Mahomet-Seymour parents have been asked to complete a questionnaire and online registration so that the district can place students in am/pm sections (K-5) and A/B days (6-12).
The email from Superintendent Lindsey Hall follows a 4-3 vote from the Mahomet-Seymour School Board to implement asynchronous learning on Monday with half-days (2.5 hours) for K-5 and a full-day, A/B (two days a week) plan for 6-12 on Tuesday through Friday until Oct. 1 when the board will re-evaluate and look at a full-time option.
The board included a remote learning option for parents who did not feel comfortable with sending their child to school.
In an email, Hall wrote that at the end of the semester, parents would have the option to switch plans, but would be locked into the plan they choose for an entire semester.
A myriad of motions were made by board members including all back-to-school options before the board, and the first plan to come out of vote successfully was the teacher subcommittee plan, a half-day option for K-5 and one-day a week for 6-12.
Toward the end of the meeting, though, board member Lori Larson said that she did not understand what she had voted against, and asked for Hall’s recommendation to be voted on again.
The measure passed.
Since Monday’s board meeting, the Mahomet-Seymour School District has released a few details about what the school days will look like.
Middletown Prairie half days will run from 8:30 to 11 or 12:15 to 2:45 while Lincoln Trail students will go from 8:45 to 11:15 or 12:30 to 3 p.m. Preschool students will follow the Middletown Prairie schedule.
Mahomet-Seymour Junior High students will go from 9:15 to 3:15 and high school students will be in school from 9:20 to 3:30.
For parents that choose the virtual option, K-5 students will be assigned to a Mahomet-Seymour teacher’s virtual classroom of all online learners and 6-12 students will either participate synchronously with a Mahomet-Seymour class or be assigned an all online class, depending on the course numbers and schedules.
Mahomet-Seymour students with IEPs may attend school all day, every day Tues. through Friday. In general, students with IEPs for speech and language and those students with 504 plans will follow the district reopening plan.
The Mahomet-Seymour School board asked additional questions Monday. To see the options before the board, scroll to the table at the bottom of the page for the table of three options. The following is not an account of the entire discussion, but rather questions, answers and concerns discussed by the board of education. Questions are grouped into categories and not a sequential account of questioning during the board meeting.
Office Hours
Jeremy Henrichs: How are office hours realistic on Monday? It seems like there’s a lot being put into that Monday if we’re counting on office hours for kids to interact with their teachers.
Nicole Rummel: So we’re going to be working on building that Monday, but I think very easily signed in a half hour to 45 minutes for that.
Henrichs: But what if you have 30 kids who want to talk to a teacher.
Rummel: They will have to make adjustments. So maybe we don’t get as much curriculum writing done during that time because we increase office hours. But also remember their are
office hours, at the junior high in high school, specifically, every morning. And we talked with the teachers, at the junior high and high school, they’re study hall periods on there and we talked about setting up supports for kids during each during the study periods. So maybe during your first period teacher, you teach math and you have study hall that period, you would be able to check in with kids that have questions in addition to the office hours all the staff will have in the morning before school.
Public Health Guidance
Meghan Hennesy: The CUPHD released back to school guidance today (Monday) where they defined best practices about what must be implemented by all Champaign County schools. Their definition: These practices are foundational to minimizing the risks of exposure to COVID-19 for students, staff, and families. These practices are considered the minimum level of implementation, and schools may not be less restrictive.”
“Everyone must maintain at least 6 feet minimum distance from others at all times: transportation, classrooms, bathrooms, lunch, recess, hallways, resource classes, emergency drills.”
Is it my understanding that your recommendation is that we enact a plan that does not follow the guidance of the CUPHD?
Lindsey Hall: So I’d like to speak to those guidelines that came out late right actually in our Regional Superintendent of Schools Gary Lewis forwarded to them to superintendents, last night. And so in reading these guidelines, which are now public on their Facebook page so they’re available for everyone to read, upon first reading, they actually seem to be more restrictive than ISBE’s and IDPH’s guidelines. So I think there’s a question about whether CUPHD has an authority to issue more restrictive guidelines than an organization that is hierarchically above them. And according to Julie Pryde, she’s saying these are guidelines. So I think there’s some question about those.
They only serve to add a layer of complication. That’s just my opinion. I’m not trying to downplay the safety aspects of them, but we got ISBE guidelines a month ago and why these are just being released now is questionable.
We have permission from ISBE and IDPH to put 50 kids on a school bus. And if you follow the guidelines from the Public Health District, that would not be possible. So I think there’s a lot of questions about that.
Again, appreciate the work that went into it by those folks in the health department, but definitely on this call it confusing, conflicting information.
Hennesy: Doesn’t the CUPHD have the ability to come and shut us down if we’re not following their (advice).
Hall: I don’t know what authority they have, actually. I’m just not sure, that’s something we are exploring.
Ken Keefe: Have you spoken to our attorney about this question?
Hall: Yes
Keefe: Which attorneys Did you talk to and what do they have to say?
