Students in the Clark County School District won’t be returning to physical classrooms next month after officials voted Tuesday to begin the fall semester online.
The Clark County School Board voted unanimously that the 2020-21 school year begin with full-time distance education. The board will require updates from health officials every 30 days on how Nevada is faring with the coronavirus pandemic to determine any changes to the distance-learning model as the year unfolds.
Board members also voted to give district staff the option to work from home or in-person.
District officials originally recommended a model where students would attend school for two days of in-person instruction and three days of online instruction each week. That recommendation was discarded this week in favor of the full-time online model adopted at Tuesday's special meeting of the School Board. Superintendent Jesus Jara said the decision to recommend full-time distance education was based on health and safety.
In a presentation to the board, CCSD Health Services Coordinator Linda Kalekas emphasized that the spread of COVID-19 has resulted in “an unprecedented number of global deaths in just seven months time.”
Kalekas said Clark County had a cumulative positivity rate of 10.8% and the gap between the number of people tested and the number of daily positive rates was closing — “which may suggest there’s actually far more widespread COVID-19 positivity circulating in Clark County now than in prior weeks.”
Of those tested for coronavirus in Clark County, nearly 7% were children who tested positive.
Kalekas pointed to data that 74% of hospital beds and more than half of ventilators in Nevada are being used, with patients waiting in hallways and emergency rooms. There are 16,000 to 17,000 people currently “in the queue for contact tracing,” and there’s a five- to seven-day delay in getting coronavirus test results.
There have been 32,025 positive cases of coronavirus and 533 deaths in Clark County.
“Unfortunately, 26 of those deaths occurred in the past 24 hours,” Kalekas said.
The School District also presented the results of a survey asking families whether they planned to return to CCSD and if they had access to a computer device and the internet. The survey accounted for just over 115,500 of the more than 300,000 students in the district. Of those accounted for, 5% said they would homeschool and 34% wanted full-time online education
Trustee Linda Young criticized the fact the survey was only offered online.
“We’ve been talking about broadband access and equity, and then you give out a survey that many people in my community can’t even do because they don’t have access,” she said.
With the move to full-time distance learning, the district is looking into purchasing hot spots for students who don’t have internet access. The cost, district officials said, could be $13 million to $23 million.
Some parents wrote to the School Board asking that schools open for in-person learning.
“Children need an education from licensed teachers. Parents are not equally qualified and do not have the same resources. Our children are not in danger of dying. Please open our schools,” said Amy Basner, a parent of five children.
Basner, who has a child each in preschool and kindergarten, said there was no way she could handle helping her children with school individually.
A parent of three Clark County students who identified as "Gina" requested that school be virtual only.
“Please keep my babies safe,” she wrote. “This is life for my family and community. We have stayed home since March 16 to protect ourselves and to protect you. It’s time for you to protect us.”
Abigail Figiera, whose daughter attends a local performing arts high school, said she was disappointed in the decision and is worried about families who can't afford day care.
"Distance learning is a travesty," she said. "This is ridiculous and completely unfeasible for the community. I really hope this decision can be reversed."
School Board member Danielle Ford asked officials what the estimated financial impact would be from students leaving the district for private schools or home-schooling, as CCSD receives state funding of about $6,000 annually per student.
“We have contracts we need to fulfill. Losing that money could bankrupt us,” Ford said.
There wasn’t a clear answer from CCSD officials.
As of July 19, about 220,800 students were registered for the upcoming academic year in CCSD, which is about 3,300 less than the number of students registered last year at the same time.