The Berkley School District Board of Education posed a new recommendation to re-open for full in-person instruction beginning April 12.
The Return to Learn Plan discussed at the March 8 meeting has been evolving since August.
The board discussed how the district plans to allow students to return to in-person learning safely while following the Center for Disease Control guidelines.
School Board Member Keith Logsdon said, “according to weekly Oakland County Health Data we receive, we are in the low percent for positive cases and are in the substantial percent for number of cases, but we are still recommending this Return to Learn Plan as we see fit to get our students back in the classroom.”
The district’s vaccine deployment is continuing to pick up. By mid-April, Logsdon said, every staff member who wants to be vaccinated will be. He added that Rite-Aid would host a clinic for their district and their spouses over 50.
Logsdon said COVID-19 caes have declined in Oakland County since January. “We had a seven-day average as high as 345 cases per day and as of Friday we had a seven day average of 94.1 cases,” Logsdon said.
Berkeley schools plan to return to in-person learning safely by social distancing students as much as possible, requiring masks, updating classroom ventilation, and sanitizing students and staff as much as needed.
To adhere to CDC social distancing guidelines, the board recommended that elementary students separate during lunch time. Some students will eat in their classrooms, while others will eat in the cafeteria and gym.
“As far as our secondary students go, we plan on having those students eat lunch in the gym or in the cafeteria to stay away from having too many students in the cafeteria at once,” Logsdon said.
Board Member, Mitchell Moses asked, “how are we going to limit the flow of traffic when students enter the school in the morning?”
Berkeley schools have multiple entrances and students will be required to use a certain door when entering and exiting so they do not all use the same entrance.
The district plans to continue a hybrid option.
Kindergarten and first grade students who are taught remotely will have a dedicated virtual teacher, while second grade through fifth grade students will have the option to live stream the class depending on the number of students wanting this option.
Moses said, “We want to make students feel like they are in person with the teacher as much as possible, so the live-stream option for students will allow them to feel like they are right there in the classroom.”
On March 15 the board will vote on the new recommendations and whether students can return in-person learning full time.