Message From The Superintendent - May 2021

Greetings!

We hope everyone is doing well! Here are some updates for everyone.   

We are still in the process of hiring three new positions here at Portage DD to improve services here for the people we serve. The three new positions will be an IT Specialist, Educational Services Manager, and Community Employment Coordinator. We are hoping to have these three new people join our team in May or June.   

Our buildings are currently not open to the public, and there are minimal staff members on-site. The on-site staff's responsibility is to assist with the crucial day-to-day business that cannot be done remotely. 

April flew by at Portage DD, and we have been fortunate. There were no new COVID-19 cases for the individuals we serve in April. Portage County's good fortune is partly due to the hard work to protect themselves and the great job that the families and providers are doing. With the assistance of the Health Department, we have also been able to get all our staff and the individuals we serve vaccinated that wanted to be vaccinated. We believe all these things have reduced the numbers. Since we finished our vaccine clinic on March 5th, only one individual has tested positive for the virus, and that was a person that had declined the vaccination.  

Speelman Electric finished putting new fiber at our school in April. This will allow us to improve our services both in the building and outside the building, especially when holding Microsoft teams and Zoom meetings. We had completed this last year over at our other building. We are now positioned to help the families, providers, and the people we serve more efficiently. A big thanks to Pat Flaherty from Envisage and our IT Director Gary Slapnicker, who made sure this happened smoothly. Most of this was done during the student's spring break, not to disrupt any of the kids from learning.  

The school continues to thrive, and we only have six more weeks of school left before the summer break. We met with the staff, and they plan to finish the year strong, keeping the goal of assisting the students at the forefront of everything despite the pandemic. They have done a tremendous job with that!

We also just wanted to take a minute and thank all our departments that have battled through these unique times. The School Staff, Maintenance, Transportation, SSA Department, Early Intervention, Medicaid, Department, Business, Department, Investigative Agents, Human Resources, IT Department, Community and Provider Relations Department, and the rest of the Administrative Staff. We continue to be grateful to all of you.  

We also continue to be grateful to the people we serve, families, and providers who have managed to navigate these difficult times and assist us in assisting all of you! Thank you!

April 23rd was Administrative Professional Day. We are grateful that we have some fantastic people to support our staff. Melissa, Missie, Kayla, Lauren, Bev, Jenn, Kim, Debbie, and Cyndi. All of them do a fantastic job of supporting us and helping us to assist the people we serve, families, and providers. A big thank you to all of them that help make our lives easier.  

We still have openings for our summer camp at Happy Day School. This is very exciting as we weren't able to have this last year due to a pandemic. Registration is still open  at www.gotcamp.org. This is funded solely by Portage DD for ages 6-21 that qualify for services at Portage DD. We contract with Akron Rotary Camp to have this camp at our building. We will have up to 42 campers a week. We usually have 60 but had to modify them. We added two weeks to make this an 8-week camp instead of a 6-week camp, and everyone can get at least four weeks and possibly more depending on how many campers register.  

Thank you again for your continued support. We are incredibly grateful for all your help! We will get through this together! Portage DD will continue to be available via phone, email, and virtual meeting (ZOOM or TEAMS) as we navigate these unique times together. Portage DD will continue to strive to meet and exceed your expectations. 

WE ARE HERE FOR YOU.

Sincerely,

John Vennetti