Chesterfield students in pre-K through third grade will be allowed to return to in-person instruction beginning Monday, Oct. 12.
The announcement was made at the school board’s Sept. 29 meeting. The board followed the recommendation of the district’s health panel based on data related to COVID-19.
In addition, the school board voted unanimously to add third-grade students to Cohort 2 and to add career technical education students to Cohort 3, which includes fourth and fifth grades.
Deputy superintendent Thomas Taylor said the changes were being made to bring the district’s “hybrid education” model — which features in-person classes two days a week and virtual classes two days a week for most students — in line with guidance from the state health department.
Nick Oyler, the district’s coordinator of student health, said that the number of COVID-19 cases was in “yellow” category at 8.3 cases per 100,000 people, while the positivity test rate for the virus (4.5 percent) was “green” and the hospitalization rate “yellow.” The district uses green, yellow, orange and red to measure progress in the aforementioned categories.
Oyler said the district would be able to put a nurse in each school, but Taylor noted that the district is looking for substitute teachers.
If the data holds or improves, the district is on schedule to bring Cohort 3 to in-person instruction two days a week starting Oct. 26 and to do the same for Cohort 4, which includes high school students, starting Nov. 9.
Taylor said that families that have students with different last names could request to send them to school on the same days. “We have a tremendous amount of grace and flexibility,” he said. Students with last names beginning with A-K will go for in-person learning on Monday and Tuesday, while students with last names with L-Z will go on Thursday and Friday. Wednesday will be a cleaning day.
Midlothian board member Kathryn Haines said she asked school principals if they supported Cohort 2 going to in-person instruction. “They were almost unanimous in approving,” she said. In reflecting on guidance from Chesterfield’s health officer, Alexander Samuel, Haines said she had never given her four children a flu shot, but would do so this year.
In public comment, Chesterfield Education Association representative Sonia Smith said there are “employees currently working in fear with high levels of anxiety.” She cited fear, intimidation, and micromanagement by some school principals, and she said it was unacceptable. Smith said some principals were “talking down to [us]and threatening termination” as a means to enforce compliance with the school district’s plan. “Communication styles are key to showing continued support to the boots on the ground,” she said. “What a person says is less significant than how it is said. Some teachers were too afraid to submit questions tonight about the hybrid plan and logistics. Some principals need to be properly equipped with the proper communication skills to effectively deploy [their]message[s]without making everyone feel less than professional.”
Smith also asked that the board consider delaying implementation of the hybrid plan until information about the impact of having Cohort 1 (grades K-12 Level 2 special education students) in the classroom four days a week. Many Cohort 1 students can’t wear masks for an extended period of time, she said. They returned to in-person instruction Sept. 29.
Shannon Macaulay, an English teacher at Meadowbrook High School, said virtual instruction “has been going pretty well. Students are really adjusting. I wonder if our hybrid is going to give us bang for the buck.”
Tony Sotelo, a fourth-grade teacher at A.M. Davis Elementary School, asked the board to postpone tests that are not directly related to instruction. “Never before has Chesterfield County asked so much of our teachers. Our responsibilities have doubled literally overnight,” he said. Regarding tests, Sotelo added that, he would be calling in sick Friday, Oct. 9, in protest.
Board chair Debbie Bailey lauded teachers when she closed out the Sept. 29 meeting. “We will continue to follow the health panel’s recommendations,” she said.
The Richmond Times-Dispatch reported that, as of Sept. 22, 33 school district employees had tested positive for the coronavirus. The daily also reported that 611 out of 4,651 teachers had retired or resigned and that the district has a lack of school bus drivers. Taylor noted during the Sept. 29 meeting that bus drivers will be doubling back, if necessary, to pick up students. Superintendent Merv Daugherty had said before that resumption of bus service would end lunchtime delivery of meals by school bus for some students.
