Plan for voluntary return to school coming

B.C. will unveil a plan at the end of May to allow parents to voluntarily re-enrol their children into the school system, as part of the province’s COVID -19 recovery plan.

Premier John Horgan said the “gradual return to regular classrooms” for the last month of school in June will be a step toward a full reopening planned for September.

“Rob Fleming, the minister of education, and I will be making an announcement near the end of May about how we plan to go through the month of June,” Horgan said Friday during an online virtual town hall in which he took questions from viewers.

“It will not be a full start. It will not be a halftime start. And it will not be mandatory. Parents need to be comfortable that their kids are going to be safe. We’re going to do everything we can to provide that comfort, but at the end of the day these are personal decisions. Our whole restart plan depends on building confidence, and if people don’t feel they’re going to be safe, they’re not going to participate.”

B.C. schools have been mostly closed since mid-march. But as many as 5,000 children of frontline essential service workers have been able to attend school.

B.C.’S economic reopening plan, announced this week, will see some provincial parks reopen May 14 and some restaurants, cafes, libraries and personal beauty salons reopen as early as May 19. Horgan said the government continues to work with “sectoral roundtables” representing different parts of the economy to develop the health guidelines needed for reopening.