Hall: I talked to Shelly Anderson at Franczek. And Franczek also represents some other school districts in the area, who had the same questions that I did. And the response that Shelly got after reaching out to Julie Pryde at CUPHD is Julie Pryde said these are guidelines.
Keefe: No, I’m sorry that’s not the question I’m asking. Have you asked the attorneys if you CUPHD has the authority to issue directives that are more specific than ISBE?
Hall: I think that’s definitely a question.
Hennesy: In Franzcek’s “40 Answers to Your Phase 4 Questions”, Shelly Anderson and Jackie Gharapour Wernz are the ones who weighed in on this. Their direct quotes are, “we recommend that schools take the recommendations and directives in the guidance seriously because they reflect the most current understanding of public health officials for how to protect students, staff, and other members of the school community when returning to in-person instruction.”
I have to say I’m extraordinarily uncomfortable, putting anything that would not follow the guidelines set forth by the public health department who is our local authority for health issues.
Hennesy: “I move that the MS Board of education follow the guidelines and best practice recommendations set forth by the CUPHD as the basis for any plan the district has moving forward for the 2020-2021 school year.”
Giles: If we need to look at additional data, this is one that comes out today, there could be another one that comes out next week and one the following week. This will be endless. I think the thing we owe most, and I want to applaud the group that put all this together
because it’s exceedingly difficult, and we’ve only heard a small portion of it is that we got to give some guidance to get the plan moving along now. We don’t have time to play the what ifs because it will change every week. I’m convinced of that.
Nita Bachman: I just want to assure you that along with what the instructional team has done, and all of the plan that they put forth, on the other side of that, we also have a health plan. In that we’re working really hard with staff that work in the offices and we’ve developed a whole plan that will go out to families. We’re working on plans to do the very best that we can within the framework to try to keep kids safe, to keep teachers safe, so that we can mitigate any rise. I’m going to be watching to see exactly what happens so when the evaluation comes, we’re making good decisions based on data that we have within the district, and not just the county.
The board voted the measure down 4-3.
Survey and Results
Max McComb: The survey went out, we think we have at least 350 students that would be off campus?
Rummel: Looks like it.
McComb: What was our response rate on that?
Hall: There were just over 2000 responses and the survey through the SkyAlert system goes to about 7300 different emails. (There are 3,069 students in the Mahomet-Seymour School District, according to Illinois Report Card.)
Max McComb: Do we have any idea of how that breaks down per building?
Rummel: These are rough numbers: we are at about 80 at MPE, 80 at Lincoln Trail, 100 at the junior high and 80 at the high school.
Hennesy: I’ve had several parents reach out to me and tell me that they were unable to fill out that survey because they were unclear what it is that they were being asked. They explained that the school days were not defined for their students and it was extraordinarily difficult for them to answer those surveys. Some of their students went to different buildings, and therefore, the responses that they would give for their first grader would be different than they would for a junior high or high school student. And so I have real concerns that because this survey did not define adequately what the days would actually look like in a full day, and they did not define, in any way, shape or form what a remote learning plan might look like, that we have data that is not very useful to us.
Rummel: I appreciate that. I feel like I have enough now that I can go back and look at numbers. When I say the 350, that tells me when I have 80 kids at MPE, that I can probably set up a kindergarten teacher remotely and a second grade teacher remotely. And if those number had come back at 25, I’d know that I was probably looking at a multi-age class. I know those numbers are not exact, and I want to be clear, when families said, “I think there was an option for some of my kids, but not others,” so those numbers are not included in there because those are strictly the parents that said, “yes, I’m interested in remote learning,” then they indicated the building that their child would be in. This was simply a temperature gauge for me. So now I know there is an interest, I have a rough idea, give or take, what classrooms are going to look like and a rough idea on how many teachers, ballpark, will have to volunteer or be assigned to remote or off-campus learning.
What the School Day Looks Like
Max McComb: On the A/B scenario, will it be AA/BB or will the alternate?
Rummel: I believe the recommendation was to alternate days.
Hennesy: Can you take me through two scenarios, please? Can you walk me through one of our K-5 from the point where they would get to the bus stop to the point where they would get to the end of their day and getting back home? And could you do the same thing for a junior high and a high school student with both of these options you’re putting forward?
Rummel: I will do my best; I’m not 100-percent sure that I have all the answers at this time. An elementary kid is going to either get dropped off by a parent or take a bus. Before they come into the building, they will be checked, symptom checked, and then they will either walk to their classroom or be greeted by somebody to be escorted to their classroom. They’ll sanitize, wash hands, they’ll have an assigned location or an assigned seat, kind of like most classrooms do anyway. That will be their space. So, I’m guessing at the elementary level, they will start with a morning meeting, then roll into instruction.
