San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Reopening uncertainties
Class disarray: Many teachers opt out of return in S.F., Oakland
For seven months, 5yearold Megan has seen her kindergarten teacher only on a screen. So she was thrilled at the prospect of heading into her Oakland classroom this week to meet in person.
Instead, Megan will encounter a stranger on Tuesday, a substitute assigned to teach her Montclair Elementary class for the next two weeks.
That’s because an agreement between the district and the teachers union gave teachers the option of returning in late March but didn’t require it. Officials hoped an $800 stipend would lure enough back to reopen schools starting with
preschool through second grade, more than two weeks before all schools reopen to eligible students on April 19.
In many schools, it didn’t work. Too many teachers opted out, and more than a dozen schools will not reopen as planned Tuesday, with another 31 partially reopening to only the most vulnerable students.
Meanwhile, San Francisco is grappling with its own reopening challenges. Officials are worried they won’t have enough teachers to cover all classrooms, and some families still don’t know whether their children will be going back two or five days a week.
In both districts, many families are still unsure if or when their children’s teachers will return to classrooms, whether transportation will be available and whether afterschool programs will be running.
This was not the way school reopening was supposed to go, families said.
The setbacks and confusion plaguing a return to inperson learning in Oakland and San Francisco are frustrating families eager for a return to normalcy after a year of distance learning during which many children struggled with social isolation, learning loss and mental health issues.
Oakland and San Francisco already lagged behind many large districts across the country in bringing back students, despite prioritizing educators for vaccinations and having authorization from health officials to reopen months ago. Both districts have been wrangling with labor unions and facilities issues as well as school boards focused on more than just reopening schools.
The problems could mean a significant loss of state funding tied to reopening most schools by midMay, as well as a future financial toll from Oakland and San Francisco families fleeing to reopened private schools or public schools in neighboring districts.
To be sure, reopening big urban school districts — San Francisco has more than 52,000 students and Oakland more than 36,000 — is complicated. Despite many officials working long days to bring students back, there were bound to be hiccups and unexpected problems.
“This has been a challenging time for everyone,” said San Francisco district spokesperson Gentle Blythe. “We are following public health guidelines that keep shifting and detailed labor agreements that took countless hours to reach. We’ve been setting up and inspecting thousands of classrooms and creating schedules for nearly 22,000 students. As hard as we try, it’s understandable there is confusion.”
Each school district in California has had to figure out how to reopen — and when — on their own, with buyin from labor unions. Some Bay Area students have been back in classrooms at least part time since September, while others remain online only, despite similar coronavirus case rates in their communities.
San Francisco and Oakland plan to reopen to elementary students in April, as well as students with high needs, including foster youths, homeless students, recent immigrants and those in special education programs. While Oakland plans to also bring back sixthgraders, neither district has a comprehensive plan to reopen middle and high schools.
In San Francisco, a recent agreement calls for district schools to start reopening on April 12, phasing in elementary students and vulnerable students across all grades with the highest needs.
But like Oakland, the district is questioning whether it will have enough teachers to reopen to all families that want to come back.
So far, 13% of San Francisco educators scheduled to return — or 274 staff members — have applied to remain onlineonly, saying they or a family member are at increased risk for severe illness because of COVID19.
California educators have had priority status for vaccinations for more than a month, although it’s unclear how many teachers have had both doses.
Unlike many school districts that require a formal legal process to receive accommodation to remain at home, San Francisco officials agreed to accept a doctor’s note as proof. Those with accommodations will continue to teach remotely, with substitutes or other staff covering the inperson part of the schedule.
In the reopened Novato schools, just one central office staff member out of 800 employees, including teachers, has a medical waiver to remain online. In Manteca, where schools have been open since the fall, none of the 1,100 teachers has such a waiver, district officials said.
“We are currently working to recruit and hire additional substitutes,” said San Francisco district spokesperson Laura Dudnick. “We will continue to monitor these numbers to make every effort to staff every classroom for the spring.”
Parent Sharon Ng, whose thirdgrade daughter attends San Francisco’s Webster Elementary, said she knows there will be problems with reopening, but she’s excited for her daughter to meet her teacher.
“It’s more important that we’re doing something and it’s not perfect,” she said. “It’s definitely scary and frustrating and all these things, but the benefits outweigh the hassle.”
Oakland school board President Shanthi Gonzales, who has been pushing for schools to reopen as soon as possible, acknowledged bumps in navigating the process, including the shortage of teachers returning Tuesday.
About 700 of 2,400 educators eligible to return have agreed to do so Tuesday, union officials said.
“Ideally, everybody would have been thrilled about coming back, but I understand there is lot of fear and trepidation,” she said. “I know we’ve already lost families to private schools and charter schools. We have to provide something really good so families will come back.”
The reversal on reopening some schools could impede that effort.
At Melrose Leadership Academy, 70% of teachers opted to return on Tuesday, but for the first week of inperson learning, they are offering families only “selfguided tours” of the school or inperson parentteacher conferences.
Parent Laura Powell was furious.
“These activities obviously don’t qualify as instruction,” she said in a letter to Superintendent Kyla JohnsonTrammell. “The children will be supervised by their parents during these activities, and no required instruction will be provided.”
Melrose had previously scheduled minimum days for this week, which prevented a return to inperson learning, officials said. Since the following week is spring break, the school’s students won’t return to class until April 12.
“We apologize for any confusion or disappointment that this decision may have caused our families who are eager to return to inperson instruction next week,” said district spokesperson John Sasaki, adding that officials Saturday reclassified the school as partially reopening Tuesday.
Parent Timadge Berkhadley said Peralta Elementary staff notified families a few teachers were unable to return on Tuesday for personal reasons.
Her secondgrade daughter won’t return now until April 19, given a lack of substitutes and staff to cover all the classrooms.
“It’s unfortunate that schools weren’t ready,” she said. “We’ve been out of school for a year. It’s poor planning at the expense of the kids.”
Despite some Oakland parents’ disappointment that kids will have to wait or have substitutes, they are eager to get them back in class.
Teacher Erin Ronhovde said her school, East Oakland Pride, will be among those partially reopening. She said she and other teachers felt the reopening was rushed, with little time to make personal arrangements and prepare for a shift to teaching both online and in person each day.
Families are still confused about the schedule, whether their child will be at school in the afternoons two or four days a week, and the students and teachers have not had time to prepare students for the emotional shift, Ronhovde said.
“For most teachers at my school we just needed more time,” she said. “We owe it to families to have a plan and not have them drop their kids in a building where teachers are not ready to teach.” Megan’s mom, Annie Gottbehuet, said her daughter was sad and upset when she learned that her teacher wouldn’t be there until midApril, but she’s planning to send her daughter back Tuesday anyway.
“I’m really nervous about sending her to school with someone who is not her teacher as her first experience walking into the school,” she said. “The lack of interaction that she’s getting with her peers and a teacher trumps not having her teacher there.”