School Board Meeting Notes - Reasons for the Delay

Churchill Country School Board met on August 26^th at 5:30 p.m. in their regular meeting.

Kenny Mitchell, Director of Transportation and School Safety, made a presentation regarding some of the challenges faced with the planning of busing students to and from school on the hybrid plan. At this time, the District is short on the number of drivers needed to cover the midday break in the school schedule. As the number of students fluctuate between totally remote and those attending AM/PM sessions, planning routes and scheduling how to get the AM students home and the PM students to school in a timely manner with the number of drivers currently available (four drivers recently resigned) has proven difficult. Mr. Mitchell did assure the Board that by 5:00 p.m. on Thursday, August 27, 2020 a plan would be presented, or the Board would be notified that busing was not resolved for the starting of classes on August 31^st. 

Dr. Stephens presented information on the current enrollment for the District. Currently there are 3,124 students enrolled in the district K-12, 1,082 of those students are scheduled to attend the morning session, 1,269 in the afternoon session, and 773 on the totally remote option. Dr. Stephens also explained some of the other issues that had influenced the decision made Monday to delay the start of school.

There were several students that were identified as having tested positive for COVID-19 and some who may have been exposed in the CARE program, which is where staff members’ children are receiving care services. (Around 40 students were possible involved in various degrees.) This led to the need to quarantine students, affecting the ability of parents to be at work in the schools. All of the buildings in the district were in some way affected. Currently there are around 12-15 staff members that are in some form of isolation or quarantine.

Some adjustments in teaching positions have also had to be made. Currently there are six teachers for online K-1, six teachers for grades 2-3, four teachers for grades 4-5, one teacher at the middle school, and one at the high school for online students. (Parent can still choose online up until this Friday. If they do so, the students will not be starting their classes on Monday.)

Each of these variables let to the decision to delay the start of school, and again Dr. Stephens stressed the need for all to be flexible and practice patience and kindness.