Blue Valley rejects county advice on opening schools and sports, will do its own study
Hours after the Johnson County health department advised districts to start the school year with online-only classes, the Blue Valley school board voted to reject that recommendation.
Instead, with dozens of families in the room pushing for reopening schools, and more protesting outside, the board voted unanimously Tuesday for the district to conduct its own evaluation of COVID-19 data, concentrating on Blue Valley ZIP codes. The district is expected to decide how to start school by the end of the week.
All other Johnson County districts are following the health department’s recommendations for the start of school:
▪ On Wednesday, Olathe school officials announced they would start with middle and high school students online. But elementary students will return to school in a hybrid model, going in person part of the time and learning from home the rest of the week so that schools can have a better chance at social distancing.
▪ Two other Johnson County districts, Spring Hill and Gardner-Edgerton, will have elementary school students in classrooms, unless they opted for online classes. Older students will take classes online. Spring Hill begins school on Aug. 26.
▪ On Tuesday, both the Shawnee Mission and De Soto districts announced they would begin the school year with online-only classes next month. Shawnee Mission also temporarily suspended all sports, starting on Friday.
On Tuesday, Blue Valley school board president Tom Mitchell said the district would “carve our own path.” In the meantime, all sports training and activities will continue, even “high-risk sports,” such as football, where students are in close contact with each other, officials said.
The board previously agreed to follow county health officials’ criteria, based on two key metrics: the number of COVID-19 cases and the percentage of positive tests. Tuesday afternoon, the health department said the surging number of cases put the county in the “red” zone, meaning most students should learn remotely.
But Blue Valley will now follow different criteria formed by the Kansas State Department of Education, which takes more data points into consideration. A committee will spend a couple of days studying the data and create new guidance based on information specific to the Blue Valley district, in southeast Johnson County.
“(Looking at) whole Johnson County data is great, but what happens in the western part of the county might not impact us,” board member Mike Seitz said. “My thought was the more local you can make it to Blue Valley, the more it makes sense.”
Under Johnson County’s criteria, even in the “red” zone, elementary students could return to class, with social distancing and other precautions. Officials said, in part, that is because “most young children are unable to stay home safely by themselves.”
That’s the reason Olathe is allowing elementary students in classrooms. Officials in that district said they will study data again Sept. 22 to determine next steps. “It is our hope that we can transition safely into full in-person learning after that time,” they said in a districtwide email.
Officials added that, “activities and athletics will be handled on a week-by-week basis to determine safety and next steps.”
On Tuesday, dozens of parents and students filled the Blue Valley Northwest High School auditorium and spoke about the importance of sports this fall so students can obtain scholarships and boost their mental health. Many also addressed several concerns surrounding online learning, such as a lack of child care options.
“We as parents are not asking you … to decide if it’s too risky for our kids to participate in sports and activities,” said Michelle Mitchell, who has two children attending Northwest. “We are asking you to give us a choice and let us evaluate the risks and do what’s best for our families. I have seen firsthand what this has done to teenagers in our community.”
Several parents urged the district to at least allow elementary students to return. Many said that they worry about having to shuffle their children from day care centers to grandparents’ homes, which could put others at risk. Some parents also brought up concerns about their children needing to return to in-person special education classes.
While most residents urged the district to open schools, a handful of teachers spoke against it. Some said that class sizes are too large to allow for social distancing and they worry about carrying the burden of students potentially getting sick.
“I respect the needs of working parents and parents’ desire to have their kids back in school. It’s very reasonable to want that,” elementary music teacher Mandy Coday said. “We want more than anything to be physically present with our kids. … But the question isn’t should we be in person, but can we be in person safely and responsibly. Nothing is more important than the one life that is lost if we don’t do everything we can to prevent that.”
Measuring COVID-19
Last month, the Johnson County health department released its guidance to school districts on how to determine when it is safe to bring students back to class. It includes reopening phases based on two key metrics.
The positivity rate is the average percentage of positive COVID-19 tests over a 14-day period. The rate was 11.3% on Wednesday. The other metric says the number of new coronavirus cases each day must be steady or decreasing. That number has been rising. Officials said they also track several other metrics that are not listed on the criteria released to the public.
School board members doubted that guidance during the meeting. They instead turned to the criteria released by the state department of education, which looks at five key metrics to determine whether to bring students back to classrooms full-time, part of the week or implement online classes.
When Kansas Education Commissioner Randy Watson released the recommendations earlier this month, he said school boards should use the suggested thresholds in consultation with county and state health officials, according to the Kansas Association of School Boards.
The state criteria includes the positivity rate, the number of new cases per 100,000 people in the community, the infection rate trend and hospitalization data.
After school is back in session, districts would also look at the two-week absentee rate — or the percentage of students absent from school compared to the same rate last year — in each building. A rate 10% higher than the previous year would put the district in the “red” zone.
“I personally like the Kansas State Department of Education one, because it had the five data points. I always had a problem with the positivity rate being the only point,” board member Michele Benjamin said. “This gives us a better picture of exactly what’s going on in our community and in our schools, which is what matters to us.”
Johnson County health officials on Tuesday said that no matter what data point you look at, “no matter how the data is presented, the level of transmission of COVID-19 in the county is too high.”
Can sports be safe?
Blue Valley Superintendent Tonya Merrigan said the district will determine whether to allow any grade levels to return to class, such as in a hybrid model.
Chris Jenson, a science teacher at Blue Valley Southwest who also has a background as a physician, has been helping the district examine COVID-19 data. He agreed that looking at more data points would be beneficial.
But he said, “this year is going to ebb and flow like no other year. We will plan. We will use mitigation strategies and we will do everything we can to keep the staff and kids we love safe. But there’s no true safe. You’re reducing the impact of COVID-19. And to be honest, you’re responding to the community around you.”
District leaders also are considering whether to allow fall sports at the start of the school year. Most criteria warn against high-risk sports, such as football, when community transmission of COVID-19 is too high.
David Stubblefield, executive director of school administration at the high school level, said he is confident that the district has implemented enough safety protocols to mitigate the risks of coronavirus among athletes. Over the summer, he said, the district reported 14 cases throughout conditioning and practices.
He said district leadership has worked to “assure that whenever we have positive cases within our district during sports and activities, we were able to identify those, quickly isolate athletes and continue with our summer conditioning programs.”
If fall sports are not allowed, he said the district is working with the Kansas State High School Activities Association to consider moving fall sports and activities to a spring season. The Shawnee Mission district is doing the same.
On Tuesday, dozens of students, some wearing football uniforms, and parents protested outside of the school board meeting. Some held up signs that read “let them play” and “my future matters.”
This story was originally published August 19, 2020 at 12:21 PM.
