Class attendance in-person varies school to school

Nearly 100% going to S.Y. Jackson Elementary, 18% to West Mesa High

Jack Vermillion anticipated a lot of students would come back to S.Y. Jackson Elementary School when they could. The longtime principal initially guessed upward of 85%.

Turns out, nearly 100% of the students ended up returning, according to data released by Albuquerque Public Schools this week. The data is a snapshot reflecting students who were in classrooms last week, according to APS spokeswoman Monica Armenta.

“I think the community really trusts the teachers that they’re going to look out for their kids and I think when you put all that together, they felt very good about sending their kids back to school,” Vermillion said.

Meanwhile, there were some schools that had just 15% to 20% of enrolled students attend in person.

At the beginning of the month, APS campuses

opened their doors, allowing all students who chose in-person learning to come back full-time — a first since last school year.

APS had been facing mounting pressure to open during the COVID-19 pandemic from some parents and students, the governor and eventually the state Public Education Department, which called for all public schools to open fully by April 5.

How many kids took the district up on face-to-face schooling differs broadly school by school.

Districtwide, 35,403 K-12 students are learning on campus out of 70,083, or 50.5%. That means more than 34,000 students are still learning at home.

“There are fluctuations in that … but that is probably a pretty good approximation of what our daily counts are,” Superintendent Scott Elder said during a Board of Education meeting Wednesday night.

That’s in line with statewide numbers. PED officials reported that about 51% of New Mexico’s public school students were learning from the classroom last week.

PED instructed districts to offer families the option of remote learning even as schools reopened.

But that hasn’t been easy as teachers juggle instructing students in front of them and those learning through a screen. Elder said he shared that with Public Education Secretary Ryan Stewart recently.

“We are strongly advocating for a decision that does not continue this model in the fall,” Elder said.

S.Y. Jackson has 98.7% of students learning in person, the APS data shows. Vermillion, the principal, said that roughly 20 children are still learning remotely.

“Our average class has most kids except for one or two,” he said.

Having a high percentage of the student population back on campus has warranted some COVID-safe adjustments. For instance, recess and lunch happen with smaller groups of kids.

Other schools in APS had lower participation rates with in-person learning.

West Mesa High School had 322 students on campus out of 1,775, or 18%, according to the APS spreadsheet.

Principal Mark Garcia said the school’s aim is to support families in whatever they choose while communicating all the measures that were put into place to make the school safe.

“We want to support their academic achievement either way,” he said.

Garcia said some seniors have kept learning online because they’ve built their work schedules around that model and it works better for them. And other students chose to come back on campus because they didn’t do well with virtual schooling.

Garcia said the number of students at desks fluctuates. For instance, some have had to quarantine and learn remotely.

The principal said he expects more students will return as more young adults get vaccinated for COVID-19.

There are about 20,000 students at APS who are 16 and over, according to Elder, and there’s been a recent push in the district and state to get those students vaccinated.

Garcia said he is grateful he can welcome back students who do want in-person learning right now, saying he missed the sounds of a busy school and the bells echoing in the hallways.

“It just reminds you why school is such a special place,” he said.