In March 2020, kids went home from school on Friday and didn’t come back for months. Some didn’t walk through the school doors in person until August 2021.
Instead, they found new ways to work that weren’t at a desk next to 25 other students. They used Google Classroom or Zoom or Teams. They did projects online and worked in breakout groups with other kids who just happened to be five miles away from each other.
For some kids, it worked. For others, it didn’t.
The hardest part to navigate might have been less about going to math class on the couch than it was about not knowing if today would be in person or if a late-night text message would let Mom know that positive Covid-19 cases turned up in that math class and now everyone would be home for a week again.
COVID-19 is still around, but kids are back in school. Mostly. Some schools in Pennsylvania are now taking steps to go remote again because of staffing shortages.
Woodland Hills School District is going to remote learning for the rest of January because of rising numbers attributed to the omicron variant and transmission among students and employees. A notice on the district website cited “the ability for the district to provide necessary transportation for scholars, the ability to have appropriate staff coverage in our buildings, and the well-being of our scholars, staff and families.”
At other school districts, extreme shortages of drivers might cause a similar shift to remote learning. The problem? Drivers are calling in sick, primarily because of COVID.
In the Kiski Area School District, the decision to go remote hasn’t been made, but officials said it’s one of the options on the table.
”We’re doing everything we can to avoid that,” an administrator said, also pointing to the successful use of remote learning in the past.
Staffing problems are everywhere and not just among regular employees.
”If we see large numbers of staff out, it will be very difficult to have the schools open. Substitutes are few and far between,” said Derry Area Superintendent Eric Curry.
If schools are forced to go to remote learning, it will be up to parents and the community to make the transition work. In 2020 and 2021, there were protests when the state forced closings. Let the districts decide, people said.
This is the schools reacting to what is happening inside their walls.
— The Tribune-Review (TNS)
