In anticipation of holiday travel, schools have been under pressure to pivot to remote instruction to accommodate quarantines and limit the spread of Covid from family gatherings.
The vast majority of schools appear committed to staying the course on in-person learning as long as possible. But some have moved to more remote instruction, and at least one is going as far as to cancel all in-person school between Thanksgiving and Jan. 11.
In the Two Rivers Supervisory Union, which serves Andover, Baltimore, Cavendish, Chester, Ludlow and Mount Holly, Superintendent Lauren Fierman announced this week that classes would go remote between the Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks, as well as one week after.
In an interview Thursday evening, Fierman said the call had been a âtremendously difficult decision to have to make.â But she surveyed both families and staff and found that at least a quarter planned to travel out of state or have out-of-state visitors in their homes over the holidays.
Other districts are making similar, although sometimes less drastic alterations. In the White River Valley Supervisory Union, school leaders late last month announced that there would be teacher planning days on Dec. 21 and 22, and a remote week in the first week of January. And in the West River Modified Union School District, the school board recently voted to let schools go remote for two weeks after Thanksgiving and two weeks after the December break, Superintendent Bill Anton wrote in an email.
In the Slate Valley Unified School District, Superintendent Brooke Olsen-Farrell said the topic has come up in conversations with fellow superintendents as well as her own leadership team. Sheâs made it clear to her staff she doesnât think going remote is a good idea.
The district has been all in-person in the middle and elementary-school grades this year, and going remote would put too big a burden on families, she said. It also sends the wrong message.
âYou’re giving your staff and your students permission to travel, you’re inadvertently telling them, âOh, it’s OK to travel.â What I’m trying to tell my staff, students and families is, you know, we all need to be responsible citizens,â she said.
Even as the governor on Friday announced strict new restrictions to limit the spread of the virus as case counts surged this week, state officials held firm that K-12 schools should be one of the last â not first â things to close.
Education Secretary Dan French has been asked repeatedly if the state will shut down in-person learning between Thanksgiving and the December break, but he has said the state has no plans to close schools. The state will continue to monitor trends, he said.
âWeâre hoping and expecting that educators in particular will follow the travel guidance and not travel out of state, precisely so we can protect opportunities for in-person instruction,â he said.
Fierman said she certainly isnât encouraging anyone to travel. But she said she doesnât presume to know whatâs best for other peopleâs families, or what obligations they might have, and noted staff are in a particular bind regarding children coming from college, whom they cannot turn away. And she added that she preferred to take decisive action with as much forewarning as possible to give people time to plan ahead.
âThe idea that I would wait to tell people that until the last possible moment, did not feel like a helpful thing to do for our staff, or our students â or our families,” Fierman said. “That having some warning rather than something happening at the last minute, felt like a way to help to increase stability rather than decrease it.”