South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Sunday)

Failed by distance learning

Parents consider sending students back to classroom as grades fall, absences rise

- By Scott Travis

Distance learning has failed many South Florida students during the pandemic, leading to a push by local schools to get kids back on campus.

Schools are trying to persuade more parents that schools are safe places in the age of COVID-19 and that online learning may not be the best option, as data shows the number of student absences and F grades have more than doubled since last year.

Broward plans to overhaul its on-campus experience so that students spend more time interactin­g with teachers inthe same room and less time on a computer.

“I’m at my wit’s end about what’s happening to students in this district. It is incumbent up on us to dosomethin­g different,” Broward School Board member Laurie Rich Levinson said at ameeting thisweek. “It all comes back to COVID and the 100% e-learning model, which may be OK for some students, butfor the vast majority of our students is not OK.”

Broward found that the number of students getting two more F’s during the first quarter of this semester was about 20,000, up from 8,000 a year ago. The number of students missing 15 or more

days quadrupled to 8,208.

Districts are also getting pressure from Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has instructed districts to enroll low-performing students in an on-campus program, unless their parents strongly object.

Schools have been open for in-person learning in Palm Beach County since late September and in Broward and Miami-Dade since-mid-October, butmost students are still staying home, often due to parents’ concerns about the potential spread of COVID-19.

Although COVID-19 cases continue to spike in the region, school districts and health department­s say schools have not been sources of major spread, and they believe it’s safe for more students to return.

When Plantation parents Roxanne and Miguel Reid were given the option to send their first grade son, James, back to Central Park Elementary, they decided against it due to concerns about COVID-19. They later had second thoughts.

“The screen is just not the same as the classroom,” Miguel Reid said.

The parents said James was getting easily distracted.

“There are just too many shiny objects at home,”

Roxanne Reid said. “He’d get up and walk away. He’d sit on the sofa, walk to the kitchen, walk to the restroom. Itwas endless walking back and forth.”

So the Reids are sending James back to school in January when the new semester starts. Roxanne Reid said she’s visited the school “and they seem to be a doing a good job with safety protocols.” Some neighborho­od children have returned, and they’re doing well, the mom said.

To try to lure more students back, Broward plans to scrap a controvers­ial teaching method known as “E-learning at school.” Basically, many students at school stayed on a computer, doing the same work as if they were at home.

In many cases, students weren’t even in a teacher’s classroom but we reina large “over flow room,” along with numerous students taking different classes.

“We say we’re giving parents a choice but we’re not,” School Boardmembe­r Debbie Hixon said. “We’re not giving them anything different except geography.”

Starting next semester’ the district plans to separate at-home and in-person students as much as possible, so that those attending in-person benefit froma live teacher whoi sn’t also teaching students remotely.

Palm Beach County,

which already uses different approaches at different schools, isn’t making any dramatic changes for next semester. But officials are asking parents of struggling students to reconsider if their kids are struggling academical­ly.

The district is especially concerned about the performanc­e of minority students. At schools where most students are Black or Hispanic, such as Boynton Beach High and Palm Beach Lakes High, over 50% of students got Fs during their first report card this semester, compared to less than 10% last year. Only about a quarter of these students are

attending school in-person.

“There’s a real fear among some of our families in the Black and His panic communitie­s, because COVID has hit them so hard, and some of them have families of different generation­s living with them,” said Keith Oswald, assistant superinten­dent in Palm Beach County.

Palm Beach County officials are trying to allay their concerns, although the final decision is up to parents about whether their kids should return, Oswald said.

“We can’t say there’s no risk,” he said. “We can say we have mitigation strategies in place to make [it as]

safe as possible,” such as sanitizati­on, social distancing and mandatory masks and handwashin­g.

Broward parent Venice Jones said he plans to send his first-grade son, Venice Jr., back to Imagine North Lauderdale charter school in January, but he has “major concerns” about doing so.

“Time and time again, I have seen my son’s classmates at the school with no mask on,” he said. “I fully understand that they are 6 and 7 years old, but the risk for exposure is still there.”

But he found out if his son stays home next semester, he would get a new teacher as the school plans to separate online and in-person classes.

While his son is doing well academical­ly at home, “from a social standpoint, he did not like being home. He gets sad when he sees his classmates doing stuff he can’t do.”

Brianna Haggard has two children who attend Manatee Bay Elementary in Weston. She plans to keep them home.

“I don’t have a lot of confidence in safety precaution­s being taken. The kids eat in a cafeteria without masks,” she said. “More students are expected in January, which makes distancing harder.”

Right nowin Palm Beach and Miami-Dade, about45% of students are on campus, and in Broward, it’s 26%.

Districts are required to accommodat­e any students who want to return regardless of space. But itmay not always beat the same school, Miami-Dade Superinten­dent Alberto Carvalho said.

“If there’s no capacity at the school, it’s our responsibi­lity to find the nextmost suitable and closest place for that child to attend,” Carvalho said.

Officials in Broward and Palm Beach say they plan to accommodat­e students at their same school whenever possible, while still doing their best to adhere to safety guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

 ?? CARLINEJEA­N/SOUTHFLORI­DASUNSENTI­NEL ?? MiguelReid, of Plantation, helps his son, JamesReid, afirst graderatCe­ntralParkE­lementaryw­ith e-learning Friday. Florida schools are concluding that e-learning has been a failure, anditmaybe time for students toreturn toschool.
CARLINEJEA­N/SOUTHFLORI­DASUNSENTI­NEL MiguelReid, of Plantation, helps his son, JamesReid, afirst graderatCe­ntralParkE­lementaryw­ith e-learning Friday. Florida schools are concluding that e-learning has been a failure, anditmaybe time for students toreturn toschool.
 ?? CARLINEJEA­N/SOUTHFLORI­DASUNSENTI­NEL ?? JamesReid, a first grader at Central Park Elementary in Plantation, works on a math problem during e-learning Friday.
CARLINEJEA­N/SOUTHFLORI­DASUNSENTI­NEL JamesReid, a first grader at Central Park Elementary in Plantation, works on a math problem during e-learning Friday.

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