Lincoln-Way among districts shifting online

Schools switch to remote learning as COVID-19 spikes

Lincoln-Way High School District 210 and Bremen High School District 228 switched to remote learning Thursday and Homer Elementary District 33C said it would do the same starting Monday as hundreds of students quarantine due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Lincoln-Way Superintendent R. Scott Tingley told families this week that, as of Monday, about 600 students in the district’s three schools were in quarantine due either to a positive test result for the virus or being in close contact with someone who had tested positive.

Tingley said that, based on reports from contact tracing, there was little evidence that any of the cases resulted from students and staff contracting the virus in school buildings, and that most were traced back to social gatherings or family settings.

He said district officials expect the number of students not being able to attend school due to self-quarantine will rise as positivity rates increase in the suburbs the district serves, which include Frankfort and New Lenox.

“There are simply too many students not able to attend inperson learning at this point due to exposure or a close contact,” Tingley said.

The number of faculty who are under self-quarantine was not available, but staff are allowed to teach from home on a case-bycase basis after consulting with their school’s principal, according to a district spokeswoman.

Homer 33C Superintendent Craig Schoppe told families Thursday that 64 staff and 224 students were quarantined due being symptomatic for the virus or having had close contact with someone who had tested positive. There were 10 positive coronavirus cases and four probable cases among district staff, and 9 positive and 10 probable cases among students, he said.

District 33C had begun bringing students back gradually last month, with parents protesting outside a school boardmeeting in late September demanding officials put an end to distance learning. But Schoppe, in a letter to families, said officials doubted the school setting had contributed to rising positive cases.

The district had “reached a point where we will be unable to cover classrooms and bus routes nextweek,” Schoppe wrote.

District 228 Superintendent Bill Kendall said Thursday that COVID-19 guidance from public health officials showing the schools are located in an orange warning zone prompted themove to remote learning.

“We’re being cautious for our students, staff and community,” he said.

District 228, which operates Bremen in Midlothian, Hillcrest in Country Club Hills and Oak Forest and Tinley Park high schools, also allows staff to conduct classes from home if they need to self-quarantine or for child care or other demands, according to the district.

Rising positivity rates have led High School District 218, with schools in Blue Island, Oak Lawn and Palos Heights, to put off plans to bring students back on a limited basis, parents were told thisweek.

District 218 started its mix of in-classroom and remote learning for all grades Oct. 19, with a maximum of 50% of students

attending at any one time. It had shifted to fully remote as of Nov. 2 because of rising COVID-19 numbers.

Arbor Park Elementary District 145 in Oak Forest also resumed a fully remote schedule Thursday after bringing some students back late last month.

As of Oct. 26, the district, which has about 1,200 students, allowed students to come into district buildings but they were still learning remotely rather than in a traditional classroom setting, according to Superintendent Andrea Sala.

The move was meant to ease a burden on parents who couldn’t work from home and help assist their children with e-learning, she said.

More than 300 students were in schools, still working with their computers, but rising COVID-19 numbers and public health department guidance prompted the decision to send students home, she said.

“When they reached higher than we were in March, that was a real bellwether for me,” Sala said.

The district’s winter break starts Dec. 18, and Sala said she’s not certain school buildings will reopen before then. The district’s break has been extended to Jan. 19, with the thinking that students and staff might need a quarantine period following the holidays and any social events or family gatherings, she said.

Many south suburban districts had started a mix of in-person and remote learning, with limits on how many students are in school at a given time to maintain social distancing. Others have indicated the coronavirus metrics make reopening school to any degree risky.

As of Oct. 26, District 228 had expanded its hybrid learning program, with all students attending class inperson one day a week, with a maximum of onefourth of a school’s student body on campus on a given day.

Lincoln-Way District 210 and High School District 230 in Orland Park have made COVID-19 numbers available at their websites, showing case numbers within the district.

District 210 reported as of Wednesday there were 109 active COVID-19 cases among the district’s nearly 7,300 students and staff.

District 230, which has schools in Orland Park, Palos Hills and Tinley Park, reported 23 positive cases and 37 instances of close contact districtwide for the week that ended Nov. 6.

In response to demand, District 218 said it would establish a COVID-19 dashboard at its website in the coming days.

Districts are hesitant at this point to tell families when schools will return to blended or hybrid learning.

District 210 and Homer 33C said they had set a target of Dec. 7 and District 218 said it’s possible that students could return to the classroom after the Thanksgiving break.

All area districts that had implemented the mix of in- person and remote learning had warned parents the situation could change quickly depending on which way the numbers were headed, and the metrics just a few weeks ago indicated they could safely resume in-classroom learning to a limited degree.

District 145’s Sala said she believes students and teachers, who have the option of working from home, have been coping with remote learning.

Teachers have been sharing technology tips and advice with one another as they continue adapting to a nontraditional teaching method that might be around for awhile.

“In a weird way the pandemic has brought my team closer,” Sala said. “It really has had a galvanizing effect.”

The switch by some back to fully remote comes as the state’s largest teachers union said that a poll of members showed a third are considering quitting the profession over concerns of safety and stress brought on by the pandemic.

The poll of 1,300 members of the Illinois Education Association showed teachers are concerned their districts are falling short on safety protocols for dealing with the pandemic, and many said they did not believe it would be possible for schools to reopen for full in-person teaching anytime soon, with 69% indicating it was either “not very” likely or “not at all likely,” according to the union.

The poll also illuminated the hardships educators are facing due to COVID-19related stress, with 76% of teachers saying this school year’s workload has been either somewhat or much heavier than last year, and 66% saying they have been feeling more “burned out” than usual.