Fayette students will start school from home on Aug. 26. See the new calendar.
Aug. 26 will be the first day of the 2020-2021 academic year for Fayette County Public Schools, a district set to engage only in at-home learning for at least the first month amid the escalating coronavirus pandemic.
The school board voted unanimously to approve the date Monday night as Superintendent Manny Caulk appealed to people in Lexington to follow health guidelines so that COVID-19 cases would drop and kids eventually can get back to in-person learning safely.
“I can’t do it alone. We can’t do it alone. Together we can,” Caulk said.
As cases surge in the COVID-19 pandemic, the proposed start date for the upcoming school year is several days later than in previous years.
Before the pandemic, officials had planned on an Aug. 12 first day for students for the 2020-2021 school year.
In addition to the Aug. 26 start, the newly proposed calendar shows that the last day of school for students would be May 13, 2020. Spring break would be March 29-April 2, according to board documents . Ten minutes would be added to the instructional day.
Last week, board members voted to begin the school year with non-traditional instruction -- or NTI -- from home.
Caulk said district officials will be constantly evaluating when students can go back into school buildings for in-person learning and will be looking for coronavirus cases to drop.
Caulk said he is going to reassess the level of coronavirus cases by late September -- no later than Sept. 28 to Oct. 2 -- to see when returning to the classroom would be possible. He said the decision will be based on science, evidence and “conditions on the ground.”
District officials will be working with the health department and not only will reassess in late September, but at other intervals, including Nov. 2 through Nov. 6, Winter Break, Feb. 8 through 12, 2021 and Spring Break, Caulk said. As the district moves into in-person learning, it could adopt a hybrid model of in-person and at-home learning.
Fayette and Jefferson, the largest two school districts in the state, are both starting out the academic year remotely while as of Monday morning, most other smaller districts planned for in-person learning with a virtual option.
On Monday afternoon, Gov. Andy Beshear recommended that all Kentucky public and private schools postpone their start date for in-person learning until the third week of August to curb the spreading coronavirus.
Caulk has said when the Fayette district switched to Non-Traditional Instruction last spring when COVID-19 shut schools down, staff had very little time to prepare or plan. Some families said they struggled with Fayette’s new form of instruction.
But Caulk has said the second round of NTI will be more engaging, more robust, and consistently implemented across schools at all grade levels. There will be more support for families, district staff said Monday as they outlined details for dealing with COVID-19. Caulk said there would be more rigor.
School board chairwoman Stephanie Spires said with the improvements, there is no reason to believe that 2020-2021 would be “the lost year” even though instruction will be different.
This story was originally published July 27, 2020 at 6:17 PM.