‘I pray we all stay healthy.’ Students returned to these KY schools on Monday.

When kindergartener Rowan Mann and his sister Anorah Mann, in pre-k, arrived at Frankfort’s Good Shepherd Catholic School for the first day of school Monday, they at first had to remain in their vehicle.

Librarian Sarah Patterson, wearing a mask, reached inside to check their temperature before taking them in the building.

“Rowan’s been talking about going to kindergarten for years,” said his mother Shawna Mann. “To find a place that I felt was safe and open was nice. They have a good process for keeping things clean.”

Good Shepherd was among the public, private and parochial schools that opened to face-to-face instruction Monday, despite Gov. Andy Beshear’s recommendation to delay until September 28.

Officials in some public districts, such as Madison County, agreed to wait on reopening campuses. But Green County opened as scheduled Monday. It was the first public district to reopen to in-person learning that the Kentucky School Boards Association was aware of.

Green County Superintendent Will Hodges said that of the district’s 1,700 students, 80.69 percent opted to attend classes in person and 19.31 percent decided to begin school online.

Most parents had told the district they wanted their children in the classroom rather that online, Hodges said.

“Our community was passionate about providing that in-person option,” he said.

One key consideration is that in-person instruction is more effective, Hodges said.

Megan Arnett said she and her husband allowed their three children, ages 12, 8 and 9 to decide if they wanted to go back in-person or virtually. The kids wanted to go back in-person.

“They told me they didn’t feel like they’d learn anything if they stayed home, “ Arnett said.

She said the children didn’t do as well when they were learning only virtually last spring.

The Arnetts have a dairy farm, so she can’t be at home all day making sure the kids are staying on top of their work. She said she believes teachers and school officials are being diligent about protecting students.

Katie Rafferty, of Greensburg, whose daughter Lilly started kindergarten Monday, said she also favored the school district going back in person. Lilly, who was in Head Start last year, didn’t do as well last spring when schools had to finish the year with non-classroom instruction, she said.

“I’m not worried at all,” said Rafferty.

Janet Phelps, whose family operates pharmacies in Greensburg and Campbellsville, said her son, who is in high school, and her middle-school daughter started school virtually in Green County.

Phelps said health concerns were behind that decision. They have family members at higher risk, and there is a lot still not known about the virus, she said.

“Why put anyone at risk that doesn’t have to be?” Phelps said.

Phelps said she empathized with parents who may not have been able to choose virtual instruction because of issues such as poor internet service or the lack of someone who could stay home with children.

The school district has set up wifi hotspots at schools and other locations around the county, and plans to install more.

In Frankfort, Michele Ulrich is principal of Good Shepherd, a pre-k through eighth grade school with about 137 students returning in-person and a few virtually only. Ulrich said deep cleaning had been underway since March.

Students, who are wearing masks and are placed six feet apart in the classroom and in the cafeteria, are glad to be back, she said. Preschool students are eating in their classroom.

Ulrich said getting back in the classroom was a long time coming for students, that “socially they needed it.”

“I pray we all stay healthy,” she said.

With COVID-19 cases surging, especially among school age children, on August 10 Beshear asked that schools consider opening virtually until September 28 and said “we do not have control over this virus.”

“And to send tens of thousands of our kids back into in-person classes when we don’t have control of this virus, it’s not the right thing to do for these kids, it’s not the right thing to do for their faculty and it’s not the right thing to do as Governor,” he said.

Generally all Kentucky schools followed Beshear’s request to shut down schools when the coronavirus pandemic began in March. However, he got push back following his latest request, and a few private schools began the new academic year with in-person learning last week. A few others will start Monday and later this week.

On Monday, a group of close to 30 frustrated parents and school-age kids who wished they could return to school gathered on the Capitol steps in Frankfort to protest their districts’ delayed in-person start dates. Driving mostly from central Kentucky to hold signs that read, “We understand the risks, allow in person-school,” and “If we can keep grocery workers safe, we can keep teachers safe,” many in the group said they felt their freedom of choice had been revoked by Gov. Andy Beshear.

