School reopenings face new votes
Area districts’ plans likely to change as TEA alters guidance
School district leaders across Greater Houston are asking their boards this week to approve changes and resolutions in light of revised state guidance on how districts may reopen campuses during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Fort Bend, Channelview and Galveston ISD administrators have asked their trustees to approve tweaks to their 2020-2021 school year calendars; Friendswood ISD Superintendent Thad Roher will ask his board to OK the district’s reopening plan; and officials in Clear Creek ISD are asking the board for $771,600 to hire additional staff for their virtual schooling option.
In Conroe ISD, trustees are scheduled to vote Tuesday on a resolution asking the Texas Education Agency to suspend highstakes State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness, or STAAR, testing and to modify school accountability ratings for 2020-2021.
The discussions follow the TEA’s issuance of revised its guidance Friday on how campuses could reopen, giving districts more discretion on how and when to bring students back into actual classrooms. Schools now can keep all students learning remotely for the first four weeks of the school year, so long as they have the appropriate technology to learn online. Districts also can apply for a board-approved waiver that would allow them to continue distance learning for an additional four weeks.
Under the TEA’s previous guidance, districts only were allowed to have all students engage in online instruction for the first three weeks of 2020-2021.
Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo encouraged districts Monday to keep all students learning remotely for the full eight weeks that TEA will allow. The county health department has not ordered any campus closures, unlike health authorities in several counties in the Rio Grande Valley.
“In the absence of a widely available treatment or vaccine, our community must bring the virus under control before inperson instruction can safety resume,” Hidalgo wrote in a state
ment posted to Twitter. “The faster we bring the virus under control and bring the ‘curve down,’ the sooner schools will be able reopen safely and stay open.”
Once schools reopen, they still will have to offer five days a week of in-person instruction to any family of a student in grades prekindergarten through eight. The new guidance, however, allows districts to keep high schoolers off campus for up to 60 percent of each grading period, as long as they have access to technology and are spending the rest of that time in virtual classes.
Fort Bend ISD, La Porte ISD, Goose Creek CISD and Spring ISD had announced their students would begin classes remotely for three weeks before the guidance was updated. Houston ISD announced last Wednesday it would move the start of its school year to after Labor Day and that students would remain off campus until Oct. 19. KIPP: Texas schools told parents Friday their students would attend classes virtually for the first seven weeks of their school year.
More detailed decisions about adding a few minutes to instructional days or changing the school year calendar typically do not require board approval, said Joy Baskin, director of legal services for the Texas Association of School Boards. She said under state guidance, boards will have to approve plans for asychronous remote instruction, that in which students do not participate in real-time lessons with teachers.
While boards may not make decisions on most operational aspects of schools reopening, she said they will be tasked with reviewing superintendents’ plans and overseeing their implementation.
“This is, obviously, a huge deal for communities, and any time there’s a need for more community input on a decision, it’s elevated to the board,” Baskin said. “Choices about how third grade math content is delivered, that is left to instructional leaders and the superintendent. But whether to only offer in-person or a remote option for third grade math, that ends up being a board decision.”
Reopening schools during the pandemic has proved challenging for school leaders, who must balance health concerns with the benefits of in-person instruction.
While data shows COVID-19 infections among children are more rare and less serious than in adults, the extent to which children can transmit and spread the disease to more vulnerable adults remains unknown. Teacher unions and some Democratic lawmakers in Texas and across the country have pleaded with education leaders to postpone in-person instruction until the number of cases subsides and more is known about the virus.
However, keeping kids away from schools also can be harmful. Students learn better in-person most of the time, and they learn how to socialize and work with their peers face to face. President Donald Trump and some other Republicans have argued that schools must reopen for those reasons, and for parents who cannot watch kids during the school day and who depend on schoolbased meals for their children.