How will NC schools reopen? Leaders promise pandemic guidance will come next week.
State health and education leaders will release guidance next week on how North Carolina public schools can reopen next school year from the coronavirus pandemic.
State health guidance on reopening schools was scheduled to be released at Thursday’s State Board of Education meeting, as school districts clamor for more information while they plan for the 2020-21 school year. But state officials said that questions were raised by districts about the proposal, so a revised plan will be presented at a special called board meeting on June 11.
“We want to make clear that we make the commitment today to deliver on the June 11th meeting of this board one single combined document that incorporates the best thinking of the Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Public Instruction and this board in consultation with the Governor’s Office to assist our districts and schools preparing for reopening of schools in August,” State Board of Education chairman Eric Davis said Thursday.
All North Carolina public schools have been closed since mid-March to try to slow the spread of COVID-19, the illness caused by the coronavirus. It’s unclear when they will be allowed to reopen for in-person instruction and what new measures will be needed to deal with the pandemic.
State Superintendent Mark Johnson formed the N.C. Schools Reopening Task Force.
Susan Perry, chief deputy secretary of the state Department of Health and Human Services, told state lawmakers last month that they’re working on health guidance focused on five areas: social distancing, cleaning/hygiene, monitoring health of students and staff, protecting high-risk populations and educating students and staff.
Questions raised about health guidance
Ideas being discussed include limiting how many students are on campus at any given time, having students eat in their classrooms, having people wear facemasks and daily temperature checks before being allowed on campus.
“The DPI team has had some pretty blunt conversations with NCDHHS about their draft health guidance for schools,” Johnson said Thursday. “While many have been expecting a defined list of requirements, it appears many of the substantive guidelines around social distancing and face coverings and remote learning may be more recommendations come August.”
Local school districts have also raised questions about the preliminary guidance, which hasn’t been publicly released.
“On Monday and Tuesday of this week, we received some valuable constructive feedback, particularly from our superintendents, but also from teachers and other partners that made it clear that there was an opportunity to improve the product that we were working on,” Davis said.
Johnson said that DPI will present guidance next week on now to put into effect the health guidelines. He said that it’s possible that each school district will have its own plan for reopening.
“We are not going to work on a one-size fits all approach,” Johnson said. “Instead, we will seek to offer a toolkit for districts to provide different levels of strategies that can be individualized to best support the decision-making of leaders on the ground in each district.”
Johnson said they need to be careful with reopening, citing the death this week of an 8-year-old Durham student due to complications from COVID-19.
“We lost a student to COVID-19 this week, a second-grader and she’s about the age of my own daughter,” Johnson said. “I cannot fathom the pain the family must be going though right now.
“They’ve made it very clear they want their message to get out there so that other families don’t have to go through the pain of that loss.”
This story was originally published June 4, 2020 at 1:11 PM with the headline "How will NC schools reopen? Leaders promise pandemic guidance will come next week.."
