An hour a week is not enough time in the classroom.
Editor’s note: The Los Gatos-saratoga Union High School District is proposing a plan in which students return for one hour of classroom instruction a week once all staff have the opportunity to be vaccinated at the recommended doses or Santa Clara County moves into the orange tier, in which case staff vaccinations would not be a condition. The district held a special board meeting on March 2 to outline the plan to parents and students, including members of a coalition whose objections are outlined below.
Schools have been closed to on-campus learning since March 13, 2020. Members of the Coalition for Los Gatos-saratoga Safe and Sane Return to In-person Schools believe students and teachers who want to be in school should have the option to be in school, not in two weeks or four weeks or four months but now.
The emotional health of our teens requires that they have this option. A freshman who spoke at the March 2 board meeting said, “Kids need kids, I am socially isolated, and online learning does not work for me. I find myself reteaching myself the curriculum for hours after class.”
The coalition’s primary purpose is to drive the high school district board to make child-centered decisions. We feel our superintendent and our board of trustees have not focused on the students, but rather, on political distractions and unions. We want our children and their well-being to be the primary driver of the safe return to school.
“Superintendent (Mike Grove) has consistently ignored the experts, made up his own safety guidelines and entered into unreasonable agreements with the teachers union, agreements that defy sciences and county and state guidelines,” Saratoga High School parent Michael Keogh said at the March 2 meeting. “This board has allowed this to happen even though it is supposed to represent parents, a dereliction of duty and failure to represent all Saratoga kids.”
In addition to attending numerous meetings with community leaders, the coalition held a rally on Feb. 26 at Los Gatos High School. In attendance were around 100 people, including Los Gatos Mayor Marico Sayoc and Catherine Somers, executive director of the Los Gatos Chamber of Commerce. Although they were invited by the coalition, noticeably absent were any of the five school board members, the high school principals and the superintendent, illustrating a growing disconnect between these individuals and the larger school community that they are responsible for representing in ongoing discussions and negotiations with the district’s union representatives.
The first on-campus instruction day is planned for March 24 for one hour. Many coalition members, as well as other parents and students, attended the March 2 school board meeting outlining this plan. After listening to the presentation, both parents and students expressed sadness, frustration and anger at the slow pace of any meaningful reopening.
Further underscoring the need to get the high school students back on campus is the fact that Fisher Middle School, which feeds into Los Gatos High School, returned its seventh- and eighth-grade students to on-campus learning over on March 3. Similarly, Redwood Middle School, which feeds into Saratoga High School, is returning on March 15. This unequal treatment of our community’s children cannot be allowed to continue.
Nicole Ricci is a member of the Coalition for Los Gatos-saratoga Safe and Sane Return to In-person Schools.