Miami-Dade County Public Schools (M-DCPS) is a tireless advocate for its students and their families. Since the onset of the pandemic, the health and wellbeing of students and employees have been of utmost importance to the school district. M-DCPS has been proactive in providing services and resources in addition to implementing preventive measures to address COVID-19.

With Spring Recess approaching and the COVID-19 pandemic lingering, we continue to partner with our community to meet the known and unknown challenges of COVID-19. As a preliminary precaution, we are urging our families to refrain from international travel during the upcoming Spring Recess. Should families need to travel, they must adhere to the new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) guidelines on air travel. This past January, the CDC announced an order requiring all air passengers arriving to the United States from a foreign country to get tested no more than three days before departure. Travelers must present a negative result or documentation of having recovered from COVID-19 to the airline before boarding their flight. Passengers who are unable to provide negative results will be denied re-entry into the country.

We ask that you join our efforts in promoting continued COVID-19 preventative practices of wearing facial coverings, maintaining physical distance and frequently washing of hands. Let’s commit to working together to keep our community safe. We can and we will persevere.

The COVID-19 epidemic has transformed our community, society, and world. Parents and children have been affected by the many changes we were forced to embrace in our daily lives as a result of the pandemic. For our students, the impact has manifested itself as struggles with academics, attendance, and poor class engagement. Even more detrimental are the covert effects on their socio-emotional health, such as feelings of isolation, fear, anxiety, and stress. Parents and guardians have experienced some of the same physical and emotional stressors, plus the added pressures of caring and providing for their families. Parental challenges in the context of COVID-19 have included: loss of employment, loss of income, increased demands for parental care and monitoring of their child, divorce/separation, homelessness, and scarcity of essential resources. Miami-Dade County Public Schools (M-DCPS) social workers are key to helping combat these threats that can, in turn, affect a safe learning environment.

March is Social Work Month, and March 7-13 is School Social Work Week. We at

M-DCPS recognize the importance of the profession and the critical role that social workers play in our schools. School social work represents a specialized area of practice within the broad field of the profession. All M-DCPS school social workers have a master’s degree in social work, are certified by the Florida Department of Education (FLDOE) and approximately one third are licensed clinical social workers. They bring unique knowledge and skills to the school system and to the schools they serve. School social workers conduct parent interviews and complete psycho-social and behavioral assessments, provide mental health and crisis support, facilitate consultations with teachers, parents and provide students with individual and group counseling and therapy.

When COVID-19 forced the closure of brick-and-mortar schools last Spring, M-DCPS administrators and educators expressed concerns about inadequate student engagement and the inability to reach families. The District’s school social workers were essential in re-establishing links between our schools, homes, and the community, to help foster academic success while promoting resiliency in families and children.

At the start of the 2020-2021 school year, the demand for student and family supports prompted M-DCPS to design an online method for schools to transmit student assistance requests to the school social worker. This system allows school administrators to generate referrals for services more efficiently. Since the system’s adoption, school social workers have received more than 7,000 referrals related to student evaluations, initial student screenings, individual counseling, and social service assistance to families. School social workers have also been extending their support to schools by assisting in wellness check-ins for disengaged students with several absences and truant students.

M-DCPS school social workers have learned many of the underlying reasons for the struggles among students and families. They provide support, guidance, resources, and linkages to ensure successful student re-engagement with their schools and studies. In turn, each schools’ multi-disciplinary teams use this valuable insight to design holistic and practical school-based intervention plans and support to complete the student’s return to or exceeding pre-COVID-19 levels.

The delivery of school social work prevention and intervention supports demands high ethical, altruistic, professional, and moral standards and a prioritization of advocacy for the most at-risk children and families in our schools. Together with our schools and community stakeholders, school social workers feel they can be catalysts for transformational change and improve our students’ chances to succeed in the academic environment and beyond.

For more information, visit the District’s School Social Worker Program website at http://sswp.dadeschools.net/, call 786-451-2401 or visit the Miami Dade County Association of School Social Workers website at https://doren0le.wixsite.com/m-dcassw.

Hosted by The Foundation for New Educational Initiatives (FNEI), the 6th Annual Superintendent’s 5K Challenge was held virtually this year. Participants ran their distance anywhere at any time between March 6 and March 13, 2021, tracking their progress and completing the event with the RaceJoy app on a mobile device. It is inspiring to see the power of a community coming together to support public schools. We can’t wait to be back together for this annual event next year on March 05, 2022, racing for education while celebrating our Miami pride on #305Day.