Most Fayette students will learn from home until winter break. Board scraps hybrid plan.

Students in Fayette County Public Schools will continue at-home learning with limited face-to-face instruction until winter break, school board members said Wednesday night at a meeting.

Schools will continue to offer two-hour in-person afternoon classes called targeted instruction on an increasing and expanding basis, but board members essentially scrapped the previously discussed idea of returning to face-to-face instruction in November.

At-home learning or non-traditional instruction will continue to be offered.

District officials plan to return to full in-person learning five days each week in January provided COVID-19 conditions warrant and the positive case incidence rate is not too high. Parents can also opt for virtual learning instead, officials said. Lexington is in a coronavirus surge currently.

School board members did not embrace a hybrid model of two days in person and three days each week of virtual learning that had been discussed. That was viewed as too complicated.

“The hybrid model created much concern and confusion for our families and our staff,” said school board member Tyler Murphy. “After seeing the framework presented today, it was apparent that the time and effort required to implement less instruction would not be beneficial to our children or our staff. There simply isn’t enough time for our schools to design and implement an effective path forward to make a return in November feasible.”

Rather than split students into two groups, all students are expected to attend together once in-person instruction fully returns.

Superintendent Manny Caulk said with more children in the classroom there would be positive cases as there have been on athletic teams that have returned and that contact tracing would be a challenge.

“That’s the risk that you assume,” Caulk said.

He said the recommendation from the school board Wednesday would give district staff time to plan before the full return to in-person learning.

The sense from school board members was the parents couldn’t appropriately schedule with going in-person only 2 days a week.The hybrid proposal was multi-layered and no board member praised it.

“We are seeing an escalation of cases that public health officials warn mirror the initial outbreak in March and the escalation we saw in July. This makes the next few weeks uncertain,” said Murphy.

Murphy said they needed to give families and staff certainty.

Therefore, the district will remain in NTI-2DL for the remainder of this current semester until winter break with expanded targeted services as public health conditions allow. Returning in January will be contingent on public health conditions at that time, he said.

“ I know that this is a frustrating time for everyone, “ said Murphy. “I’ve said from the beginning, we have to do what is safe, responsible, and sensible for our children, our staff, and our families.”

“It would not be safe, sensible, or responsible, to ask our schools and staff to scramble in a few weeks to piece together a model that would be difficult to implement and yield less instructional opportunities,” he said.

Board chairwoman Stephanie Spires said that both the comments on the surveys and the messages and emails that they received from teachers and families, expressed concerns with the hybrid plan. Families indicated that they wanted to return to school but had concerns about the increase in Covid-19 cases in our community and that their students would receive less instruction under hybrid than under the current NTI system. Also many families indicated a desire to complete the semester under the current NTI-2DL structure.

The hybrid plans were complicated and would increase the workload for teachers, Spires said.

Todd Burus, a leader in the social media group Let Them Learn in Fayette County that is calling for an in-person return said his group was still trying to process everything that happened Wednesday night.

“Needless to say, we are disappointed,” Burus said. “We are disappointed that the district leadership has wasted away an entire semester through their inaction. We are disappointed that the Board allowed them to go on with this charade so long that it reached a point of no return. “

“The parents of Fayette County and (Fayette school) staff both made a clear statement with their response to the recent survey, only to once again be ignored,”’he said. “Virtual learning is failing our community, but the failures of those tasked with running public education have us stuck with it for the foreseeable future. There must be accountability for these failures moving forward.”

The school board meets again on Monday.

Fayette schools have been shut down during the pandemic to in-person learning since March, began virtual learning in late August, and have started with limited two-hour in-person learning on October 19.

Families whose children are currently enrolled in the Virtual Learning Academy will have the opportunity to remain with VLA, or choose either remote or in-person learning for the second semester.

The open enrollment window for the second semester of the Virtual Learning Academy will be from November 2 through November 16. Those interested in the ability to learn anytime, anywhere at their own pace during the second semester will be able to apply for that option.

In a recent survey, 82 percent of staff and families indicated a preference to return to in-person instruction, while 18 percent expressed a desire to continue with remote learning.

“The vast majority of our families and staff want to return to in-person learning,” Caulk said.

However, many also expressed concerns about the disruption of doing so just two days a week.

All five school board members voiced a commitment to returning to in-person learning with a model that allows families to choose between remote learning or in-person instruction five days a week. Rather than disrupt class schedules and teacher assignments at this point in the semester, school and district efforts will focus on preparing for a smooth transition in January.

District and school leaders will continue to share more details with employees, families and community members as schools develop instructional plans to serve students in both the remote and in-person cohorts.

This story was originally published October 21, 2020 at 7:35 PM.