During its meeting Thursday evening, the Snyder ISD school board heard reports from district administrators about how at least the start of the 2020-2021 school year will proceed.
Friday morning, Superintendent Dr. Eddie Bland, Chief Academic Officer Dr. Rachael McClain and Public Information Officer Valerie Morris spoke with staff from The Snyder News about the beginning of the new school year in the era of COVID-19 and social distancing.
“The instructional delivery, we’re going to have face-to-face, we’re going to have virtual and we’re going to have some hybrid, where some of it’s virtual and some of it’s face-to-face,” Bland said.
McClain assured parents that virtual and face-to-face learning will be as similar as the district can make them.
“It’s very important that parents know that virtual kids and face-to-face kids are going to be held to the exact same expectations,” she said. “What we did in the spring…our teachers did a great job, but we didn’t aggressively grade. We gave a lot of freedom on what we accepted as an engagement. That will not be the case. In virtual school, kids are learning from home but they will have the same rigorous expectations that they do in a face-to-face class.”
McClain explained that students learning virtually will be expected to keep up with studies at the same pace as their face-to-face counterparts.
“We’re going to take attendance asynchronously, so a student has to engage in their work in a 24-hour time period. But some of that engagement might be that it’s virtual at the same time — so synchronous instruction,” she said. “So they may log into a Zoom (virtual meeting) with a teacher, and it will be a live interaction, and that will be part of that expectation for the students.”
Instruction and schoolwork in the two models will be the same, but students in a virtual learning model will miss out on some aspects of school life.
“If you’re defining ‘experience’ as changing classes in a building and walking up and down the hall and the social interactions, at-home virtual learning, that will be a different experience,” Bland said. “But as far as the academics, we’re trying to set it up so that is virtually the same.”
McClain said that in-school students will obviously have greater opportunity to be guided by their classroom teachers.
“Virtual school cannot replace that face-to-face, ongoing interaction with a teacher. So when a student is struggling, or if they’ve mastered it and need to be pushed harder, if we’re face-to-face we can see that, and the teacher adjusts on the fly,” she said. “Virtually, there will be a little bit of a lag in that. But the activities, their mini-lessons from the teachers, they’re going to record them and the kids can watch them. The activities, the mini-lessons, the assessments, all of that will be the same. What you lose in a virtual environment is that adjustment, that ‘I have a question.’ We’ve created processes where that can happen, it just might not happen in real time.”
The hybrid instruction won’t be an option students or parents can choose at the start of the year, but will take effect in some situations.
“An individual student gets exposed to COVID. They are face-to-face. They’re exposed to COVID and they have to go home for 14 days,” McClain said.
Some extracurricular activities or courses of study might also necessitate a hybrid course of instruction.
“The hybrid being also, ‘I want to go virtual, but I also want to be in athletics,’” Bland said.
“You don’t do athletic practice virtual. They may be choosing to do virtual because academically, their child excels in that environment. It may not even be COVID-related. The majority of them will be. I think CTE (Career and Technical Education) is going to present some hybrid requirements. Welding. You’re going to have to do some lab time. You’re going to have to do some welding. They may be doing all of their other classes virtually, but if they want welding, there’s going to be some face-to-face with that. So that would be the hybrid model.”
Dr. McClain said the schools will maintain a strict safety protocol for students attending face-to-face classes.
“Grades four through 12 will be expected to wear a mask,” she said.
“We’re actually providing all of our students with (a mask). It is a gaiter (mask that covers mouth nose and neck) but it is a thicker gaiter. I couldn’t blow out a candle with this on.”
Bland added N-95 respirator masks will not be required, and that, although students are required to wear their masks, the district will provide paper masks to students who come without them.
Teachers will have masks and plastic face shields, McClain said.
Students at lower grades will be protected as well, she said.
“Our little ones, Pre-K through three, we’ve got plastic tri-folds that go around their desk,” Dr. McClain said. “They can wear a mask, but also we expect them to use that shield.”
Other safety measures include hand sanitizer in all classrooms.
“Since about 30 percent of our kids are doing virtual, we’ll be able to spread out in the classrooms. Not the six feet. We won’t be able to do the six feet, but you’ll be able to do some distance,” McClain said.
Each campus will have a plan for lunchtime, McClain added.
“That was a big issue for us,” she said. “Every campus has a plan where the kids will be fairly secluded with their eating. That’s when they take the mask off, obviously, so we tried to put as many barriers in place as possible.”
Temperature screenings at bus stops and no visitors on campuses are also part of the plan.
Bland said finishing touches are being put on plans for UIL sports activities in the fall.
“We’ll be able to have limited seating in the gymnasiums and at the football field,” he said. “Basically 50 percent capacity is max capacity. I’m not sure we’re going to make it to 50 percent capacity because it’s hard to even go to 50 percent capacity and maintain social distancing. We’ll be running below 50 percent capacity.”
The home side will probably seat between 700 and 900 fans plus the band, school employees and essential personnel.
The band will play at home games but will not travel to away games. Fans of the visiting team will also be welcome and will also be expected to socially distance.
Bland said UIL guidelines don’t make any provision for students to wear masks while in play.
“This is per UIL guidelines. They don’t have to wear a mask while they’re participating,” he said. “When they’re not participating, they have to wear face coverings, and they’re spread out all down the sidelines. They’re not just grouped up.”
Other UIL activities, such as academic competitions or One-Act Play are not typically held until spring, so are too distant to plan for, Bland said.
Bland assured parents that the disttrict’s leaders have the students’ best interests in mind.
“We want to make sure that the school board and the administration, down to the campus level, are committed to taking care of children,” he said. “Their safety, their health: Priority one. We’re committed to providing the absolute best academic program that the environment allows us to provide at the time.”
In other business at the school board meeting, the board approved with a single vote a consent agenda including minutes from three previous meetings, finance reports, accounts payable, 2019-20 budget amendments, adoption of the TEA-created program Texas Home Learning 3.0, contracts for services from the Education Service Center 14 in Abilene, purchase of attendance credits for the upcoming school year and the district’s proposed tax rate of $1.0194 per $100 valuation including $0.9564 per $100 in Maintenance and Operations and $0.063 in Interest and Sinking.
The board also approved Texas Association of School Boards Policy Update 115, discussed Lone Star Governance and heard presentations of updates on the Snyder High School CTE program and on the planned STEM MakerSpace.