Most California public school campuses will not reopen when the academic year begins under state rules to be announced by Governor Gavin Newsom on Friday, but will move to full-time distance education in response to the summer surge in coronavirus cases.
Education officials briefed on the plan said schools will remain closed in 32 counties on the state’s COVID-19 watch list, a mandate confirmed by the Newsom administration shortly before the governor made his announcement. Public health conditions in those counties led state officials last week to require a variety of closing facilities, including gyms, shopping malls, nail and nail salons, and places of worship. Counties are home to 35.5 million Californians.
In schools that may open, state officials will require all staff and students in grades 3-12 to wear masks. Younger students will be encouraged to wear masks and school officials said they had been told that they could ask students who were unwilling or unable to comply to switch to remote learning.
The new directives represent the most far-reaching effort by the state government to direct the operations of more than 10,500 schools in California during the pandemic. But for a quarter of the state’s 6 million schoolchildren, the mandate only reinforces plans already announced by local officials.
On Monday, the leaders of the Los Angeles Unified School District and the San Diego Unified School District announced distance education for all returning students for next year. Other large districts in Southern California, the San Francisco Bay Area, and Sacramento also voluntarily agreed to forgo classroom learning due to current health conditions.
While the practical effect of the new Newsom administration mandate is simple, some of the details of the policy are complex. Schools in counties that are being monitored for the spread of coronavirus could not reopen until those counties see at least 14 consecutive days of declining coronavirus cases and are therefore removed from the state, authorities said.
The threshold for closing additional schools depends on the tests for COVID-19. If a teacher or student in a classroom tests positive, the state will suggest that the class be sent home for quarantine. If multiple classrooms are closed, the state will direct school officials to work with local public health agencies and consider closing the campus. School districts will be asked to close all campuses if 25% of their locations had enough cases of coronavirus to require a closure.
Some educated leaders informed about the proposal questioned whether it is realistic to impose test-dependent rules when many communities already face a shortage of test kits.
Newsom’s decision to impose a strict state standard comes four days after it suggested that the state had already provided broad guidance for schools, a stance that even some of its longtime allies suggested would put children at risk. students, teachers, and school employees and would leave parents and families unsure of what would happen and when.
Last week, the powerful California Teachers Association. Newsom wrote to say that many schools could not safely reopen under current conditions, including the lack of sufficient evidence of coronavirus and personal protective equipment.
Low-income communities, many of which disproportionately comprise black and Latino students, still face major challenges with distance learning that state and local education officials must address, community advocates said.
“Things are more difficult than they were on March 16 for our communities … with the continued economic impact of the pandemic and the increased spread,” said Maria Brenes, executive director of the East Los Angeles community. which organizes the nonprofit InnerCity Struggle, and a unified LA Parent.
“We are talking about the essentials, the front line workers who keep our economy going and these are their children and we are committing a serious injustice to them,” he said, noting that there are still students without access to devices, reliable internet service or quiet space to study.
Students with disabilities also face challenges with distance learning, said Elmer Roldán, executive director of the Nonprofit Communities in Los Angeles Schools, which provides support and case management to approximately 1,000 Los Angeles families. Schools must be involved in providing services to students with special needs through distance learning and must address the existing needs of families who are disadvantaged with homeschooling, such as those with parents who speak a different language.
“What do we do to address connectivity issues? Are students the ones with a working device or internet or the space where they can do homework? And what happens when a student needs support that a parent cannot provide because a parent may need to work or the parent cannot understand the lessons the students are learning? Roldan said.
It is not yet clear whether school districts can fully cover the costs of expanded distance learning, much of it related to the technology needed for students with limited or no access to computers and broadband services. Newsom’s state budget signed last month commits $ 5.3 billion for school needs linked to the pandemic, most of the federal aid package enacted in the spring. More than half of the money will go to schools based on the number of children who learn English or who come from low-income families.
Still, K-12 schools will find their resources depleted in the coming year. The state budget extends the payment of about $ 13 billion in school finance obligations, which will be covered in the short term by local cash reserves or by school districts that borrow money. Districts have also been concerned about language included in the final budget that appears to require a certain level of in-person schooling, though lawmakers later insisted that it would not prevent public health requirements from completely closing the campus.
Before Friday’s announcement, the new school year seemed to be beginning as much as the last year had ended, with local officials making their own decisions, on their own schedules, on how to respond to the coronavirus crisis. Despite state-wide calls for action, Newsom and state education officials eschewed a general policy that dictates when to close schools as the virus spread across the state in early spring.
The governor, who has four young children, chose to broach the issue as a father, and told reporters in mid-March that he told his daughter that schools would likely not reopen at the time, framing the comment as a check from reality, not a directive from your office.