Let’s say they come in the morning, breakfast would be in the classroom then. They would grab their breakfast and eat in the classroom. And then we’d have a lunch to go for them. Then at some point, we’ll get them cleaned up, packed up, and lined up. In dismissing, we’re working with Nick in transportation to ensure that the buses, another reason for the change in start and end times, is when school gets out buses are here, so it may not be all of K-2 dismissing at the same time. It could be kindergarten dismisses and they are getting on their buses, and then first grade or a pod of kindergarten, a pod of first and a pod of second so there’s not the congestion and we’re able to distance in the best way that we can.
Kids that come in in the afternoon on the elementary, would grab their lunch, if they’re eating lunch at school, and then they would eat in the classroom. And then they would pick up their breakfast for the next day to take that home with them.
We’ll have Kids’ Club, so some kids won’t get on the bus, they will go to Kids’ Club and workers will work with them to get their learning done if they need. Then some activities and movement in there.
Keefe: Will they have recess?
Rummel: They will not be able to access equipment, like the jungle gym or playground equipment because we can’t clean that forty-some times during the day. At the elementary, the teachers may take them outside for learning, and they may take a quick break, but remember they’re only here for 2.5 hours. And that 2.5 hours includes that time getting them off the bus, so it’s going to be slow at the beginning. We’re going to maximize that instructional time.
Hennesy: Is instruction time 2.5 hours? Will students will be sitting in their seats for 2.5 hours?
Hall: I think it’s fair to say that we don’t have the exact details of every hour of the school day completely hashed out at this point. There’s still conversations and planning, and it’s likely that readjustments of these plans could occur once we get started.
Hennesy: I’m just asking questions that parents have asked me because they wanted to know what the day would look like. So I’m just trying to get an understanding of what the days look like for these kids. I’m passing along questions that were forwarded to me, I think parents are looking for these types of details in order for them to really understand what kind of decision they would make.
Hall: We needed a plan in order to move ahead with the details.
Those are great questions, they’re fair questions. And we understand that parents need to know that. But that’s why tonight is key to move ahead with a plan, whatever it is so we can get those details out to parents.
Hennesy: Nicole, do you mind doing that same exercise for the junior high and high school students, please.
Rummel: If you are a junior high or high school student, and you choose to take advantage of signing up, there will be some times when you can come into the building early if you need internet access and you want to work or schedule a time to meet with a teacher or you want to work in a small group; you have to sign-up for those spaces.
Then school will start and you’ll go first period, second period, third period, fourth period, fifth period, sixth period and seventh. I know Mr. Mills is really trying to hold onto Bulldog Power Hour because he wants to really be able to do some of the social-emotional stuff during that time, as well.
So I think that much of the day is going to be very similar, yet different. So I do not know yet if it’s going to be exactly the same. I don’t know, for example, at the high school or even at the junior high because we haven’t really been able to move forward on a plan, not knowing what that is going to be. They may move to block *scheduling) where we do four classes one day and then the next day that you’re on campus, you do the other four classes. So you don’t have as much transition time between and there’s not as much cleaning the desks as when you’re coming in every 42 minutes and wiping down. So it may look more like a block. I think that’s one thing they’re looking at. We have shared staff. So it’s not just as easy as saying we’re going to reduce the transitions during the day. So we could do that, we could continue with our same day.
Hennesy: So the students will be moving instead of the teachers moving?
Rummel: So at the high school there’s not an option for teachers to move because, I’m sure there are a couple of kids that have the same schedule, but very few kids have the same schedule or take the same courses. So kids will have to move. And potentially at the junior high, too. Even though everybody takes English, kids are in different math classes, kids are in different electives. I do know that’s something that’s very important for some kids, their elective courses are the thing that keeps them most engaged in their school day. So we want to be able to offer those classes, as well, and keep those kids engaged in those classes.
Hennesy: Under the A/B plans, how many kids are in the building at one time? Is that half the school? What is the distance kids will be at in those classrooms under the A/B plan?
Rummel: It’s half, minus the kids that do remote only. So, it can vary from class to class, but in running the numbers, I can at least do 3-feet that we talked about in the last board meeting. And can move closer toward that four or five feet. It depends on how that square footage is laid out in that classroom. We all have houses and know some square footage is more usable than others.
So we may have some furniture that we move out of the classrooms, to help with social distancing, but I’m confident that we can do it in a safe way with half the kids.
Keefe: Can you say how long the passing periods are, and are all students to pass at that time?
Rummel: No, I cannot say. I will say that I built in time when I did the 5.5 hours, we built in a 5-minute passing period, which could allow for staggered, but I’m going to be honest, staggered passing time does not solve all of our problems because kids leave one class, but kids haven’t left the other class, and there’s nowhere for them to go. So there’s a lot of details that that doesn’t fix. I built in 5 minutes, but it doesn’t mean that when they build that master schedule, that they need to use all 5 minutes for a passing period. The building administrators are putting together teams of teachers who would better know what might be needed in terms of passing periods and other finite details. I’m just kind of the big-picture person on this.
Hennesy: Can you also explain what the synchronous learning will look like for the junior high and high schoolers on the days that they’re not in the buildings?
