Gov. Phil Scott has characterized a call for the creation of a task force on reopening K-12 public schools as a political gambit by Democratic Senate leader Tim Ashe. The governor said state officials are already extensively working with educators and public health experts as they move forward with plans for the fall.
Last week Sen. President Pro Tem Ashe, D/P-Chittenden, demanded that Scott create a statewide panel with teachers, superintendents, principals and school board members to develop strategies for opening schools safely in the coming months.
Ashe said Monday that he has been “swamped with messages from parents and school staff” who are concerned about whether schools, which were closed during the Covid-19 pandemic, will be prepared to restart in the fall.
“Establishment of this task force will create confidence that Vermont is preparing for the realities of the fall in an inclusive way,” Ashe said in a statement.
The Vermont-NEA, the union that represents most of the state’s school employees, previously made a similar demand of the Scott administration.
The political rhetoric from the union and Ashe is misplaced, Scott said on Thursday, because that work is already underway. The Agency of Education has issued an initial round of guidelines for school reopening and has solicited input from the Vermont NEA and others in weekly discussions.
“There have been many, many people at the table, experts from every field, those in the pandemic community, as well as from the NEA themselves. I think there was probably four representatives that were involved in this since April. They meet every single week,” the governor said last week.
The governor derided Ashe’s task force demand — made after the Legislature adjourned on June 26 — as a political move. Scott said he was surprised legislative committees didn’t previously ask his administration to discuss plans for reopening.
“I thought it was unfortunate that, two days after the Legislature had adjourned, that they called for more oversight,” he said. “I would have thought the committees in the House, in the Senate in education, might have wanted to check in.”
“This is politics, it’s a campaign year,” the governor added. “There’s a series of elections in November and August, so I’ll leave it at that.”
Ashe, who is running for lieutenant governor, said Scott’s charge was “nonsensical.”
He said he has heard “loudly and clearly from teachers, parents, school administrators” who are concerned about the guidance for reopening in August.
The Senate leader said teachers and others responsible for reopening schools should help craft the plan.
“We’ve seen administrations, whether it’s in Vermont, or other states or at the national level, who say they’re working on it and they’ve got it figured out,” Ashe said. “But if they’re not including people who actually have to implement it, it means that there’s a high likelihood that by the time we see the proposal, the guidelines won’t work in practice.”
“I think what the governor ought to be thinking is, why is it that so many teachers and administrators are so concerned right now,” he said. “And if they’ve got some great plan, wonderful, but they should be sharing it to give people confidence and predictability going into September.”
Vermont Secretary of Education Dan French echoed the governor in remarks on Thursday and said pediatricians, infectious disease experts and associations representing principals, special education administrators, superintendents and independent schools have all been meeting regularly with the Agency of Education to discuss the August reopening plans.
Now, the agency’s focus is on implementing the guidance and resuming in-person programs in the fall.
“We’re going to be focusing our efforts on implementation, so it remains an open question to what extent such a committee would already supersede work that’s going on,” French said of the proposed task force.
The NEA continues to push for the statewide panel. Darren Allen, a spokesperson for the union said Friday that school staff including teachers, custodians, paraeducators, bus drivers, and food service workers should all be at the table with the administration as it contemplates the fall reopening.
“It’s one thing to have the administration in consultation with us,” he said. “It’s quite another, and we believe vital, to have actual educators at the table, making the decisions along with the state’s other experts.”
