GFPS officials discusses factors related to reopening under Bullock’s phased plan
The Great Falls Public Schools board and staff discussed factors that impact the decision to reopen schools beginning May 7, a decision left to local school districts under Gov. Steve Bullock’s phased reopening plan.
District staff outlined a number of challenges that reopening would pose given the cleaning, social distancing and staffing requirements under the governor’s plan.
The board is scheduled to make a decision on whether to reopen during a special meeting on May 4.
Trisha Gardner, the county health officer at Cascade County City-County Health Department, spoke to the board about the requirements for health screenings under the governor’s plan for employers and in GFPS’ case, students as well, plus the recommendations for face masks, social distancing and limiting groups to 10 or less in confined spaces.
Asked her opinion of reopening schools, Gardner said, “I don’t think it’s a good idea. I think it opens up a potential floodgate for this to spreads very quickly and easily throughout our community.”
The district surveyed parents and received about 5,400 responses by noon on April 27.
Superintendent Tom Moore said of those, 71 percent said they would keep their students home and 29 percent said they’d send their students to school if they were reopened.
The district also surveyed staff and the majority were concerned about the health and welfare of students and their fellow staff, as well as the family members of staff members, particularly those who are health compromised, Moore said.
Erica Harp, the lead nurse for GFPS, said daily health screenings “would pose quite an obstacle. There’s no written protocol for this, this is all new.”
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In the event that there was a potential or confirmed positive COVID-19 case at a school, either a students or employee, CCHD would have to conduct a contract tracing investigation, which would likely require closing the school for at least a few days and then a deep clean of the building.
Capt. Scott Van Dkyen of the Cascade County Sheriff’s Office and the acting Disaster and Emergency Services manager said the county wouldn’t have personal protective equipment available for GFPS.
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Right now, the county has 4,862 surgical masks in the county, Van Dyken said.
“What we have right now is very minimal supplies,” and the county isn’t expecting to receive more any time soon.
Van Dyken said the county was able to order 1,200 gallons for hand sanitizer for the district that would arrive in the next few weeks.
He said there’s also issues with faulty supplies being shipped since some companies are taking advantage of the crisis. Van Dkyen said Benefis Health System had just received a shipment of medical grade masks that turned out to be unusable since they were of such poor quality.
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Brian Patrick, GFPS business operations director, said the district would need to consider filters to deal with ventilation concerns in facilities, and it would be challenging to meet the cleaning requirements district wide, particularly if any student or employee contracts COVID-19 and a deep clean is needed.
Cafeterias would not be used and students would be eating in classrooms, staff said.
Bus transportation would be another challenge since the recommendation is one child per seat, Patrick said.
It would be “almost an impossibility,” Patrick said, since buses were already full and they were doubling up on some routes.
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Dale Lambert, GFPS director of student services, said he’s concerned with transporting students with disabilities and those with health conditions such as asthma, diabetes, cystic fibrosis or other conditions that might put them more at risk to contract COVID-19.
Ruth Uecker, assistant superintendent for K-6, said it would be challenging to keep the young students separated since that’s already a struggle.
Since many parents would keep their children home and continue remote learning, if schools reopened, teachers would be doing a hybrid of in person and remote teaching.
“I don’t think it’s feasible or realistic to ask our teachers to do both,” Uecker said.
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To reduce class sizes would require shifts, staggered schedules, maybe a week on and a week off, all of which would affect the working conditions of teachers and create more transportation challenges.
Regardless of whether GFPS reopens schools, Uecker said her staff is working on a jumpstart summer program for August to work with students who need some extra help before the next school year starts.
At the last packet pickup, 12-40 packets weren’t picked up at each school, she said.
Her estimate is that there will be about 20 students per grade band, K-1, 2-3, 4-5, who will need remediation.
Heather Hoyer, assistant superintendent for 7-12, said they’re worried about the ability to fill classrooms since some teachers won’t be able to come back to their physical classrooms under the phase one guidelines and they won’t have a large pool of substitute teachers.
Hoyer said it would likely take several hours to get students through the medical screenings before instruction starts.
Deep cleaning would also be a challenge since in high schools, each desk can serve 7-8 students daily.
Hoyer said the principals are also working on plans for credit recovery and other remediation programs.
At North Middle, there are about 48 students who are failing one or more classes who would need remediation. At East, that was an estimated 70 students.
At Great Falls High, there’s about 160 students failing one or more class and the principal at CMR High was working on gathering numbers, Hoyer said.
There are also challenges for human resources in terms of how COVID-19 will play into employment laws, such as in cases of employees who are encouraged not to return to work under the state’s guidelines, according to Kerry Dattilo, GFPS human resources director.
There will also be more discussions with the collective bargaining groups since there are continued changes in work conditions.
