Central KY school district will shut down, move to at-home learning next week

With 89 students positive for COVID-19 and 656 students quarantined, Franklin County Schools will move from in-person to at-home learning for five days next week, Superintendent Mark Kopp announced Thursday.

“It’s a very difficult time for us,” said Kopp. The latest available data from the Kentucky Department of Education showed that Franklin County Public Schools had 6,173 students.

By Thursday night, the Kentucky School Boards Association had posted information on social media about 10 school districts that this school year have closed for various periods without offering instruction or are moving to at-home instruction.

Russellville Independent Schools and Magoffin County Schools are closing all next week without offering instruction. Magoffin County already had Friday, September 3, scheduled as a day off, officials said in statement. The district will add four makeup days to the end of the school year.

In addition, Casey County Schools and Carter County Schools officials announced Friday that those districts are moving to at-home learning or NTI next week, with plans to return to in-person instruction September 7.

Franklin County Schools will use 5 of the 10 annual non-traditional instruction days allowed by a new state law approved by the 2021 General Assembly. The state law only gives school districts 10 days of non-traditional instruction that they don’t have to make up. The law was intended to avoid the extended remote learning that Kentucky experienced during the pandemic that began in March 2020. In 2020-2021 districts had unlimited at-home learning.

Kentucky reported 5,401 new cases of COVID-19 on Thursday, a third of them in children.

In a video, Kopp said the district has 89 positive COVID cases and 656 students in quarantine.

“We are going to take next week,” Kopp said. “Monday through Friday are going to be NTI days.”

District officials said the local hospital is full and pediatric hospital beds at the University of Kentucky are filling up.

“We want more than anything to have in-person instruction throughout the course of the year,” Kopp said.

Also on Thursday, the Kentucky Department of Education released guidance to help districts in implementing a hybrid schedule for grades 5 through 12 by utilizing their board’s policy on performance-based courses. Those are courses that emphasize what a student can do and what skills they have that demonstrate their knowledge.

Districts can use a hybrid schedule at the request of students and families as an additional COVID-19 strategy to help with social distancing, the guidance says.

Since performance-based courses can be virtual or in person, it is possible for a student in all performance-based courses to attend school on a hybrid schedule. The guidance says students on a hybrid performance-based schedule must have requested the schedule and follow the district’s board policy for performance-based courses.

This story was originally published August 26, 2021 at 8:42 PM.