When is the last day of school? Is the schoolCOVID dashboard accurate?

Have a question about South Florida schools and COVID-19? Sun Sentinel reporter Lois Solomon will find the answer. Submit your question at SunSentinel.com/ AskLois.

“Therehave been somany changes to the school calendar. I’mwondering if the last day of school has changed, too. Also, has the firstday of classes been figuredout fornext year? It seems like thesummerwill bemuchshorter if this year is ending later in June and school startsupagain inearly August.”— Lisa, BocaRaton

COVID-19 has caused somuch upheaval that it’s been hard to keep track of all the calendar adjustments. The first day of school in Palm Beach County changed fromAug. 10 toAug. 31. Then they had to figure outwhen tomake the switch fromvirtual to in-person classes, which ended up starting Sept. 21. Hopefully, the rest of the year will be more stable.

Palm Beach County’s last day had been set forMay 28; now it’s June 18. Broward schools are maintaining their June 9 last day, and Miami-Dade’s last day is the same.

All the districts are giving the kids twoweeks off for winter break, as previously planned. Palm Beach andBroward also have aweek offfor Thanksgiving and aweek offfor spring break in March.

It seems like ages ago that a contingent of parentswas objecting to school start dates in early to mid-August because they interfered with family vacations andNorthern sleepaway camp schedules.

It will be interesting to see if this problem resurfaces as the school districts figure out their calendars for next year. With all the scheduling disruptions of the current year, none of our South Florida school boards has begun to tackle the 2021-22 calendars yet.

“I sent youan email revealing a case of a student at Boca RatonMiddleSchool. The letter fromthe principal said: ’I’mwriting to inform you that a student has tested positive forCOVID-19. I’d like to assure you that all contact tracing protocols are presently being followed, and anyonewho was in close proximity to this person will be notified. If you are not notified, your child was not directly exposed.’ This case does not appear on the school district’sCOVID-19 Dashboard. Whatelse are they hiding?”— H.K., BocaRaton

I checked the Palm Beach County School District’s online dashboard the day I got this email fromH.K., and Boca Middle did not have any cases listed at that point. But the case mentioned abovewas on the dashboard, which showsCOVID cases by school, by the next day.

There’s a lag betweenword getting out about aCOVID case at a school and when it appears on the dashboard, and it appears to be causing distrust between the school systems and their families. I asked the school district about the reasons for the delay, and here’swhat Iwas told.

Before it gets to the dashboard, a case has to go through several layers of bureaucracy. Families have to report their children’s positive diagnosis to their principals by the next day. The principals tell their bosses so they can figure out which areas need to be cleaned and whether a classroom or the school needs to be closed.

The school’s administration has to contact several departments, including RiskManagement, Maintenance& Plant Operations, School Support Services, and Environmental and Conservation Services.

The families have to give their principals a list of everyone they were in close contact with. The principal’s boss then shares the information with a school district health specialist, who begins contact tracing and coordinates a response with the Florida Department ofHealth. The health specialist also contacts the district’s director of communications, who informs the superintendent, who tells the School Board.

So there’s lots of red tape before it gets to the public. And they’re not going to tell uswho was infected.

“The name of the student with the positiveCOVID-19 test will not be revealedwhen notifying other students’ parents/guardians and members of the school’s staff,” according to the district.

Thus the rumor mill gets going. To aggravate matters, it can be three to five days between the reporting of an incident and its announcement on the dashboard, a spokeswomansaid.

“The dashboard isn’t updated onweekends,” according to the spokeswoman. “But again, to stress, this isn’t an effort to hide anything as your reader stated. The parents will knowabout it in advance of the dashboard update.”

What about substitute pay?

“Why are they paying less to the substitute teachers than youcanmake atMcDonald’s? It’s ridiculous, especiallynow with coronavirus. Thesubs should get exactly what the teachers are getting.”— James Gehron, Plantation

There’s little motivation for anyone to become a substitute teacher these days. The pay is depressing, there’sminimal training in howto teach online and in-person at the same time, and then there’s potential exposure toCOVID-19.

Broward pays its subs about $11.27 an hour. In Palm Beach County, retired teachers who sub get $13.91 an hour, those with bachelor’s degrees earn $13.39 an hour and those with associate’s degrees $11.59. You can get $3 an hour extra if you’re willing to teach in the towns around Lake Okeechobee.

Miami-Dade County pays about $13 an hour for subs with bachelor’s degrees, which Indeed.com says is 21% higher than the national average.

According to Indeed, a jobs website, McDonald’s cashiers typically earn $10.78 an hour in Florida.

So subs do make a little more thanMcDonald’sworkers. Why does their pay remain so low? Subs don’t have unions to protect their rights and advocate for higher pay. They rarely get attention from school boards or from Gov. Ron DeSantis, who in June signed a bill to raise classroom teachers’ starting salaries, but not those of subs.

Surprisingly, Broward schools say they have enough subs, although they are always hiring more. There are 3,595, compared with 3,356 at this time last year, the district told me.

The Palm Beach County schools’website says “Now hiring substitute teachers, click here” on the banner at the top of its main page. It looks like they are much needed. Although the pay is not an incentive and there are no health or retirement benefits, there are a couple of positives, including choosing the days you’llwork and knowing you’re helping kids learn.

Will colleges open?

Because the focus has been, and rightfully so, onthe forced re-opening ofK-12 or they risk losing their funding, there has

been very little information on thepublic university system. Will they be opening? Will they lose funding if they don’t? Are there anydefinitiveplans for any of theSouth Florida colleges and universities?—

LaurieMeyers, Davie

OnJuly 10, PresidentTrump did threaten towithhold the tax-exempt status of colleges and universities that did not reopen. But unlikeK-12 schools, South Florida’s higher education institutions have all announced detailed reopening plans that include back-to-campus life, with the caveat of lots of limits.

Dorms will be open at FloridaAtlanticUniversity in Boca Raton and Florida International University in Miami. The universities are staggeringmove-in periods and instructing students on howto keep their rooms clean. Visitors will be restricted and students are set to be tested

forCOVID-19 regularly. Although most classes will be remote-only, all the colleges and universities are allowing in-person learning for courses such as science labs. At Broward College and Palm Beach State College, classes such as public safety and nursing also will be face-to-face.

At Florida International University, about a third of classes will be in-person or a combination of online and face-to-face. The school is setting aside 132 beds to isolate students who test positive for

COVID-19.

It will be interesting to see howthe virus affects campus life. FAUPresident John Kelly told students in a July 13 letter that masks must beworn “when entering and exiting buildings and while inside public spaces in all buildings, including restrooms, elevators and stairwells, classrooms, and on FAU transportation.” They also have to be on “when close proximity to others is possible” outside. It’s hard to imagine college students adhering to this, but maybe I should have more faith.