Dracut works on reopening schools
Superintendent explains need for more desks, other changes
dracut » The school system is unlikely to need a waiver of the April 5 date to reopen elementary schools, School Superintendent Steven Stone told the School Committee and the town’s parents.
But to meet that deadline will involve “a massive amount of moving … taxing our custodians, maintenance workers, teachers and administrators,” Stone said in his letter to parents.
For example, the school system needs to take delivery of about 600 desks and chairs and other equipment to meet the latest state-defined physical distancing requirements. .
As a result, Stone advised parents of elementary students “to pencil in April 1” as a date for full remote learning. A final decision on that will be made over the next few days.
“We have worked hard to establish educationally sound learning environments over the past number of years, in part by the use of tables and collaborative learning spaces. To comply with state guidelines, we must replace all tables with rows of desks, with all students facing in the same direction,” Stone said in his letter to parents.
He anticipates there will be changes “at certain grades and in certain schools where students will be attending.”
In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic schools struggled with how to keep learning going. Dracut adopted a cohort model of hybrid education that called for one cohort of students being in the classroom for a full week and rotating to remote learning the next week.
The state Department of Secondary and Elementary Education has mandated that all elementary school students return to full inperson learning on April 5. Middle school students will