NC school reopening law will bring changes. Here’s what it means for your students.
North Carolina’s new school reopening law will lead to changes in how thousands of Triangle students are educated the rest of this school year.
Gov. Roy Cooper signed legislation Thursday that requires North Carolina school districts to offer in-person instruction to every student this school year. At the same time, the bill also says remote instruction must still be offered to those students who don’t want in-person classes.
Elementary school students and special-education students must be offered full-time, daily in-person instruction under an option called Plan A, in which minimal social distancing is required. Middle schools and high schools can use Plan A or Plan B, whose requirement of 6 feet of social distancing makes it hard to offer full-time in-person classes.
Middle schools and high schools have not been allowed to use Plan A until now. Some districts, including Beaufort County and Henderson County, quickly responded to the new law by approving plans to offer daily in-person classes to all grade levels.
The legislation came as some Triangle districts didn’t plan to offer daily in-person classes to elementary and special-education students. It also came as districts were wondering how to increase the amount of in-person time for middle school and high school students.
General Assembly staff say the legislation doesn’t mandate a specific number of days of in-person classes under Plan A.
Here’s what individual Triangle school districts are doing in light of the new law:
Wake County weighs secondary school options
The big question facing Wake County is whether to take advantage of the option to switch from Plan B to Plan A in middle schools and high schools. Many secondary school parents have complained that the current Plan B rotation of one week of in-person instruction every three weeks isn’t enough for students.
But switching to daily in-person classes would mean revamping schedules late into the school year. Rearranging teachers could also impact the instruction offered to Virtual Academy students.
“The Wake County Board of Education will discuss the effect of the legislation on plans for returning middle and high school students to in-person instruction more frequently at its March 16 meeting,” Wake posted in an online update Thursday.
Wake will have to offer daily in-person instruction to special-education students regardless of what they do with other students in middle schools and high schools. The law requires Plan A to be offered to students who have an Individualized Education Program (IEP) or a 504 plan
Wake won’t have to make changes for elementary schools. Starting Monday, fourth- and fifth-grade students will get daily in-person classes for the first time in a year. K-3 students already get daily in-person instruction.
No change for most Durham students
Durham Public Schools will stay with Plan B for middle and high schools, Superintendent Pascal Mubenga told the school board on Thursday. Students will get two days of in-person instruction every other week.
The specialty high schools will resume in-person instruction on March 18. Middle schools and remaining high schools will start April 8.
But Mubenga said the district will offer four days a week of in-person instruction to middle school and high school special-education students to comply with the legislation.
Elementary schools will also offer four days a week of in-person classes. No live classes, either in-person or online, will be offered on what Durham calls “Wellness Wednesdays.”
The return of elementary school students on Monday will mark the first time any Durham students have had in-person instruction since March 2020. The district originally planned to spend the whole school year in remote learning due to COVID-19 concerns.
“I know it’s going to be a challenging time,” Mubenga said Thursday. “It’s been a year. We know that a lot of districts, they were able to open while we were in remote.
“I am going to say this again. It’s going to be a repeat. I am going to ask for grace.”
Chapel Hill must offer daily in-person classes
The Chapel Hill-Carrboro school system will need to make major changes to its reopening plan because it hadn’t planned to bring students back for full-time, daily in-person instruction.
The school board had voted to begin bringing students back March 22, starting on the Plan B hybrid schedule. But now they’ll need to offer daily in-person classes to elementary school students and to special-education students.
District staff met Thursday to talk about what to do in response to the new state law and met with principals Friday.
The board will be asked to approve a new plan at its March 18 meeting that brings elementary students back to four or five days of in-person learning, according to an agenda posted Friday. Middle and high school students would return to a Plan B hybrid with two days a week of in-person classes and 6 feet of physical distancing.
The week of March 22 would be an acclimation week, allowing parents to send their students to school or keep them remote until in-person learning begins April 5. Spring break is March 29 to April 2.
Superintendent Nyah Hamlett is expected to share more information in her weekly email to families.
Like Durham, Chapel Hill-Carrboro is one of the last school districts in North Carolina to resume most in-person instruction. The district brought back roughly 50 to 60 Adapted Curriculum students to in-person classes four days a week in December.
Orange County working on Plan A schedule
The Orange County school system returned to hybrid classes for grades K-2 in late January and returned its pre-kindergarten students and those in exceptional children’s classes to in-person classes Oct. 27.
The rest of the district’s students began returning under Plan B in the past week.
The district is making plans to implement a Plan A schedule, district spokeswoman Melany Stowe said in an email Thursday. She didn’t say whether the Plan A schedule would be for all grades or just for the students required to receive it in the new legislation.
Superintendent Monique Felder will present her recommendation to the board at its March 22 meeting, she said.
Johnston County already on Plan A in elementary
Johnston County school leaders have been vocal about wanting to resume daily in-person instruction as soon as possible. In a statement Friday, the district said it will review the new law before any adjustments are made to the current school plan.
Elementary schools are already providing four days a week of in-person classes. Middle and high schools are offering students two days a week of in-person classes.
Special-education students in self-contained classes are already getting daily instruction. But the district will have to look at other special-ed students who’d be available to receive Plan A.
Chatham County expanding Plan A
On Tuesday, Chatham County will start a Plan A schedule four days a week for exceptional students and preK-5 students.
Other elementary students would return to Plan A on a staggered schedule: April 12 for pre-K through third-grades and April 19 for fourth- and fifth-grades.
Middle and high school students currently get two days a week of in-person classes.
No additional information was available Friday morning, district spokesman John McCann said.
This story was originally published March 12, 2021 at 2:07 PM.
