CARLSBAD MIDDLE, HIGH SCHOOLS TO STAY CLOSED

Carlsbad middle and high schools, previously set to open this week, will remain closed in compliance with a new state health order, the school board decided Wednesday.

“We had approved the middle and high school (reopening) but new (California Department of Public Health) directives changed that,” Superintendent Ben Churchill said, explaining that the district’s secondary schools cannot open until the county reaches the red tier of COVID-19 restrictions.

Gov. Gavin Newsom announced the new health order last week, which established new requirements for face coverings, distance between students’ desk and “stable cohorts” of students. It also clarified what qualifies as a re

opened school, defining it as a a school that has offered in-person instruction to all students in at least one grade level.

North County districts, including San Marcos and Carlsbad Unified, and San Dieguito Union High School District, planned to open middle and high school campuses in the spring semester, arguing that they could do so since they had opened campuses to small groups, or “learning pods,” of high need students. Under the terms of the new state order, those never fully reopened, so they can’t open now while the county is in the purple tier with high COVID-19 rates.

“It’s a public health directive, and schools must comply,” Churchill said. “So to be clear, we are required to follow.”

The change fueled frustration among parents who have experienced multiple delays in reopening middle and high school campuses. Planned reopenings in the fall were postponed until January, and then pushed back again from Jan. 5 to Jan. 25 because of concerns about staffing and equipment. The series of delays eroded parents’ trust in school leaders, and has left them doubtful that middle or high school students will return at all this school year.

“There is no question that keeping our students out of school for 10 months, and now until June, is harming them,” said Scott Davison, the parent of an eighth-grader at Calavera Hills Middle School and founder of the group, Families for Opening Carlsbad Schools.

Melanie Burkholder, a parent and mental health counselor, said students in remote learning are experiencing increased anxiety, depression, attention problems, and even suicidal thoughts and attempts.

“We must address the devastating mental health impact of keeping our schools closed,” Burkholder said.

With secondary schools closed for the foreseeable future, school board members brainstormed ways to bring more students to those campuses

in “small cohorts,” consisting of 14 or fewer students. The district is already running some of those groups, and will try to increase them, Churchill said.

Board member Kathy Rallings proposed hiring “100 substitute teachers” to supervise small groups of students on campus, while they engage in distance learning.

Board member Elisa Williamson said she would prefer to have students attend at least one class with an assigned teacher, so they could receive some in-person instruction, rather than a “study hall” model of supervised independent work. Other board members rejected that as too complicated to schedule, and asked the administration to “explore ways to get as many students on campus as possible under the cohort model as quickly as possible,” as well as expanding special education cohorts and other steps.

Substitute teachers have been in short supply during the pandemic, so it’s unclear how many additional substitutes the district could hire for long-term assignments. In an email, Churchill acknowledged that challenge, but said the district has recently hired 12 substitutes, to work at five secondary campuses starting Monday.

“I think the comment about 100 subs was rhetorical and for illustration only, as there is no way we could procure that many substitute teachers,” he said. “The purpose of those subs will be to monitor a fixed cohort of 14 or fewer students in a classroom while they engage in distance learning (via their Chromebook) from the classroom.”

Elementary school students, however, have been in hybrid learning through the fall, and will return to five days per week on Monday on a modified schedule, Churchill said. Elementary students whose families chose in-person learning will be on campus from 8 a.m. to 1:15 p.m. each day, with supplemental instruction such as music and PE provided virtually for the remainder of the day after students go home.