Elementary students will return to full in-person learning on January 5, while high school students will remain remote until at least February.
Douglas County School District (DCSD) announced a four-phase plan last week to return students to school following the winter break. The plan, outlined in a letter sent to parents Friday, calls for preschool and elementary school students to return to full, in-person learning five days a week starting January 5, while middle and high schoolers will remain fully remote to start the semester.
Middle school students could return to in-person hybrid learning between January 25 and February 1 under phase 2 of the district's plan, and high school students could return to hybrid learning between February 22 and March 1 under phase three, the letter said.
The district will discuss these plans at DCSD Board of Education meetings scheduled for January 19 and February 16. Phase four—with no timeframe, as of now—is to return all students at all levels to full in-person learning.
Health experts and elected officials have encouraged policies that allow students to be in school despite positivity rates, the district said. However, these recommendations fail to address what it says is the real reason schools are having difficulty staying open, which is lack of staff members—from substitute teachers to bus drivers to nutrition services personnel and administrative staff—to support in-person learning at every level five days per week. The shortages are driven by staff members that are sick with COVID-19 or other seasonal illnesses, or who are quarantined under procedures required by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE) and Tri-County Health.
While positivity rates within schools have been extremely low, required quarantine procedures have left schools shorthanded, the district said.
The district said it will evaluate its organizational stability between phases to ensure it's capable of adding another level of schools to in-person or hybrid learning and remain fully operational. If it determines it cannot do so, it will postpone the return of middle and high school students to in-person instruction.
"Our goal is to ensure that we do everything possible to keep students in their learning model so we can avoid transitioning back and forth from in-person or hybrid learning to remote learning," said the letter signed by Interim Superintendent Corey Wise.
The district noted the pandemic has proven to be unpredictable and warned parents that the outlined plans are subject to change.
Wise encouraged the community to help get students back to full in-person learning by contacting Governor Polis and encouraging him to provide schools with needed supports such as prioritizing educators to receive vaccines; providing free or low-cost test kits, personnel, and training so schools can provide ongoing COVID-19 testing to staff and students; and addressing guidelines for quarantine protocols to give schools more flexibility and reduce the number of healthy staff and students placed in quarantine. The letter further asks parents to apply to be substitute teachers, bus drivers, and kitchen workers and continue following health protocols and guidance by keeping children home when they are ill.
In response to the district's plan, a group of concerned DCSD parents launched a Change.org petition seeking to have students at all levels return to in-person learning in January.