Rummel: So on the days that they’re not in there…let’s just say the first period is 9:30…they should be on at 9:30 and the teacher is going to take roll and the class is going to go. That will look very different from one class to the next class. Maybe today is a small group day and you’re going to jump into Google Meet with your small group. Maybe today is a lecture day and you’re going to listen and take some guided notes. It’s going to be different depending on what that the teacher has planned for that day and learning.
Hennesy: If we’re going to do lectures, are the rooms equipped for that type of in-person and remote learning? What’s the expectation for the teacher in terms of how they take that lecture piece of it?
Rummel: We do have some webcams. So we’ll encourage the teacher to either focus the webcam on the dry erase board or on themselves whenever they feel will be most productive to the instructional day. The powerpoint may already be available through Google Classroom, so they don’t need to show the powerpoint, they may prefer to show themselves.
I think that there are options for what works best for that teacher in that classroom.
Hennesy: How does that scenario work for folks that decide they want their kid at home full-time?
Rummel: So my hope is that we have an option where we have some online only classes, at least K-5, if not K-8 (each grade not together). So then that whole class will be an online class that you would be taking with the teacher and synchronous learning.
At the high school, I’m still evaluating, and I’ve talked with Chad (Benedict: M-S Principal) and Pat Bailey (Assistant Principal) about a couple of options. They are still getting feedback on those options. And once we finalize what that will be, I’ve been working with the Regional Office of Education, I can finalize what that option will be.
And I will share that with the parents.
Hennesy: If we don’t have enough, what might that look like?
Rummel: I will have to look at potentially another online offering.
Keefe: What platform will we be utilizing? Will we use WebEx?
Rummel: We are using Google.
Keefe: Do we have the network and internet infrastructure to host potentially hundreds of video chat rooms simultaneously?
Rummel: Yes.
Henrichs: How are we going to manage a learning option K-5 in participation and attendance and pulling those kids along, even in a hybrid, as well as a remote option? There’s got to be a percentage of kids that are going to completely fall out. And how are we going to manage that? It just doesn’t seem to be viable to me, especially for that age group.
Rummel: I would say if that’s not an option for you and your family, you can choose in-person model so you can have some more direct contact. The things that we are sending home in the afternoon are not the things that would typically involve the direct guidance of the teacher. I understand some kids are better at independent practice than others, but we’re going to try to best utilize that time.
Keefe: How is Pre-K impacted by this plan?
Pre-K will follow the MPE calendar. So whatever the half day is for the elementary kids.
Social Distancing
Henrichs: We know that there are many districts around us that are doing five days a week, how are they managing that and social distance guidelines?
Hall: I will speak generally because I don’t know the details of other school district plans, but other districts are planning to go back, full, in-person. Some of them are much smaller than us. And some of them, I’m guessing, have more space than we do. So those are two reasons that come to mind.
I have information from our Regional Superintendent of Schools, and there’s actually far more schools starting on a hybrid schedule and not going back full-time. I think it’s a very localized decision, though. If that’s what works in other places, that’s great.
I think it’s really important to recognize the fact that we were given local decision making authority and a lot of autonomy with this, through ISBE guidance, and boards have to make decisions based on their situation.
Keefe: Have you looked at options for additional facilities beyond our four buildings?
Hall: We have discussed that. We have an offer from one church, in particular, that’s not off the table. So we will continue to explore those. We are also looking at getting two tents for each of our buildings so there’s an outdoor alternative learning space so our kids can be outside.
The presentation of the plan tonight does not represent the end to anything. If anything, it represents a jumping off point once the board provides direction to the administration to where we can really dig down deep. We’ve got to work out the details and get everything out to parents.
Hennesy: What is the social distancing that we are able to achieve in each of these buildings under this plan (full day)? I guess K-5 may be the same, but with respect to junior high and high school, what is the distancing and can you reiterate what the cleaning procedures will be for these classrooms?
Hall: The social distancing will be dependent on the size of the classroom and the class. I don’t know how more to answer that. We will follow the ISBE guidance, which says social distancing as much as possible or to the greatest extent possible. It is class dependent at the junior high and high school, depending on what class, what room, how many kids.
Schultz: We do have classrooms that have 60 kids in one classroom, right? Because we put a partian up and hold two classes in there?
Rummel: Yes, those were larger classrooms that were divided. And we hired new teachers to reduce class sizes.
Schultz: But we don’t have anymore rooms, right?
Hennesy: Will we be able to have that information out to the parents before we ask them to pick a plan?
Rummel: I’m going to be honest, we are not going to be able to maintain six feet, so if that’s what you need for your kid to return to school, the remote option is probably the best option for you.
Cleaning
Hennesy: You mentioned something about cleaning. Can you tell me who is going to be doing the cleaning between those class groups?
Rummel: I think it’s going to be a team effort. I think it means that we’re going to have materials available and if a kid wants to grab a Clorox wipe and wipe down their desk and chair, they’re going to be able to do it. And the teacher has two minutes and can grab a Clorox wipe and wipe down tables and chairs. It’s going to take everybody if we want to get kids in the building.
