Foothills Community Christian School will complete the remainder of the school year by remote instruction.

Their board of directors decided this week that all grades will continue remote instruction through May 22.

“The board and administration felt the decision was in the best interest of students, parents and teachers,” according to a release.

Foothills has been using remote instruction since March 18 and “has been able to provide a nearly full curriculum including music, art, and other elective options in addition to standard coursework. Standard grading scales and rubrics have been maintained,” according to a release.

Commencement exercises for the Class of 2020 will be held at Central Assembly of God church at 6 p.m. May 22. Seating will be arranged in accordance with social distancing guidelines and the venue will allow for us to celebrate the accomplishments of our graduating class. Attendance information will be available via the Foothills website and social media channels in mid-May.

Plans for assisting academically at-risk students and additional year-end events will be distributed to families in the coming days.

Foothills Community Christian School is a non-denominational Christian school serving grades Pre-K through 12 with a student enrollment of 152.

Montana Catholic schools are also finishing the year by remote learning.

In a letter from the bishops of the Diocese of Great Falls-Billings and the Diocese of Helena, they wrote, “because we know that not every student would return to school if we began holding classes, we would have to present a hybrid learning-at-home/learning-at-school model and it would be asking too much of our teachers to transition to another type of instruction. We believe that it would negatively impact student learning by changing their routine again. It is difficult to imagine our students practicing social distancing after being away from each other for so long.”

The dioceses are leaving decisions on early learning center, individual tutoring, school masses and graduation ceremonies to the local level.

Local Catholic schools are also able to decide when to end school any time after May 22 so they can plan for the fall.

“We are expecting that this virus will continue to disrupt our lives for the near future,” they wrote in the letter. “We expect that at some point next year, remote learning will again be necessary–whether for vulnerable students, for an entire school, or the entire state.”