school building.
We are prioritizing the emotional health needs of our students and staff with the same level of attention and concern with which we are prioritizing physical health.
We are creating a restorative model in all schools, increasing student opportunities to develop and strengthen social-emotional learning skills, and including circle time or advisory to enhance a sense of student belonging.
We have trained staff members in developing a trauma-conscious lens to enable us to be more attuned to student and family needs as well as building opportunities for resiliency in students. We are committed to being a protective factor for students as well as our families whether we are working with them remotely or in person.
Our social workers and counselors have participated in additional professional development to enter the school year well prepared to respond to the needs of students and families given the challenges arising from the pandemic.
Social workers and counselors will continue to work with families directly to support them in connecting with resources.
Students and families will have access to KIPP NYC’s Social Work and Counseling team to address social-emotional needs as well as case management and access to resources.
KIPP NYC has partnerships with Northside and Interborough, providing on-site, school-based mental health services to KIPP schools located in Brooklyn, Harlem, and the South Bronx.
KIPP NYC has a professional partnership with Headway andAyana Therapy, providing both in-person and teletherapy services. Headway and Ayana each offer accessible, diverse, and culturally competent therapy services for our students and families. We also have a relationship with the Jewish Board of Family & Children’s Services for its loss and bereavement programs.
Our Community Resources page has the most up-to-date programs and services for students and families.
Daily student attendance has resumed as normal, with students being marked as absent if they are not physically present in school, with the following exception:
If students are required to quarantine due to exposure and/or a positive COVID-19 test, they will have the opportunity to participate in asynchronous learning and will be marked as Remote Attendance Present (REP). This will be determined by students’ daily login to Canvas.
In order to protect staff and students in our buildings, any visitor to the building must show identification and complete the daily health screening.
Exceptions to the visitor vaccine mandate:
KIPP NYC will work with the NYC Department of Education to ensure daily cleaning and sanitizing of all used spaces.
At night, our buildings will be disinfected using electrostatic machines.
Classrooms will be stocked with spray cleaner and paper towels.
We are using the same Alert Level system used by NYC.gov that tracks COVID-19 transmission and health care capacity in the city to determine testing percentage requirements. These levels will help us understand what precautions we need to take and how to best protect our school communities.
Level and Testing Requirements:
Please note that this will be the general rule, but we may deviate from this in certain situations. For example, after school breaks, we may increase testing to at least 25% of students the first week back regardless of Alert Level. School sites always have the option to test at a higher rate than the weekly requirement rate. Staff may elect to be tested once within a month but should be offered testing on a weekly basis.
For more on COVID Alert Levels, please refer to this site.
Reminder: The testing program is voluntary for students. As such, there is no process for requesting an exemption. Families that feel their child cannot participate in testing for medical- or disability-based reasons should note that their child will not participate. That said, failure to participate in some or all testing programs could require quarantine for some students.
Outside of school, testing sites in your zip code (including Mobile testing sites) for children can be found here.
Additionally, NYC Health and Hospitals offer walk-in testing at a number of locations. Your local City MD offers rapid tests and PCR tests.
Student & Staff – Close Contact Quarantine:
Regardless of vaccination status, students and staff will no longer quarantine if they are a close contact of a positive case – as long as they do not experience symptoms and participate in the following “test-to-stay” strategy.
Following CDC guidance, KIPP NYC will follow a “test-to-stay” strategy. In practice, this means that if there is a positive case in a classroom, students who were in close proximity to a positive student will no longer have to quarantine and will continue attending school as long as they do not have symptoms and continue to receive negative results from an at-home rapid test.
So how would this work?
*If a student starts having symptoms anytime in Days 2-4, student immediately takes Test #2.
Students who don’t exhibit symptoms and don’t test positive will continue to attend school. Close contacts need to provide proof of their negative rapid test in order to return to in-person learning (we will provide you with instructions on how to submit your results).
If symptoms develop at any time, students should take a test immediately and quarantine. Any positive test result should be reported to the school immediately.
Students Isolation Period for Positive Test:
The isolation period for students who test positive for COVID-19 is five days (reduced from 10 days). Anyone returning from a five-day isolation period should be fever-free for 24 hours without the use of fever-reducing medication, and their overall symptoms should be improving. Here is a step-by-step visual for this updated policy.
Fully Vaccinated School-Based Staff Isolation Period for Positive Test:
the isolation period has changed from 10 days to 5 days. Teachers and school-based staff may now return to work on Day 6 after testing positive for COVID-19 under the following conditions.
Per State guidance, the positive teacher/school-based staff member must be asymptomatic OR have mild symptoms only:
Quarantine is not required following domestic or international travel. All travelers, domestic and international, should follow all CDC travel recommendations, which include a recommendation to be fully vaccinated prior to travel and, if not fully vaccinated, to quarantine following travel.
Yes, we are requiring all KIPP NYC staff to receive the COVID vaccine. Many of our partners, from afterschool providers to related service providers, have similar vaccine requirements. The vaccine is not required for students to attend school; however, we strongly encourage all students who are eligible to receive the vaccine.
All students who wish to participate in high-risk sports must be vaccinated against COVID-19. High-risk sports are football, volleyball, basketball, wrestling, lacrosse, stunt, and rugby.
A COVID-19 vaccination requirement also applies to students participating in high-risk after-school extracurricular activities like chorus, musical theater, dance/dance team, band/orchestra (with concern for woodwinds), marching band, cheerleading/step teams/flag team. Students ages five and up must be vaccinated in order to participate in these extracurricular activities. This will affect all DYCD-funded programs, sports teams, and general after-school activities held by the day schools.
If you are eligible to receive the vaccine, use NYC Health’s Vaccine Finder to search for a location near you.
*represents our support of KIPP NYC Middle School Alumni that attend high schools other than KIPP NYC College Prep and KIPP NYC 8th grade completers that have graduated KIPP NYC College Prep or other high schools within the past six years.