Hispanolistic Getty Images
Editor's note: This story first appeared in our 2020 Private School Handbook.
School is going to look different this fall. When facilities closed this spring because of the pandemic, students and teachers switched to online learning. With new protocols of social distancing, disinfecting, and wearing masks, the big question at press time was “What else will need to change to keep students and teachers safe if they return to in-person classes?”
As of this summer, schools were still grappling with that question. Educators know they’ll need to find ways to decrease mingling and increase physical distance among students and teachers, accommodate more frequent sick days, and ramp up their cleaning regimens. Though some schools are hoping to reopen their doors this fall, they plan to take extra precautions and continue to offer online classes.
Thad Falkner, head of school at The Wilson School, says there are three things that he wants to happen: The school will reopen in the fall; the plans will be adaptable to whatever may happen; and the school will use a hybrid of in-person and online instruction. In both classrooms and hallways, educators plan to try enforcing that plan to try keeping kids at least 6 feet apart, and the school will limit mingling by keeping students in the same groups throughout the day. The staff will also remind parents to conduct frequent symptom checks.
As parents decide to keep symptomatic kids home, virtual learning will be a vital tool as well. “We want our kids to be able to participate in the learning rather than feeling like it’s been interrupted until they get back to in person,” Falkner says. “We want to work together so that our learning and the ability for our kids to interact and continue the pace of the class isn’t only dependent upon their attendance.”
Bob Cooke, head of school at Community School, says the institution will implement similar measures. “One of the things that we’re really trying to do is to ensure that the learning all remains intact,” he says. “I think that’s the prime thing driving our thinking on this.”
School programs that encourage social interaction will now operate virtually. For example, the school’s buddy system, in which students are paired up across grade levels, will likely be reimagined technologically. Community School educators have also created a task force of mental health experts, teachers, administrators, and parents to figure out how to keep kids from feeling isolated.
Falkner says his staff is also discussing how best to minimize the impact of changes on students, both in learning and relationships with one another, especially for younger kids. “Developmentally, we have to be very thoughtful about how we teach and enforce physical distancing, for a lot of reasons,” he says. “It’s important that a 3-year-old actually has that ability to be close to somebody, and that’s a difficult thing in this situation. We certainly don’t want that to be viewed as punitive or anything that internalizes to a child that they’re not loved and cared for.”
Despite the challenges, Cooke believes that holding classes in person is a better alternative than all-online learning. “Learning takes place in school with trained professionals who care a lot about them,” he says. “The way to make sure the school remains open is to do everything we can to mitigate risk.” Each classroom will have a designated bathroom to avoid cross-group contamination, for example, and he hopes to hold some classes outside. Cooke also says online teaching can provide a way for specialists to continue to teach multiple grade levels without needing to be physically present.
The long hours of planning will have been well spent, says Falkner, as long as students can safely return to some sort of normalcy in the fall. “If we can provide an experience that is still what kids need educationally and socially,” he says, “it’s worth it.”
