About two weeks ago I wrote a News Notes column with a South Portland Schools’ COVID-19 update. Since then we have also provided the school board with a further Pandemic Response Plan update at the March 10 meeting. For a link to the meeting, visit the South Portland School Department website. The Pandemic Response Plan update runs from about 54:50 until 1:40:30.
Here are some highlights:
We want students back as much as possible, but the public health guidelines have not yet changed.
We are constantly preparing for the possibility they will change.
For now we are continuing with the hybrid model because current practices follow current public health guidance and maximize learning opportunities.
School staff vaccinations have started, but with two shots and then two weeks after final shot for full effectiveness, are not expected to be complete until mid-May.
We acknowledge that this time has been tremendously challenging and agonizing for all students, parents and staff. It is hard for parents who are not yet sending their children to in-person learning as they do not yet feel it is safe to do so. It is hard for parents who want their children back full-time as soon as possible. We hear regularly from parents on both sides and we are listening and trying to respond as clearly as we can.
When presenting to the school board with our nurse coordinator and three principals we stressed three points:
We are following the guidance for health and safety from Maine CDC, U.S. CDC, the American Academy of Pediatrics and that are part of the Maine Department of Education six requirements for in-person instruction. Following this guidance we have had minimal disruption to in person learning following our hybrid schedule. As a result, we have about 40 elementary students returning to in-person hybrid from full distance for the third trimester. With the guidance as it currently exists, we are not able to bring all students back full-time given available space constraints at various grade levels and schools. We are continually re-evaluating our ability to expand in person learning should the guidance changes.
We have designed our program to maximize learning to the greatest extent possible. We believe we have been able to provide in-person and distance learning days that are predictable and consistent to the extent possible during a pandemic. All of our staff, teachers, special educators, educational techs, principals and other professional staff, have worked hard to maximize both in person and distance learning. We have seen considerable improvements this school year compared to the “emergency remote learning” from last spring. Since early September our schools have been open – providing in-person and remote learning opportunities for all students. Use of space in our buildings, technology and resources have been leveraged to provide learners with access to that which is most essential, including meals and targeted instruction for academic and social emotional learning. At the same time we know that It is not perfect or pretty for anyone – teachers, students or parents – but we do see evidence that students are learning. We also know that for some this has not worked as well as any of us would like, and when this happens we encourage parents to reach out to teachers and principals so that we can support your student.
We want our students attending full-time as soon as we can safely, predictably and consistently do so. While some districts, because of their enrollment, size of rooms or other factors, have been able to increase learning time, outbreaks have caused several to move to remote learning due to the number of staff and students who are considered close contacts who must quarantine. We are not confident that we will be back full-time, in-person this spring without significant changes in current guidance, but we are confident given the anticipated course of the pandemic and rate of vaccination both among school staff and in the general community, that it will be by September. We will continue to provide updates on this regularly.
As I have reported previously, we are moving in the right direction, but with the pace of vaccination just starting to pick up and the possibility of more contagious variants increasing, we will continue to follow current health guidelines that have allowed us to have so much in-person instruction this far.
At the current rate of vaccination, we expect most school staff to have their first shot by early April. Even if this happens by the end of March, which we are working toward, it is 28 days between the first and second shot (Moderna) and then two weeks after this for full effectiveness, taking us to mid May until we can reliably say that all staff have had the opportunity to be vaccinated, which our surveys show the overwhelming majority are eager to do.
As I wrote in late February, thanks to very careful planning and ongoing efforts, we have been extremely effective in containing/preventing increased spread of COVID-19 due to school operations. While this is not how any of us want to spend this school year, we do think that our hybrid learning plan has provided consistency, predictability and access to quality learning during this once in 100 years pandemic. At the same time, we are actively continuing to explore our operating capacities under different scenarios should there be any adjustments we see in guidance from U.S. CDC, Maine CDC and Maine Department of Education.
Ken Kunin is superintendent of schools for South Portland. He can be reached at kuninke@spsd.org.
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