Keefe: Is 5 minutes sufficient time to disinfect the spaces while the students are also changing classes?
Rummel: In the passing period, I would say that when I get up and leave one classroom and go to another classroom, that I can pick up a Clorox wipe and wipe the desk that I am going to sit on in five minutes. The typical passing period I believe is 3 (minutes) so that gives them 2 minutes to wipe it down.
Keefe: And are we going to be utilizing anything to sanitize the air since that’s where the virus is transmitted?
Rummel: Yeah, we’re wearing masks.
Keefe: So our plan is to wear masks to satisfy sanitizing the air?
Rummel: This is not my area of expertise.
McComb: We don’t have any special equipment, no.
Nita Bachman (District Nurse): It has been proven over and over if everybody wears a mask inside that the transmission is reduced. So our number one thing is going to be that all staff and students will wear a mask when they are on the buses, when they’re in the buildings, and with distancing, we will do the very best that we can. Steve has been working really hard on coming up with our cleaning products, and how we can space the kids, and how we can stagger. Some of those details, honestly, we’re still going to be working on once we know exactly what plan we’re going to do going forward so that we can work with the buildings, teachers, principals, so we can finalize those little details to do the very best we can to keep the staff and kids safe.
Transportation
Keefe: How many students do you expect to have on a bus at a time?
Rummel: We can bus up to 50.
Keefe: Whose responsibility will it be to make sure that the 50 children on the bus are keeping their masks on?
Rummel: Well, I’m hoping that we will all work together on that. That as parents, we’ll talk to our kids about the importance of wearing their mask. I think it’s going to be the same as talking to kids about keeping their hands to themselves on the bus. I’m sure there’s going to be infractions, and we’ll work through it like we do any other infraction.
Hennesy: With 50 kids on a bus, how many kids in a seat does that work out to be?
Rummel: 2
Masks
Keefe: Can you talk about when they will be required to wear their masks?
Rummel: When they’re in the building.
Hall: All the time.
Rummel: On the bus and in the building.
Keefe: We’ve said that everyone is going to have to wear masks at all times, how are we going to handle situations where parents ask for exceptions for their children. Are those students going to be allowed to not wear a mask?
Nita Bachman: If a student is asking to not wear a mask, we have to have a doctor’s not.
And that follows the guidelines that we’ve been given all the way through, is that a doctor’s note is required. We also already have on hand, we have face shields for special education students and those situations where students absolutely cannot for whatever reason, wear a mask so that they can be protected. If we have a teacher who doesn’t feel safe they can wear a shield and a mask so that they are double protected.
So, along with a lot of other options that we’re talking about. We’re doing our very best to put as many things as possible to keep our staff, our students and everybody that’s in our building safe. The beginning of that is everybody in the building is going to have the expectation, and our parents will know that the expectation is to wear a mask; they need to start with our children now. It takes some training, but that’s our first step. And then we have some other factors that we will work out on a case-by-case basis as those things come through.
Keefe: If a student has that note, and they are not wearing a mask, are they going to be separated from all the other students or are they going to be in the general population?
We have some amounts at this point, of masks. They are disposable, but we can use as backup
for that time when, and it will happen, for that time when a student forgets their mask. They will be handed a mask to put on when they come into the building. We have child sized and adult size.
Keefe: I’m asking if they have a doctor’s note, and they’ve been approved by the district to be exempt from the requirement to wear a mask, are those students going to be mixed into the general population, are they going to be separated?
At that point, what my hope would be, we’ll speak with those parents individually and we’ll make a plan. Although inaudible, Bachman said these situations would be dealt with on a case-by-case basis.
But, a lot of it is going to have to fall back on our parents. And I know that they can do that. And I know that we have a great district and they’ll be able to help us because they want their children to be safe too.
The Plan and the MSEA
Schultz: Who gave input on this plan (the part-time with potential full-time return in October)? We got this board packet and this option wasn’t there. And we heard from the teacher’s union tonight that they’re opposed to full-time return. So who worked on this plan, who has it been shared with, and how do our stakeholders feel about this plan?
Hall: The only difference between this plan and what was recommended by the (teacher) task force is two days at the junior high and high school in-person instead of one day a week. That’s the only change.
Schultz: I was under the impression from our last meeting that the task force believed that one day a week was necessary to have the spacing that they needed. We’ve all received email from people at the junior high talking about how crowded the junior high is and how some of even the core classes have two full classes in a room with a divider. And so I’m concerned about the distancing, particularly at the junior high that will happen with half, which I was under the impression was the motivation for one day a week. The teachers all seem to want to be there as much as possible, but they want to be safe. And they seemed to indicate that they could not achieve that goal in that way.
I’m wondering where we are with the teachers.
I’m concerned about passing a plan that none of our teachers have seen or heard about.
And, to be clear, this plan doesn’t say that we will do the teacher plan. It says we will do the teacher plan for four or six weeks, and then go back full-time. We seem to have heard from the union that they are opposed to that.
