Seven months after start of COVID-19 lockdown, Chambersburg students returning to school
Students in Chambersburg Area School District will return to classrooms this week for the first time since the COVID-19 lockdown went into effect seven months ago.
Elementary students will go back starting Monday. Middle- and high-school students will return starting one week later, on Oct. 26.
The transition back to classrooms will help the majority of the district's 9,066 students have some semblance of pre-pandemic life. District staff are treating it like it is a "second opening" to the 2020-21 school year, which began Aug. 24 will full-time distance learning, according to spokesperson Brian Miller.
Around 70% have chosen to go back to school on a hybrid schedule; roughly half of them will go to school Monday and Tuesday or Thursday and Friday, then participate in distance learning the other days (on Wednesdays, students will complete assignments posted in their learning management system, and teachers will have time to meet virtually with students). On any given day, about one-third of the entire student body will be in classrooms.
Families also had the option to continue to keep their children out of schools, either in distance learning or CAVE, the district's own cyber school. Some families have pulled their children out of CASD in favor of private schooling or a third-party cyber program.
As of Wednesday, about 340 students had not yet reported their choice to the district, according to Superintendent Dion B
More:Chambersburg school board approves two-tiered reopening plan
Precautions and logistics
Gearing up for any school year is challenging. Implementing health and safety measures to stem the spread of COVID-19 makes it more so.
Betts and two principals all said they feel as ready as they can, but how successful the rest of the school year will be will depend on attitudes and cooperation.
"Everybody will have to take a breath and mentally prepare themselves for things to be different," said Shawn Kimple, principal at Ben Chambers Elementary.
Across the district, classrooms will have desks spaced out and not much else. Even some cafeterias will have desks instead of tables, and tables that do remain will only seat two or three students at a time.
Machines to fill water bottles have replaced water fountains.
Sinks for handwashing have been installed throughout some buildings.
Each room has a hand-sanitizer dispenser.
In offices, plexiglass will guard secretaries from visitors. However, most meetings will be virtual.
Students won't get to hang out together after arriving at school or while waiting to leave; they will move directly from busses or other transportation to a classroom (or the cafeteria, if they get breakfast), or vice versa.
Recess will be different for elementary students. Jungle gyms and other equipment that can't be cleaned between uses will be off-limits, Kimple said.
“We will let kids use swings but only if there is an adult standing by who can clean the chain in between each student use,” he added.
Schedules have been adjusted so that only a portion of students in a school on a given day are in the halls at one time. At CAMS North, for example, each grade level will have its own bell schedule, according to Principal Kurt Widmann.
More:Chambersburg Area School District Foundation creates scholarship in name of late alumna
More responsibilities, not enough teachers
Teachers will have a lot on their shoulders this year. They are expected to teach students at school as well as those who have chosen distance learning. Some teachers will also continue to work with students learning independently in CAVE.
How will this work? Administrators have largely left the logistics up to the teachers, but basically half of a class will be students at desks and the other half will attend via video conferencing. Students will continue to use their Chromebooks and the various programs they have gotten used to over the past seven weeks of full-time distance learning, which will help with the transition of the hybrid schedule.
Teachers across different grades and schools have been working together and coming up with innovative ways to make it work, Betts said.
“I’ve been saying to teachers all week: when students come back, have fun and help each other,” he said.
The district is contending with a teacher shortage. About 40 teachers have requested leave in relation to COVID-19 because they have a medical condition that makes them more susceptible to serious illness or they do not have enough child care, according to Betts. On top of that, the district anticipates that some teachers will need to quarantine following exposure and while awaiting test results.
Karen Gokay, human resources director, said at a school board meeting on Oct. 13 that the staffing issue is a "concern." There are not enough substitutes available, either.
Some teachers who cannot be in school buildings, particularly those in quarantine, may be able to telework. In those cases, the district will still need to find someone to be physically present with students in the classroom.
The district is looking at getting qualified support staff certified so that they can fill in as substitute teachers when a teacher cannot be present or telework. There are also discussions about having student teachers fill in as substitutes.
"We want to be able to be as flexible as possible so students can continue to have the educational benefit of their regular teacher," Gokay said.
More:With uncertainty surrounding the school year, Chambersburg band camp marches on
Mask mandate will be enforced
Administrators said they will not mess around when it comes to enforcing the state's requirement that everyone in a school wear a face covering.
If a student will not keep their face covering on properly, a parent will be called, Betts said. If that doesn't resolve the issue, the student will be sent home. The first day of school will serve as a grace period, Kimple said.
Widmann, the CAMS North principal, said he does not anticipate major issues at the secondary level. He said he has heard from colleagues in other districts that have welcomed back students that they follow the rules because they don't want the school to close again.
"They want to have that interaction. That relationship piece is very, very important; it's tough to do through the internet and online," he said.
At the elementary level, it will be all about constant reminders, Kimple said.
"We have to mentally prepare that that’s gonna be all day," he said. "We don't want it to turn into a discipline issue."
Students will have limited opportunities to remove their masks during the day, including while eating lunch. Elementary students can take off their masks during recess if they can maintain 6 feet of distance from others.
COVID-19 cases posted online
The school district will soon publish a dashboard on its website where it will share the number of COVID-19 cases in schools. It will appear at casdonline.org/reopening.
There is no rule that a certain number of cases means automatic closure of a school. Rather, the school district works with the Pennsylvania Department of Health and would follow its guidance on decisions like that.
Like most of the state, Franklin County is rated as having a "moderate" transmission rate, meaning there have been less than 100 cases per 100,000 residents in the previous seven days or a percent positivity rate of 5 to less than 10%. The health department recommends that school districts in counties in this category either open schools in a hybrid/blended model or have remote-only schooling.
For the seven-day period ending Oct. 15, Franklin County's incidence rate per 100,000 residents was 62 cases, according to the department of health's early warning monitoring system. There were 31 more positive cases than in the previous seven days.
"We're definitely keeping an eye on the uptick," Betts said.
However, the health department recommends that school districts consider the 14-day rolling average for their own localities when making decisions. Dr. Michael Colli of Keystone Health keeps district administrators up to date on the data.
Corrections: Some details have been changed in this story, including: students won't get set mask breaks (but will have limited opportunities to remove them); not all schools will be limited to one person in a bathroom at one time; a support staff member only needs certification if they are serving as a substitute, independently. And, to clarify, students will have assigned school work on Wednesdays.
Amber South can be reached at asouth@publicopinionnews.com.