Schools planning to expand in-person instruction

Local school districts are working to expand in-person instruction even further as COVID-19 restrictions have continued to ease in recent weeks.

Here’s what Yuba City Unified School District and Marysville Joint Unified School District are planning:

YCUSD

Doreen Osumi, superintendent of YCUSD, said students in kindergarten through fifth grade will be returning to the classroom full-time beginning Monday.

“The YCUSD governing board directed staff to return students back to full time

as soon as possible,”

Osumi said. “When the California Department of Public Health changed the recommendations regarding social distancing from six feet to three feet, we quickly determined that we could bring students back to school full time and meet the social distancing requirements.”

Parents were surveyed and asked to select full-time, in-classroom learning or distance learning, Osumi said. Classes were formed based on the information gathered and students shifted into new classes if needed.

At the elementary school level, the district has distance learning teachers who will be assigned to teach students who choose to remain on distance learning.

“Staff have worked hard to prepare for the return of our students to full time,” Osumi said. “...We are looking forward to having more students on our campuses. Returning to a more ‘normal’ day for our students and staff will definitely be a benefit.”

She said the district’s safety protocols remain in place and the only change is the social distancing requirements.

Osumi said students in preschool have returned to full time and, at this time, the plan is to return the district’s secondary schools to full time when the risk of community COVID-19 transmission is in the moderate range – according to the state’s Blueprint for a Safer Economy reopening framework, Sutter County’s risk level is in the substantial category.

Students in middle and high schools in the district are currently utilizing a hybrid in-person instructional model.

“Our goal continues to be to return the remainder of our students back to the classrooms, full time as soon as safely possible,” Osumi said.

MJUSD

Gary Cena, superintendent of MJUSD, said beginning Tuesday students in grades transitional-kindergarten through third will have the opportunity to

attend blended in-person instruction four days a week for the remainder of the school year – up from the current twoday blended in-person schedule.

Students in grades fourth through sixth will have the same option beginning April 27.

He said the change follows updated guidance from the California

Department of Public Health’s physical distance requirements being reduced to three feet of distancing between student chairs – it was previously six feet when practicable.

Students and parents have the option to continue on full distance learning or attend blended in-person instruction two days per week (the

current Cohort A/cohort B schedules) or choose Cohort A and B, which is now referred to as a classroom “stable group,” Cena said.

“We want to extend the option,” Cena said. “We want to encourage all students to attend four days a week but if family circumstances limit (that), two will be permitted.”

Daily schedules –

including Monday activities – will not change.

Due to current COVID-19 transmission rates, under the new guidance, secondary schools (grades seventh through 12th) will not be able to implement three feet of distancing between student chairs until Yuba County enters the orange tier of the Blueprint for a Safer Economy, Cena said.