Superintendent's Update
10/14/2020
Dear CSD Parents/Guardians and Faculty/Staff:
Everyone’s goal is to prioritize the reopening of schools as safely and as quickly as possible, given the many known and established benefits of in-person learning. To enable this to occur, the CDC advised that it is important to adopt and diligently implement actions to slow the spread of COVID-19 inside the school and out in the community. Vigilance to these actions will moderate the risk of in-school transmission regardless of the underlying community burden.
As school officials, we are tasked with making decisions and recommendations about school reopening based on available data, including the PCR positivity rate, incidence per 100,000, and community transmission levels, along with our capacity to implement appropriate mitigation strategies in schools to protect students, teachers, administrators, and other staff. The CDC has reported that COVID-19 is mostly spread by respiratory droplets released when people talk, cough, or sneeze. It may be possible that a person can get COVID-19 by touching a surface or object that has the virus on it and then touching their own eyes, nose, or mouth. In order to reach the goal of reopening schools as safely and as quickly as possible for in-person learning and help our schools remain open, we needed to recommend and the school board to approve a plan that would allow us to implement actions to slow the spread of COVID-19 inside the school and out in the community. For us to be successful, this means that students, families, teachers, school staff, and all community members must work collaboratively and take actions to protect themselves and others where they live, work, learn, and play.
Continuum of Risk
Per the CDC, the risk of COVID-19 spread in schools increases across the continuum of virtual, hybrid, to in-person learning with the risk moderated for hybrid and in-person learning based upon the range of mitigation strategies put in place and the extent they are conscientiously followed.
While not exhaustive (or exactly like CSD), the below stratification provided by the CDC attempts to characterize the risks of spread among students, teachers, and staff across the continuum of in-person models (hybrid to full):
Some risk:
- Hybrid Learning Model: Some students participate in virtual learning, and other students participate in in-person learning
- Small, in-person classes, activities, and events
- Cohorting, alternating schedules, and staggered schedules are applied rigorously
- No mixing of groups of students and teachers throughout/across school days
- Students and teachers do not share objects
- Students, teachers, and staff follow all steps to protect themselves and others at all times, including proper use of face masks, social distancing, hand hygiene
- Regularly scheduled (i.e., at least daily or between uses) cleaning and disinfection of frequently touched areas implemented with fidelity
Medium risk:
- Hybrid Learning Model: Most students participate in in-person learning, some students participate in virtual learning
- Larger in-person classes, activities, and events
- Cohorting, alternating schedules, and staggered schedules are applied with some exceptions.
- Some mixing of groups of students and teachers throughout/across school days
- Students and teachers minimally share objects.
- Students, teachers, and staff follow all steps to protect themselves and others, such as using face masks, social distancing, and hand hygiene.
- Regularly scheduled cleaning and disinfection of frequently touched areas largely implemented with fidelity
Higher risk:
- Students and teachers engage in in-person only learning, activities, and events.
- Students minimally mix between classes and activities.
- Students and teachers share some objects.
- Students, teachers, and staff follow some steps to protect themselves and others at all times, such as proper use of face masks, social distancing, hand hygiene.
- Irregular cleaning and disinfection of frequently touched areas
Highest risk:
- Students and teachers engage in in-person only learning, activities, and events.
- Students mix freely between classes and activities.
- Students and teachers freely share objects.
- Students, teachers, and staff do not/are not required to follow steps to protect themselves and others, such as using face masks, social distancing, and hand hygiene.
- Irregular cleaning and disinfection of frequently touched areas
Yesterday evening with a vote of 9-0, the Centennial Board of School Directors approved the administration's recommendation to move the school district from full-virtual to the hybrid (blended) instructional model. In presenting the plan, the administration articulated six (6) overarching considerations:
Promoting behaviors that reduce COVID-19’s spread
Maintaining healthy environments
Maintaining healthy operations
Preparing for when someone gets sick
Minimize disruption to the instructional model (stability for students and parents)
Flexibility to adjust the instructional model based upon health and safety conditions
Additionally, based upon the CDC's model for the continuum of risk, CSD's recommended instructional model supports the lowest risk possible of in-person hybrid.
To ensure that our families have some of the key information regarding this transition, I am sending this newsletter to provide a full copy of the presentation and accompanying videos that help explain the model and classroom scenario set-up.
Hybrid (Blended) Plan Instructional Model Video
Timeline for Faculty and Operational Support Staff
Timeline for K-5 and 6-12 Students Return
School Board Meeting - October 13, 2020
Remember COVID-5
Dr. Dana T. Bedden, CAA
Website: https://www.centennialsd.org/
Location: 48 Swan Way, Warminster, PA, USA
Phone: 215-441-6000
Twitter: @Dr_Bedden