Public on-campus instruction remains in quandry

Coronavirus surge has made it problematic for districts to determine reopening dates

With the coronavirus out of control in California and the health system reaching a breaking point, momentum toward opening more public schools for in-person instruction has largely come to a halt.

Some districts already offering in-person instruction are returning to distance learning, if only temporarily, as school leaders try to get through the holiday season and weather the full force of the pandemic’s spread.

That’s according to an EdSource survey of the state’s 58 county offices of education conducted between Dec. 7 and Dec. 16. At the time, almost all counties in the state had moved onto the Tier One “purple” list, effectively prohibiting schools not already offering in-person instruction from doing so.

At the end of October, when Edsource conducted a similar survey, schools were reopening for face-to-face instruction at an accelerating pace, although the vast majority of students in California were still learning through online instruction.

Now, even more students are learning via online instruction than in October, with no clear pathway as to when they will be able to return to school. That is happening while parents, teachers and education leaders generally, including state Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, continue to worry that the distance learning regimen is contributing to significant learning loss, especially among the state’s most vulnerable students.

The Edsource survey sought information on districts offering instruction to students attending regular classes, not special education classes, learning labs or support centers. It did not attempt to tally the extent to which districts are offering face-to-face instruction to small groups of students with special needs, such as those in special education, English learners, and homeless or foster children. Those figures are generally just not available.

Other findings of the EdSource’s sur vey, which involved a questionnaire sent to all county offices of education, supplemented by telephone interviews and online research, include the following:

• All or most school districts in 22 counties, with public school enrollments of just over 3.7 million students, are offering instruction in mostly distance learning mode. That compares

to the 17 counties at the end of October in that category.

• In 19 counties, with enrollments of 476,000, all or most school districts are offering some form of inperson instruction to some students, down from 21 counties in October. That’s down from the 21 counties

in this category in October, with enrollments totaling 737,000 students.

• In the remaining 17 counties, serving about 1.8 million public school students, instruction varies considerably, with some districts offering all or most instruction via distance learning, and some offering some form of in-person instruction.

• A small number of school districts have an

nounced that students will study via distance learning through the end of the school year, including San Bernardino City Unified, one of the state’s largest, Moreno Valley Unified and Burbank Unified.

• Several districts planning to open in January have pushed back the date when they hope to begin to offer in-person instruction for regular classes.

Long Beach Unified offi

cials, for example, said students will stay in distance learning mode at least until March 1, instead of its earlier tentative back-toschool date of Jan. 28 for some students. Near the Mexican border, South Bay Union School District officials say they will open for hybrid instruction on April 5 after students return from spring break.

In San Francisco Unified, the district had an

nounced it would open on Jan. 28 in some schools for in-person instruction. But negotiations with its teachers’ union have broken down and the district now doesn’t have a date for when it might offer in-person instruction.

Even districts trying to move forward with in-person instruction are having to cope with divisions on the issue within their own communities — notably in San Dieguito Union High School District in San Di