Johnston County students will begin returning to school this month. Here’s the plan.
The first Johnston County students will return to school this month after having spent six months learning from home due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The Johnston County school board had voted Aug. 27 to keep all students on virtual learning through the end of the first quarter on Oct. 16, because of concerns about COVID-19 spread. But the school board voted this week to bring back K-12 special-education students in self-contained classes and Pre-K students on Sept. 28 and kindergarten students on Oct. 12.
Superintendent Eric Bracy said he’s now comfortable with bringing some students back sooner because of Gov. Roy Cooper’s decision to move the state’s reopening stage to Phase 2.5, which has looser pandemic restrictions. But Bracy said they’re not bringing back other students early to be on the safe side.
“The pandemic is real and we have to slowly walk ourself back to school and work toward taking baby steps as we come back to normalcy,” Bracy said at this week’s board meeting. “It’s good to get everybody back in school, but we want to be very intentional and purposeful and come back in lower numbers than we normally would.”
Students will get in-person and remote learning
The Pre-K and self-contained special-education students will go to class four days a week. On Wednesdays, students will work from home as the schools get a deep cleaning and teachers receive training.
Kindergarten students will be split into two groups, with half having in-person classes on Mondays and Tuesdays and the rest on Thursdays and Fridays. Students will get remote learning on Wednesdays.
Students in grades 1-5 will return to class Oct. 19. They’ll also be split into two groups, getting two days a week of in-person classes and three days of remote learning.
The district is working on the details for how to return middle school and high school students to campus.
Johnston County is North Carolina’s seventh-largest school district, with nearly 37,000 students.
The majority of the state’s 1.5 million public school students haven’t had face-to-face classes since Cooper ordered campuses closed in mid-March to try to slow the spread of COVID-19. Cooper has allowed schools to reopen under social-distancing rules, but the majority of districts opted to stick with virtual instruction when they began the school year on Aug. 17.
Johnston County school leaders said they can’t yet bring all students back at the same time because of state rules that limit the number of people that can ride school buses and be on campus.
Virtual learning not working for some students
The district will continue to operate a virtual program for students who don’t feel comfortable returning to campus. But Paula Coates, Johnston’s deputy superintendent for curriculum, instruction and accountability, predicted a mass exodus from the virtual program once schools reopen.
“I’m getting requests constantly that virtual’s not working and I want to go back face-to-face,” Coates told the board. “When we get in that model, I think we’ll have significant reduction in the number of people requesting virtual.”
A growing number of parents around the state have become frustrated over the use of online learning.
Students will have to deal with new requirements such as wearing face coverings and undergoing daily health screenings and temperature checks before they’ll be allowed on campus.
“We talk about a new normal,” Bracy said. “This is definitely a new normal: taking temperatures as students roll up in buses and carpool lines. We want to get these protocols and safety regulations down to a science.”
This story was originally published September 11, 2020 at 9:00 AM.
