As Old Rochester Regional Superintendent of Schools Mike Nelson applies the finishing touches to plans for the 2020-21 academic year, he realizes the best-laid plans could turn upside down at a moment’s notice.
“We’re constantly looking at all the data points in our school community,” said Nelson, who spoke with The Wanderer on Monday morning. “We are constantly unpacking the latest guidance… We understand now that there are many moving pieces, and we have to consider all of them in real-time in order to make the best decisions.
“Most importantly, the ideology is we know we have to be able to pivot into other learning models.”
A basic change in the game plan could be dictated by the governor or the Tri-Town school district itself. Superintendents created fully attending, hybrid, and fully remote learning programs in accordance with a state mandate.
The learning model ORR will open the school year with is the hybrid model that will essentially divide the student body in two to achieve safe social distance in remodeled classrooms and common areas in school buildings. One-half of the student bodies will attend on-campus two days per week, the other students on two other days.
ORR is calling the days of the academic week “hybrid in” and “hybrid out;” when students are “hybrid out” they will be learning via remote access. That won’t always mean the computer or the Chromebook, but it will be a more intense curriculum than what students experienced in the spring.
“I don’t anticipate that what we saw this past spring being what we’ll be offering this fall,” said Nelson, referencing a “more robust” learning model affecting both the “hybrid-in days and hybrid-out days” and “more learning opportunities… to our curriculum.”
Widespread concern in communities over remote learning models, mainly questioning both its effectiveness and its effect on families whose parents work, have spawned grassroots efforts to bridge the gap between curriculum and especially younger children.
“I was aware not only locally but (statewide and nationally) there is a grassroots movement for learning pods that are community-driven,” said Nelson, who is married with two children, a preschooler, and a rising second-grader. “I understand from the parent perspective how important those years are.”
Nelson acknowledged that Tri-Town Learning Community reached out shortly after it was formed, but could not respond at the time as he was immersed in the detail work associated with preparing ORR’s three return-to-school models and readying the presentation of his proposed rollout to the school committees.
Part of that process included numerous Zoom meetings with other superintendents from school districts around the state. From those meetings came several reports of other grassroots efforts to help working parents access remote learning content.
“I know it’s not unique to the Tri-Town,” said Nelson.
While he says there simply hasn’t been time to digest the “overall purpose or mission” with a grassroots movement toward home-based learning pods, Nelson said, “I recognize our families and parents and students all have individual needs in our households, but it’s imperative that we maintain social-distancing practices so that our… COVID-19 rates are as low as possible.”
On August 2, Marion resident Terri Lerman created a Facebook page called Pandemic Learning Pods South Coast (since updated to match the organization’s name, Tri-Town Learning Community/Collaborative) to discuss the challenges parents face in a remote-learning model and invite households in the Old Rochester district to participate in a survey. By the morning of August 10 that number had grown to 419, and the morning of August 11 the survey had 78 respondents.
By September 1, the Facebook page had 581 members, and going into last weekend there were 24 names in TLC’s educator resource accessible via a live link on Facebook.
While the need is undeniable based on the initial wave of response alone, the challenge of fundraising and/or sponsorship has been conversely slow to move.
Tri-Town Learning Community was unavailable for comment for this story.
Old Colony Regional Vocational-Technical High School in Rochester is also enacting a hybrid opening of school, albeit with classroom-only students on a fully remote plan while vocational students alternate on a two-weeks-in and two-weeks-out rotation.
Both Old Colony and ORR have truncated the academic year to 170 days, planning to use the 10 days for intensive faculty training before students arrive.
By Mick Colageo