The recent holiday break brought USD 257 a chance to regroup in light of the coronavirus pandemic.
Last week marked the beginning of a new semester.
Students who had been struggling with online classes were asked to come back into the buildings for in-person classes.
At the elementary level, that meant the district was able to reduce the number of its online teachers from three to two. At Jefferson, enough students returned to class so that the online teacher who taught first- and second-graders was able to move to a regular, in-person classroom.
McKinley Elementary School’s remote teacher took two of the Jefferson students, while another joined the remote class at Lincoln Elementary.
The holiday break also brought a little bit of relief from COVID-19 itself.
Prior to the break, the number of quarantined students and staff typically ranged between 70 to 100, Superintendent Stacey Fager said.
“Our numbers were a little elevated. The Christmas break came at a good time.”
After returning last week, around 30 were in quarantine.
Those numbers appear to be going up though, Fager said. The girls varsity and junior varsity basketball teams had to be quarantined again this week.
So far, the district has been able to manage the absences, Fager said.
“We realize how much our parents need us to continue face-to-face instruction,” he said. “As long as we can continue to run our buses, prepare meals, get enough substitutes and keep enough faculty and staff healthy, we feel like we can go forward.”
Fager said he did not know at what point the district might have to send an entire building into remote learning “but we haven’t gotten there yet.”
He thanked all faculty and staff members for their extra efforts to clean and sanitize the school. He also gave credit to students and staff for following coronavirus protocols, including wearing masks and practicing social distancing.
The district expects to get another round of CARES funding after Congress approved a new stimulus bill at the end of the year. The district used its first round of assistance to purchase sanitation and disinfection products, as well as touchless items like water bottle filling stations, paper towel dispensers and more.
During an update on the board’s goals and strategic plan, Fager pointed to the coronavirus as forcing the district to fast-track its technology needs. Faculty, staff and students had to quickly learn how to adapt to online teaching tools like Zoom, Google Classroom, Seesaw and ClassDojo.