As often happens at schools on the first day, first graders at Good Shepherd worked on an exercise about getting to know their classmates. As classes got underway, a staff member cleaned surfaces in the library.

A Good Shepherd Facebook post said tuition would be 50 percent off for students new to Catholic schools. Shawna Mann said she decided about three weeks ago to enroll her children, who are new to the school.

Last week, Tom Brown, Superintendent of Schools for the Catholic Diocese of Lexington which includes Good Shepherd, sent a letter to schools about the decision to reopen Catholic schools in the state to in-person learning.

He encouraged parents to focus on the principles outlined in the School Re-entry Plans: mask wearing, hygiene, social distancing, health checks, staying home if sick.

Some student athletes at Kentucky public schools contracted the coronavirus after workouts resumed this summer. Fayette County Public Schools was among the first districts in the state to announce that it would begin the 2020-2021 school year virtually until conditions were safer.

Kentucky Department of Education and public health officials have been trying to change the decisions of more than a dozen public school districts that announced they were reopening their campuses before Sept. 28, fearing the outbreaks that schools nationwide have experienced.

The Green County school system set out standards for protecting students and staff based on the level of active coronavirus cases in the community, with tighter controls if the case index goes up.

All the stages envision measures that include regular use of hand sanitizer, efforts to keep six feet apart and daily temperature checks for students and employees. Students will be encouraged, but not required, to wear masks throughout the day when it isn’t possible to keep six feet from others, but will have to wear them on the bus and in common areas where they remain for an extended time.

Crystal Cecil, who has a 5th-grader and a 1st-grader in school in Green County, said there were six or seven school employees in the drop-off line Monday morning checking students’ temperatures before they got out of cars. The kids were to wear their masks in common areas, such as when going to class, but could take them off in class with desks far enough apart, Cecil said.

“If you move, you mask,” is the mantra inside the schools, she said.

Several parents said they feel teachers and school officials are being diligent about safety. Cecil said she talked with a teacher over the weekend who was going to re-arrange desks in her classroom because one was five inches shy of the six-foot separation.

Hodges said there is a concern about COVID-19 cases going up with school in session, but feels like the district has a solid plan to protect students and staff and to respond if there are cases that affect the schools.

“We felt like we could open up, maximize learning, and do it in a safe manner,” he said.

Hodges said he anticipates the schools will have to close for varying periods in the coming months because of coronavirus cases, and will act quickly.

“Nobody will have to tell us to close,” he said.

In an update posted Saturday night, the Lake Cumberland District Health Department, which includes Green County, said schools “represent a series of difficult challenges,” including enforcing social distancing and whether students will be diligent about wearing face coverings.

“Will COVID-19 spread within the schools at an accelerated rate if they return to in-person instruction? Very likely it will,” the district health department said in the Saturday post.

The department also pointed out that the guidelines on re-opening schools aren’t as strict as the ones for operating nursing homes, and still the disease has spread quickly in several of those facilities.

“The question our society faces right now in terms of schools reopening to face-to-face instruction is, ‘Is the remedy (virtual classes to avoid the spread of COVID-19) worse than the problem (the significant chance of causing a community spike in COVID-19 cases [and the mortality and hospitalizations that would undoubtedly follow] if schools return to face-to-face instruction)?’” district health officials said in the post.

“Each community will have to answer that question for itself.”

Green County Clerk Jessica Baker said she was glad schools went back in-person. She has twins who were 13 in the spring when schools switched to NTI and virtual instruction, and they were home by themselves.

One did well, but the other’s grade point average dropped.

“They couldn’t focus at home because there was too much going on,” Baker said.

Baker said teachers and school officials have done a good job preparing and most people in the community were ready to get kids back in school.

“They’re ready for their kids to get back to a normal routine — somewhat routine,” she said.

Staff writer Alex Acquisto contributed to this article.

This story was originally published August 17, 2020 at 9:47 AM with the headline "‘I pray we all stay healthy.’ Students returned to these KY schools on Monday.."