Rummel: I’m going to address both: 1) it’s not a made-up plan. In the original packet that we sent out, we had a teacher preferred plan, and then we had allowable by ISBE guidelines. So the A/B day was already run by the committee. So while they’re preference would probably be to start with one day, I think they understand that there is a balance and I think they will make it work.
If you’re looking at the number of kids, 900 plus at the high school, in just doing class changes, in the hallway, just some of the logistical pieces, they felt would be easier to do with a quarter of the students instead of half of the students.
But I want to be clear, they have seen that. That is not something that was just put together. It was something that we talked about through our meetings.
Also, it was never from the K-5 committee or the 6-12 committee, the idea that this was the plan for the year. Both committees had the idea and have shared that they felt this was a continuum and that this was a good place to start. And they understood that moving ahead the ultimate goal has always been to get kids in school every day.
Or, if, unfortunately, the virus goes in a different direction and we have an outbreak, they understand that we may have to go all remote. At no point did I get a feeling, that anything that we recommended would be the recommendation for the entire year.
Schultz: I certainly agree that going back to school full-time is everyone’s goal. Certainly, they would support that as the ultimate goal at the end. But you’re telling me that you believe that the teachers as a whole support the idea of going back part time for four to six weeks and then full time after that?
Rummel: I’m saying that they are supportive of reevaluating it in four to six weeks.
The MSEA survey that went out, when you surveyed the 6-12 teachers, it was 50/50, maybe a difference of four teachers between going back one-day a week and two-days a week.
The one thing that was really low was returning to school full-time. That had very few votes.
Schultz: Are Meg (Jones) and James (Heinold) (MSEA reps) in the room? Could we ask them to weigh in? Do they support going back full time on Oct. 1?
Heinold: We have talked about it with Dr. Hall and Dr. Rummel, and what we thought is that we would re-evaluate in four to six weeks and see where we’re at. It doesn’t mean we will go back full-time on Oct. 1, but we will re-evaluate and see where we’re at. If things are looking good, then it’s a possibility. If it’s not looking good, then we would continue with the plan that we’re on.
Criteria for Full-time Instruction
Hennesy: What’s the criteria that defines “looking good” versus “not looking good?”
Heinold: An increase in the cases of COVID or a decrease in the cases of COVID or stagnant or staying the same. Seeing what guidelines are coming out, changing of mandates from the department of health or ISBE. Seeing what other things are happening in our area, especially our community.
Jones: I think another thing we have to look at, or as a community re-evaluate, is it even possible for us to have every student in the building. I think that there are a lot of things that go into when you say you are going to re-evaluate in 4-6 weeks. There are lots of aspects that you want to look at, not just the number of cases, but this is what is working, this is what hasn’t worked. There are a lot of aspects that are going to be looked at as far as re-evaluating. We did not vote as a union that agreed for us to go back on Oct. 1, that was not discussed, we didn’t vote on that. They said we would re-evaluate.
Schultz: Lindsey, is that your understanding of the plan? I feel like I heard you say the plan was to go part-time and then full-time on Oct. 1.
Hall: I think what was presented tonight was to reassess it.
Henrichs: I want to know in four weeks what are we going to use to determine how to decide if we’re going to go to a five day option in four weeks?
Hall: I think we look at the things that Dr. Rummel presented in her presentation. I think we look at what’s going well, what’s not going well. The goal of starting with less kids in the buildings is to get people used to their routine, to get habits and behaviors taught, since it’s nothing that anybody’s ever done before. Look at what’s going on locally with infection rates, what’s happening in our community with that. I think it’s a number of different factors. If it were a different situation that I were familiar with I could probably be more definite.
Henrichs: So if we’re in the same situation that we’re currently in and we have a low infectivity rate in our community, and say, less than 10% of our students have been infected or even less than 5%, were ready to go to five days per week.
Hall: I think the board should consider that at that point.
Giles: I think we developed a metric after we pass a plan. Let’s give us four weeks to develop a metric and we will come back to the board we discuss it again.I don’t think we want or need an automatic trigger.
Henrichs: I’m not asking for a full figure. I’m just saying that at some point, the appetite has to change or accepting a certain amount of risk. Because the risk group isn’t going to change even if we come back to the same point in four weeks, it’s still going to be the same risk. That’s what I’m asking. In some sense, I heard someone say kicking the can, kind of kicking the can down the road the other four weeks, and my concern is that we just keep kicking the can. And we’ve got parents probably who were making decisions tonight based on what they think is going to happen for this semester, are they going to homeschool even completely pull their kids out of school and not do even the remote learning option because they think there’s better options out there. So then we’re just kind of posing these other parents, and that’s that’s my point. And I feel like, at some point, there has to be some appetite to accept some risk. And I’m not seeing that it’s even going to change in four weeks.
Larson: I would agree. I don’t even know how we’re ready to open our doors to educate the kids in less than four weeks. We don’t have a plan, there’s so many questions. Are we really ready?
Keefe: In four weeks we’re going to have data on how schools across the nation have returned, and how the students have been impacted. To me that’s what you get out of four weeks.
