STUDENTS RETURN
Younger grades back in classroom
LANSDALE » Monday, Oct. 26 marked another milestone for the youngest, if not quite all, of the students in the North Penn School District.
Kindergarten through second grade students spent their first day since March back in the classrooms, as the district began the first phase of a split hybrid return to schools.
“Keeping our folks in our schools — students, staff, everyone — safe, is the priority,” said Assistant Superintendent Todd Bauer.
Since late July administrators and staff have been working on ways to get students back into classrooms, after the board approved an online-only start to the schoolyear with a goal of returning the youngest students to classes earlier, followed by the remainder by early November. A revised return plan was approved on Oct. 15 spelling out how K-2 students would be the first to come back on alternating days, along with those who have special educational needs, and Bauer and Superintendent Curt Dietrich reported to the school board Safe Schools Committee this week about progress and what’s left on their to-do list.
Over the past weeks, Bauer told the committee, staff have developed and distributed a series of short videos meant to bring all parents, students and staff up to speed on the latest safety procedures, policies and practices for going back to school in a post-COVID world. The committee saw one firsthand: a 90-second video produced by student-run NPTV channel, showing kids how to safely space out as they board and ride a school bus.
“Here’s an example of how we are explicitly instructing students and families how to ride the bus safely,” Bauer said.
In the video, kids line up several feet apart at their bus stop, wearing masks, and get on the bus one at a time, with families sitting together and buses loading back to front. Drivers will wear masks and be protected by plexiglass, and ventilation on the bus will be increased by open windows and roof vents, and once they get to a school the buses will offload students front-to-back to minimize students passing each other.
Bauer said the video was emailed to all families of K-2 students, and a similar video will go to secondary students before they return, while area emergency responders helped make a similar fire safety video, and staff have gotten a video roughly 30 minutes long detailing the newest COVID safety policies.
“While we want our building leaders to provide the professional development on our health and safety plan, we also want a consistent message across the entire district,” Bauer said.
Staff are also developing a data dashboard that will show an interactive map of the district with documented COVID-19 positive cases.
“The good news is, right now, we have zero cases, so that is something to celebrate,” Dietrich said.
On that demo version of the dashboard, each of the district’s 13 elementary, three middle, and two high schools listed total student numbers, numbers of student and staff cases, and percentages of the school figures, with a color-coded map showing where in the district each school is located. Dietrich said the district currently gets case data from the Montgomery County Health Department weekly, but are “in the process of” getting that data more often, and updates on the site will be made as soon as updates from the county come in.
“It will be prominently displayed on our website. That’s the intention,” Bauer said.
Dietrich added that North Penn’s detailed and thorough planning has caught the eye of officials at the county level: in a meeting two weeks ago with superintendents across Montgomery County, the district was singled out as an example of best practices.
County officials have encouraged each district to appoint one individual to act as a liaison between districts and the county, to ensure each district is aware of cases, can coordinate contact tracing, preparedness items, and any other changing rules or directives from above. North Penn has already identified someone for that role, Dietrich told the committee, and is in the process of hiring a substitute so that individual will be “fully available” for COVID-related responsibilities.
District Coordinator of Safe Schools Chris Doerr said he and security staff have checked and tested all school alarm and surveillance systems ahead of reopening, and updated emergency guidelines sent to each school’s leadership based on updates from the state post-COVID. Each school’s visitor stations at their front entrances have been modified to ensure safe distancing and minimal contact, Doerr told the committee, and over 2,000 staff and contractors have been issued updated IDs, while roughly 9,000 new student IDs should come soon.
Security staff have also met with local law enforcement to coordinate on reopening plans, and give updates on outside-of-school areas like crosswalks and signal zones, and coordination remains close.
“I will say, they’re always perplexed by our schedules, but they’re not in the educational world, they’re in the policing world. They’re all up to speed, and we saw today, they’re out in force,” Doerr said.
Security office staff have also begun talks with each school about holding emergency drills once students have fully returned, including a new “hold” drill meant to act as one step below an emergency for cases like medical calls.
Student liaison Sahana Prasad said she was in school when the first hold drill happened last year, and the only problem she noticed was a lack of information about why it was happening.
“No one really knew what the hold was, at the time it was happening, which I am going to assume was intentional. That low anxiety was there, everyone kind of understood it wasn’t a serious issue,” she said.
Committee Chairman Jonathan Kassa reminded that, as schools start to reopen and students return, that’s no guarantee that the pandemic is now over.
“Just because the schools are opening, does not mean we should be having birthday parties, soccer games, unmasking — that will help to close the schools as fast as it did before,” he said.
“We must be vigilant, and make sure we keep our positivity rate low. I’m very confident that, if we follow these rules, not just in school but also outside of school, we will continue this path, so we can get to five-day instruction as well.”