Official Newspaper of Eddy County since 1883
Official Newspaper of Eddy County since 1883
On Tuesday, July 14, North Dakota Governor Burgum announced the statewide reopening of schools this fall, stating, “We are entering new territory this fall as we serve a dual purpose to our state: the education of all students and safeguarding the health and safety of students, staff, families, and communities.”
In an effort to best serve more than 120,000 students throughout the state, Governor Burgum and State Superintendent Kristen Baesler introduced the North Dakota K-12 Smart Restart Guidelines. These guidelines offer school districts a color-coded phased approach to help inform planning and future decision making. In addition, school administration and board members will develop an ongoing health and safety plan in collaboration with public health officials as well as a distance learning plan.
Gov. Burgum also advised schools to consider a hybrid approach that combines in-person instruction with distance learning to best meet the needs of all students and families.
Staff and administration at NR-S already have a head start when it comes to planning. Earlier this month, staff were invited to begin discussing the topic of re-entry. Through small group discussion and scenario planning, staff were able to define and articulate initial areas of consideration. Such considerations included setting clear expectations and protocols, maximizing sanitation, implementing regular hygiene protocols and reconsidering traffic flow in and out of the building and within communal areas.
Louters explained in her online update, “As a school district, we are a communal organization, and although we can not create an environment that is risk-free, we must do our best to ensure that we remain open. We heard loud and clear from the surveys; most stakeholders want to be back in school. We need to do this safely. And we need to create the conditions that allow us to remain open, which may mean looking and feeling a little tighter right from the start.”
If current conditions continue in Eddy County, NR-S could very well be starting the 2020-21 school year in the green after completion of the required plans. However it should be noted that an influx of cases in the county could elevate the risk level from low (green) to moderate (yellow) or in extreme circumstances to high (red).
The details of these phases can be found on the North Dakota Department of Instruction website at https://www.nd.gov/dpi/parentscommunity/nddpi-updates-and-guidance-covid-19/nd-k12-smart-restart-guidance.
Schools are able to open under the Green (Low-Risk) phase if there is a low case count within the community, ample healthcare capacity to diagnose and treat COVID-19, and protocols for social distancing and hand hygiene as determined in the district’s health and safety plan.
Phase Yellow, which indicates moderate risk, is implemented when the community experiences an increase in case counts. During this time, staff should increase the routine cleaning of high-touch surfaces and shared spaces. All vulnerable individuals should continue to self- isolate during this time and avoid large groups in public places. Those who are sick will be asked to stay home and seek testing for COVID-19.
Phase Red occurs when there is high risk for exposure due to community spread COVID-19. Only essential travel and essential workforce, adherence to strict social distancing guidance, increased cleaning and disinfecting of bathrooms and high touch surfaces. Schools should remain closed for general in-person instruction. All instruction must continue via distance learning, whether using digital or non-digital platforms.
Distance learning might not have been a popular topic last spring. However, as Gov. Burgum stated, it was an effective means of educating students during a pandemic. To that end Superintendent Jill Louters identified two major learning outcomes. “We learned a lot about what is needed to facilitate a better experience and we learned the students need the school community.”
Those two aspects will be integrated into the upcoming distance learning plan, as well as a fair amount of critical thought and community input. Superintendent Jill Louters concluded, “We have invited a team of school leaders, representing different positions, employee groups, and positions on reentry to be a part of a small planning team as we continue to fine-tune our plan, based on what is best at this time for our students, staff and community. This team will meet several times, bringing together diverse ideas and needs to ensure that we can start as safely as possible.”
With just a few weeks away until the academic calendar begins, Louters and her team have a lot of work to do and a highly uncertain set of scenarios. That is why the K-12 Restart Guide was created to allow districts to explore and answer questions related to the classroom, school, family and community.
Here are a few of the guiding questions district officials seek to answer:
• What communication tools exist for educators to stay connected with families. Where are they effective?
• How will these resources be used to share information about school programming and expectation?
• How will schools and districts ensure students with developmental challenges or those who are medically fragile are kept safe while in the school buildings?
• How will the school district balance the social and emotional needs of youth to engage in learning with academic learning?
• How will the school district ensure that adults are modeling good social and emotional competencies?
A series of meetings will occur over the next two weeks with staff and parents to discuss the development of the reentry plan.
On July 31 at 3 p.m. the district will host a school board retreat via Zoom to review/discuss the proposed reentry plan.
A tentative school board meeting to finalize the reentry plan is planned for Friday, Aug. 7 at 3 p.m. Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81002923143?pwd=WlZJdG5ibW11WmtlMVlqK0YxZlZpUT09
Meeting ID: 810 0292 3143 Passcode: wXi46m
Details of the board’s organizational meeting are on page A3.