Henrichs: We already have data from across the globe that the schools have done, and in Europe. In fact there’s schools that never even closed in Europe.
How much data do we need? That’s my question. I’m not, I’m not big on the compromis thing, I think we need to school five days a week and we have a remote learning for people who don’t want to accept that risk.
Additional Staff
Hennesy: What are the additional staffing requirements for this plan (full day), and what are the costs associated with those? I don’t believe that there is any leniency on the six feet when it comes to eating and drinking. How much additional staff per building and what are the costs associated with that?
Hall: So without knowing what the plan was going to be, it was difficult to know how much lunch supervision we would need, so that would be something that we would look at and plan for and also put out a call for volunteers if anyone wants to help with lunch duty. I don’t know the answer to that question mainly because the selection of the plan would have informed how many staff.
Liability
Schultz: As a representative of the board, I am really concerned about our liability in this issue. We’ve heard from our insurance company that they are not going to cover COVID-releated claims. And we’re heard from our lawyer that they highly recommend that we follow the recommendations that we’ve received to reduce our liability. My understanding is that if we need to defend a lawsuit or we lose a judgement, that we will need to pay for that out of our TORT fund, and many school districts across the state and many superintendents are talking about how if they’re sued then they’ll have to pay this out of the TORT fund, which, of course, means raising taxes on the community to pay the judgement. And if we are not following the guidelines we’ve been given, then my concern is why we wouldn’t attempt to make a plan that brings kids back to school, but follows the guidelines that we have.
Hennesy: I think one of the good points that Dr. Hall made is that we have local decisions that we have to make. Our decisions are very different from what Chicago might make. We happen to be in a really wonderful situation where we have the Champaign County Public Health Department who set a set of guidelines specific to our county. I think that allows us to weigh pretty heavily on a local organization who knows what’s going on in our county. They’ve given us some very detailed recommendations and those can be different than ISBE who is required to give state-wide recommendations. Certainly the size of districts that are going to be looking at ISBE are vastly different in Chicago than they are down here.
Henrichs: But I think that we can also question those local guidelines, too, and how those decisions were made, who is making them and what evidence its based on. Currently we have just over 100 active cases in the whole county and you have several hundred-thousand people. So I think those guidelines should be taken with a bit of grain of salt because I’m not sure that they are actually applicable to the entire county.
Heather Smith (Chief Financial Officer): I just want to make something clear. The liability company did not say that they would not cover it. They said that it would be like any other case. Say that somebody comes and says that their kid fell off the monkey bars. They’re going to look into it, they are going to investigate it, then they will make a decision on whether or not it’s a compensatable claim. It’s not that they aren’t going to cover any COVID cases.
Positive COVID Tests
Hennesy: Can you describe for me what happens under this scenario that we are talking about tonight when someone tests positive, either a staff member or a student, tests positive for COVID?
Nita Bachman: When somebody tests positive, I will be working directly with public health to take care of that to determine what the contacts were. If you’ve got a on the southeast corner of a room and the other kid is 25 feet away in the other corner of the room, that child is not exposed. It’s just those people who are in direct contact within that 3-feet circle for more than 15 minutes.
We had a pertussis outbreak several years ago so we’ve done some of this before. So I have the tracking, I have already spoken to public health about how that will work. They’ll call me when we have a positive case, and in our health plan that will go out to families, and to all of our staff, we have those steps that we will be taking with what happens if they’re positive, what happens if they’re exposed, we are going to be checking if children have symptoms, then I’m going to be looking at some of that to determine if it’s strep throat or is this something else. We have a whole gamut of things that come in the fall.
Hennesy: If someone tests positive in the classroom, will the entire classroom’s parents be notified that there’s a positive test in that classroom?
Bachman: In the past that was not necessarily the case, but case, yes. That classroom will be notified. The whole school will not necessarily, but I’ll work with public health guidelines on that. They actually will give me a letter to send and will tell me: this goes to the whole school or this goes to the classroom.
Hennesy: What happens if it’s a teacher?
Bachman: Then we are going to have to get another teacher. That teacher is going to have to be quarantined. It’s going to be the same thing, whether it’s a teacher or a child, it’s still the exposure piece and what their contact was. At the high school, a teacher who stands 20 feet in front of her class the whole day, and never comes close to those kids, that’s a whole different thing. Those kids aren’t exposed because they were not in six feet of her. The Pre-K teacher who is interacting with her students daily, that’s a whole different story. So it really is a case-by-case basis.
