‘It’s wonderful.’ Wake and Durham elementary schools resume daily in-person classes.
Wake County and Durham elementary students are getting some normalcy for the first time in the year since COVID-19 upended their lives.
Monday marked the first day of daily in-person instruction in a year for Wake fourth- and fifth-grade students. Monday also was the first day of any in-person classes since March 2020 for Durham elementary school students.
Durham students are making the move straight from all remote learning to now having four days a week of in-person classes. No live classes, either online or in-person, will be held on Wednesdays.
“This is the first time we’ve ever opened up a school in a pandemic, so there’s not really a playbook to go by,” Rod Teal, principal of Pearsontown Elementary School, said Sunday in a YouTube broadcast to Durham parents.
“We’re really just going to have to make sure that we’re doing everything we can to make sure that our students are safe, make sure that our staff members are safe, so that the learning process can continue for both face-to-face kids and our virtual kids.
But it’s not a completely normal return. Students still need to get their temperature checked daily, and they have to wear face masks in an environment where they’re encouraged to remain socially distanced from classmates and teachers.
“I think, all in all, just having them back in the building, even if it’s different, having them back in the building is going to be a positive experience for them,” Lisa Brown, principal of Green Elementary School in Raleigh, said in an interview Monday with The News & Observer. “And I think they’re going to salvage a really good experience out of school for this school year.”
Push to reopen NC schools
The return of students to face-to-face instruction schools is ramping up statewide as school districts feel pressure to increase in-person class time.
Last week, Gov. Roy Cooper signed legislation that requires North Carolina school districts to offer in-person instruction to every student this school year. At the same time, the new law 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.
The State Board of Education passed guidance Monday requiring all public schools to offer in-person instruction by April 1.
Lawmakers did not include charter schools in the law, but the state board included them in the elementary school requirement to offer at least four days a week of in-person instruction by April 1. But the board doesn’t have the authority to allow charter schools to use Plan A in middle schools and high schools.
Charter schools are asking lawmakers to pass additional legislation to give them the Plan A option in all grades.
Some districts have rushed to move all their schools to daily in-person classes.
Durham is opting to stay with Plan B for middle schools and high schools. The Wake County school board will discuss Tuesday what changes may be made to increase in-person instruction for middle school and high school students.
Elementary schools give daily in-person classes
Wake, Durham and Johnston counties already meet the law’s requirements for elementary students. Districts such as Chapel Hill-Carrboro and Orange County will need to modify their plan to provide daily in-person classes.
Elementary schools haven’t been as crowded as they are in Wake County for a year. Until this week, fourth- and fifth-grade students have been on a rotation of one week of in-person classes and two week of online classes.
PreK-3 students in Wake had already been getting daily in-person classes.
At Green Elementary, 247 of the 539 students are now on campus. The majority of the school’s students are in the Virtual Academy program. Brown said some students looked apprehensive Monday, but their faces turned to smiles when they saw their teachers and classmates.
“It’s wonderful to have all of our kids back in,” Brown said. “That’s obviously our preference to have as many of our children in the building as we possibly can.”
Social distancing in class
Elementary schools are trying to provide 3 feet of social distancing in classrooms. It can create a challenge in fourth- and fifth-grade classes that can have 30 or more students when they’re at full capacity.
Green Elementary, like several new or recently renovated Wake elementary schools, had to replace the large group tables designed to promote teamwork and group projects. Warehouses have been raided for smaller tables and individual desks to provide social distancing and to have students all sit facing the same direction.
Instead of working with rotating groups of eight students in the classroom at a time, fourth-grade teacher Sydney Neaves now has 24 students in front of her at Green Elementary.
“We’re doing the best that we can with the spacing and everything,” Neaves said in an interview Monday. “I have an air purifier for my classroom too.”
It’s also different during lunch time where students are supposed to be socially distanced, because it’s one of the few times where they’re allowed to remove their masks. Some schools like Green are still able to use the cafeteria, but many schools are having students eat in their classrooms.
Neaves said they’re as close as they can be to making the school experience feel normal while still trying to keep students safe. But the first-year teacher is still looking forward to the day when she can have more direct contact with her students
“I miss hugs,” Neaves said. “I’m a hug person, so I really miss the hugs from them.”
This story was originally published March 15, 2021 at 2:49 PM.
