Nov 8, 2020 2 min read

Canon-McMillan School District is considering a return to in-person classes four days a week, starting on Jan. 19.

Students will not return to full-time, in-person classes before that date.

Said Superintendent Michael Daniels, “The Canon-McMillan School District Administration and the Canon-McMillan Education Association, including the school nurses, cannot support a full return to school at this time.”

The district’s pandemic planning team presented a plan to the school board at Thursday’s meeting for students to return to full-time classroom education.

The presentation, which lasted about 30 minutes, highlighted pros and cons of remaining in the current hybrid learning model versus moving to the full-time, in-person model.

Among the challenges: social distancing and other health and safety protocols suggested by the state Department of Health and the Centers for Disease Control will be more difficult to follow, and contact tracing would be harder to conduct in a full-time, in-person setting if an outbreak occurred.

The benefits of returning to full-time, in-person learning include socialization, and addressing students’ mental and physical health.

Under the plan, students would return to the classroom four days a week, with Wednesdays remaining as a remote learning day to permit building cleaning and sanitizing.

Parents who attended the meeting, and who want students to return to classes before the start of 2021, voiced disapproval, commenting that their children’s academic performance is slipping while they are attending classes on the district’s hybrid model. Currently, students attend in-person two days a week and remotely the other three days.

The high school is closed until Nov. 9 because of COVID-19 cases among students and staff.

The school district has implemented several measures to address COVID, including sanitizing high-touch areas such as door knobs hourly throughout the school day.

Because the school district won’t be able to maintain the six-foot social distancing recommendation, it has purchased additional Plexiglas barriers so that lunch tables can go from two students per table to six. The district also has ordered more Chromebooks.

The district’s final decision about returning to the classroom will be based on the health and safety of the students and staff.