| Teacher Subcommittee Task Force Plan | Plan Developed by Administration Following ISBE Requirements | Full-Day Plan Developed by Administration |
| Pre-KDuring Phase 4, PreK students will attend school on-campus Tuesday-Friday in half day sections. The current session time frames may have to be adjusted toaccommodate for district-wide transportation planning. Classes will be limited to 10 students, to meet guidelines. Current tuition-based students are welcome tore-enroll, however, in Phase 4 no other tuition-based spots will be filled. In addition to academic learning, there will be emphasis on teaching students proper hand-washing and how to clean their spaces. Between sessions, staff will have lunch and sanitize the room for the next class.Grades K-5During Phase 4, elementary students will attend school on-campus for a half day Tuesday-Friday. This plan will have half of the students in a class attend in person in the morning and the other half in the afternoon. Between sessions teachers will have lunch and disinfect the classroom. When students are not learning oncampus, they will be engaged in a combination of synchronous and asynchronous learning. Asynchronous learning will include online activities with Dreambox(math) and Mystery Science. Synchronous learning will include activities such as lessons by encore teachers.Some elementary students needing RtI services in math, reading and/or SEL will attend the whole day. Half of their day will be spent with the classroom teacher.The other half of the day will be spent with interventionist and/or encore teachers. Other elementary students will receive RtI services remotely.All students who receive special education services for math, reading, writing andsocial-emotional learning will attend all day, T-F. They will attend their general education classes for half the day and receive special education instructional minutes and related services the second part of the day as well as participate in encore classes.Mondays will be asynchronous learning for all students. Teachers will attend professional development in the morning and have a period for planning. The afternoons will be reserved for office hours and remote small groups. | Grades Pre-K-5During Phase 4 all elementary students will attend school daily for a full school day.Students will remain in their “homeroom” classroom for all classes. Students will have an assigned area within the classroom where they will remain for alllearning. This will allow for the most practical social distancing given the age group. Building hours may be adjusted slightly to allow for professionaldevelopment and additional support for students. The focus during this instructional time will be on building relationships and reengaging with learning.Pros:-Reduced need for child care-Face-to-face learning with the whole class-Increased time at school; safe place | Grades Pre-K-5**It is requested that the first two weeks elementary students attend on A/B days with only half the students present at a time. This allows for teaching of routines, expectations, and new procedures. The 5th day of the week would be an asynchronous learning day. It is requested that JH/HS students attend on the ISBE proposed plan (2 days a week) the first two weeks of school. The 5th day of the week would be an asynchronous learning day. This would allow time for the teachers to engage with students to assess learning loss and build relationships. Pre-K: During Phase 4 all PK students will attend daily for a shortened half-day. The half-day for PK students will be 2.25 hours. Grades K-5: During Phase 4 all elementary students will attend school daily for a 5.5 hour school day. Students will remain in their “homeroom” classroom for all classes. Students will have an assigned area within the classroom where they will remain for all learning. This will allow for the most practical social distancing given the age group. Building hours will be adjusted to allow for the following: -Addressing learning loss through interventions and small group supports-Developing a comprehensive remote learning plan-Engaging in professional development-Connecting with students engaged in off-campus learning |
| Grades 6-8 During Phase 4, junior high and high school students will follow a modified six-hour school day Tuesday-Friday. Students will attend school in person one day a week and attend off-campus synchronously three days.On Mondays all students will attend school off-campus with asynchronous learning. Teachers will participate in professional development and department planning on Monday mornings and will assist students in small group instruction during office hours Monday afternoons.The campuses will be open with sign-ups for students to access the building for internet during off-campus learning.Junior high students in need of RtI services and/or additional supports will have the opportunity to receive those services before school and during the school day.High school students in need of RtI services and/or additional supports will have the opportunity to receive those services before school and during study hall both on-campus and off-campus. Students receiving RtI and/or IEP services may need to attend on-campus for additional days.Students who participate in Compass and ATLAS programs will attend all four days of in person learning.Eighth grade Foreign Language will be taught during the RtI time at the junior high. Students needing transportation for RtI or foreign language may ride the elementary bus. | Grades 6-8 Junior high and high school students will follow an abbreviated school schedule Tuesday-Friday. Students will attend school in person two days a week and attend off-campus synchronous the other two days. This will reduce the number of students on-campus at one time. On Mondays all students will attend school off-campus with asynchronous learning. Teachers will participate in professional development and departmentplanning on Monday mornings and will assist students in small group instruction during office hours Monday afternoons.The campuses will be open with sign-ups for students to access the building for internet during off-campus learning.Junior high students in need of RtI services and/or additional supports will have the opportunity to receive those services before school and during the school.High school students in need of RtI services and/or additional supports will have the opportunity to receive those services before school and during study hall bothon-campus and off-campus. Students receiving RtI and/or IEP services may need to attend on-campus for additional days.Eighth grade Foreign Language will be taught during the RtI time at the junior high school. Students needing transportation for RtI or foreign language may ride the elementary bus. | Grades 6-8 During Phase 4 all junior high and high school students will attend school daily for a 5.5 hour school day. Students will follow their school schedule or a modified schedule identified by the building staff. Due to the number of students, social distancing will not be possible in the classroom setting. Flexible seating arrangements will need to be made during lunch. Building hours will be adjusted to allow for the following: -Addressing learning loss through interventions and small group supports-Developing a comprehensive remote learning plan-Engaging in professional development-Connecting with students engaged in off-campus learning |
