D135 targets late October return
After hearing from parents, proposal OK’d by school board
Orland Elementary School District 135 will resume in-person learning, possibly by late October, under a plan that has some students in the classroom more frequently than others.
The school board voted 4-3
Wednesday to approve the plan, after hearing from parents in the Orland Park district, which has more than 5,000 students, who argued for the district to stay the course with remote learning. Others said that having their children stare at a computer screen for several hours each day was causing more harm than good.
One parent said that by reopening buildings “too soon, the virus will spread like wildfire,” while another, who works in a neighboring high school district, said elearning was failing students.
Donna Driscoll, a guidance counselor at Andrew High School in Tinley Park who has two students in District 135, told the board that teachers are not able to read nonverbal cues of students who might be struggling with a subject.
“We have to provide an inperson education,” she said. “It is vital.”
District 135 is among a number of south and southwest suburban elementary and high school districts that have recently resumed in-person teaching to some degree, citing good trends in COVID-19 test rates.
Under the plan, junior high students will be in class for shortened periods two days of the week, with some students in the classroom and others taking part through a livestream. Students would return home by early afternoon and pick up with remote learning to finish the day.
Wednesdays would be set aside for fully remote learning for all middle school students.
Students in kindergarten through fifth grade would be in class four days a week, again on a shortened day, with some taking part in classroom activities virtually to limit class sizes.
They would work on assignments remotely in the afternoons,
and on Wednesdays all students would take part remotely.
All parents would continue to have the option of keeping their children out of class and continue elearning.
District officials said younger students would benefit from more in-person face time with teachers, although they said that classrooms would have to be reconfigured to provide for social distancing.
Some board members preferred having all students come back on a limited basis, the option that will be implemented for junior high students.
Masks will be required and lunchwon’t be served in school buildings, although the district will provide lunches for students to take home.
Superintendent John Bryk said that class sizes would fluctuate depending on how many parents opt to stay with remote learning.
A survey of parents had shown 75% wanted inperson learning to resume to some degree, and District 135 had, at the start of the school year, planned to look at a possible blended learning model after the end of the first trimester Dec. 11.
Bryk said implementing the back-to-class plans would probably take a month, partly because the district’s school bus companies would need to
bring back drivers who had been laid off after so many districts started the year with remote learning.
The school board had considered other options, including one that called for all students at all grade levels to be in buildings for a full day. It was determined that option wouldn’t work due in part to physical limitations of buildings in accommodating social distancing.
Bryk said that the districtwill need to gradually phase in plans to have students come back to class.
“We’re going from zero to 100,” he said of teachers switching from fully remote to in-person instruction.
Bill Zopf, a District 135 teacher and president of the Orland Council of Educators, the union representing teachers, said he sees issues with having some students in the class and others participating virtually through a livestream.
Zopf told board the union does not believe “it is physically possible for a teacher to pay attention to both groups” at the same time. He said that teachers who don’t feel comfortable returning to the classroom should also be given the option to teach remotely.
Bryk said the district has more than 30 teachers who are working from home for various medical reasons. The district had been requiring teachers to be in school buildings for remote learning.