Bill sets date for in-person learning, could force return at Fayette’s special programs

A bill receiving final passage Thursday in the General Assembly and signed by Gov. Andy Beshear would require all Kentucky schools to open for in-person by March 29 throughout this academic year at least four days a week.

House Bill 208 could affect Fayette County Public Schools in Lexington.

Although most Fayette schools are returning to campus in the next few weeks, a return date has not been announced for several special middle and high schools due to a shortage of school bus drivers.

Grades K-2 in Fayette County returned Feb. 22. Grades 4-6 returned Wednesday and main middle and high schools will return on a graduated basis on March 8 and 15.

But because of the school bus driver shortage, the opening date has not been announced for three technical centers and Carter G. Woodson Academy, Family Care Center, Martin Luther King Academy, Opportunity Middle College, STEAM Academy, Success Academy, The Learning Center and The Stables. About 1,885 students attend those 11 programs and are currently attending class virtually, district officials said.

Fayette County Public Schools has “already outlined a path to full in-person learning for 95 percent of our students no later than March 15. We anticipate announcing a solution for the remaining 1,885 students by that date as well,” district spokeswoman Lisa Deffendall said in response to the bill.

The roughly 1,000 students who attend the three technical schools -- Eastside Technical Center, Locust Trace AgriScience Center, and Southside Technical Center – for a part of the day will attend face-to-face at their home high schools for the time being.

On Monday, the Fayette County Board of Education approved an incentive pay package to help retain bus drivers and monitors, and attract additional substitute drivers. Transportation hubs, schedule changes, and the use of nine-passenger vans may all play a role in the solution, Deffendall said Wednesday.

“ The steps already taken in our district continue to be in line with the expectations and requirements ...proposed in H.B. 208,” Deffendall said.

Fayette’s graduated return has not been without challenges. As of Wednesday about 130 students and 10 staff members have been quarantined since K-2 students in Lexington returned to campus Feb. 22.

Among students and staff who have been on campus since K-2 students returned Feb. 22 in person for the first time since March 2020, there have been about 10 positive cases at eight separate schools. On Wednesday, in the latest update, district officials said one student tested positive at Maxwell Elementary, where 20 students and one staff member were quarantined.

Students, under the legislation, would have to at least return to the classroom in a hybrid or half-time in-person form, in which every student is physically in the classroom two of the four days each week.

The legislation says that a district that does not meet the in-person requirements can request additional non-traditional instruction or home learning days only if the county COVID-19 incidence rate exceeds 25 per 100,000.

The majority of Kentucky school districts are currently returning to in-person learning. Harrison County schools, for example, announced Wednesday that district was returning four days each week beginning March 15.

Under the bill, individual students could make individual written requests to continue virtual learning, but could revoke that request if families changed their mind.

The bill’s sponsor, House Education Committee Chairwoman Regina Huff, R-Williamsburg, told members of the Senate Education Committee that she wanted “a manageable return” to in-person learning that could not be disputed.

Huff said schools would not be limited to opening to only four days each week under the bill and could go back 100 percent.

State Sen. Reggie Thomas, D-Lexington, voted against the bill at the committee meeting saying it strips away control from local school boards, telling them when and how they must open.

The Kentucky Department of Education supports the bill.

This story was originally published March 3, 2021 at 3:53 PM.