by Jessyca Cardinell
The Gouverneur Central School District Board of Education met for their monthly meeting at the Gouverneur Central Middle School on the evening of Monday, August 3rd. Everyone was welcomed to watch the meeting via Facebook Live, a safe alternative during this confusing time of COVID-19 Pandemic
A major topic of discussion was the upcoming 2020-2021 school year, which is in the works of becoming a functioning plan to assist the Gouverneur Central School District families, staff and students.
“At this time, we are sharing Gouverneur Central School District’s reopening plan, approximately 80 pages worth of work, this was accomplished by a team of fifty-seven people with over three hundred people in the community providing input. A good thing to note is this is a working document, it’s a live document as we find out more information and collect more questions in the community. We will address those and redesign the plan with the given information we know about,” said Mrs. French
“What is very difficult is it’s like a chicken and the egg type story, do you put the plan out and then get feedback or do you get feedback first and then make the plan. So what we have done is with the 57 individuals that have volunteered to sit on this and with the comments we got from the community we are putting an initial draft and then we will be looking at feedback,” said Mrs. French as she went over the drafted item.
“The survey is basically going to be asking parents to make a commitment and that is, here is the plan we are looking at, here is the commitment we need from you. What is it and where is the disconnect? What is the connection between what your family needs and the school?” said Mrs. French. “Basically what we have done is divide the student population in half with the letters of the alphabet A-K and L-Z. There are 808 students in the first half of the alphabet and 838 students in the second portion of the alphabet. Those students will be placed in their grade appropriate classrooms. What that will enable us to do is to socially distance all of our scholars. The average classroom can hold about ten students. When you look at the elementary, I don’t want to say easy, because none of this will be particularly easy, but it will be easy for us to hold students in groups of about ten in the elementary. This enables them to be socially distanced and they will also be wearing masks during this time. Classrooms will have their encores pushed in so that students will be limited to exposure and there won’t be as many opportunities for our scholars to be mixing with different groups of children. This would mean music would be pushed in, PE will be pushed in, this way our scholars will be pretty much a group of nine or ten other students with their teacher and about one or two other push in teachers,” said Mrs. French.
She shared exciting news that meals can be served in homes, the school is looking into being able to provide meals in bags for students to be take home and enjoy.
“Another thing we’ve looked into is in order to litigate congestion in the hallways, we have designated certain doorways as UPK and Kindergarten doorway, a 1st and 2nd grade doorway and a 3rd and 4th grade doorway,” said Mrs. French.
Mrs. French shared that the bussing situation will also provide social distancing for students, as 61% of the school population uses the bus as transportation to and from school. This amounts to approximately 360, however this will be separated in half to about 160 students and separate doorways.
Mrs. French stated that students with be based in small groups, limited interaction and socially distancing int the classroom, providing a safer atmosphere. The School District will also be looking for ways to help assist families seeking childcare.
“With families coming with by the letter of their last name, the entire family will be coming into school and leaving a 1st or 2nd grader home while an older sibling is at school. That jumps to the next step which indicates we will be going back to a single bus run, students will be picked up on a single trip and they will be taken home on a single trip.” said Mrs. French, who explained why this would be more effective.
“When we looked at how much time it would take to clear a bus and clean a bus and then letting the bus sit in a resting stage while the disinfectant has time to work, which is a good chunk of time, then send that bus back out to get another bus run of students, there’s no way we could get all students into a seven hour day. It will be a single run A-K, what we are looking at is Monday and Tuesday will be A-K, Wednesday will be a remote day and Thursday and Friday will be L-Z,” said Mrs. French.
“Another thing we have indicated is we will certainly work with families who have blended families.” said Mrs. French, this would mean those families with two last names who are not in the same group would still get to attend school at the same time. This would also be helpful as families do not have to social distance on the buses.
This Mrs. French stated is the reason for the second survey, a way to get a closer look at what families need.
Mrs. French went over the various options that they are looking for feedback on, including parents who are interested in remote learning only, meaning their student would acquire attendance through a remote platform.
“We are also looking at a hybrid modeling your student is in two days a week and then three days a week with remote learning included. We are also looking at students who are self-contained and get outside serves including speech and P.T. The things that we cannot send people who provide those services to individual homes. Those students are in classes of eight or less so we can actually meet their needs here at school and again keep the environment as safe as possible,” said Mrs. French.
Mrs. French stated that is the purpose of the survey, to figure out which model of learning parents are most interested in their students receiving. Whether that be the hybrid model which includes in school learning as well as remote learning from home, or if the preferred model would be a completely remote learning experience from home.
When it comes to masks, there has been a great debate and concern about this.
“Right now, the medical opinion is that they wear their mask 100% of the time in school.” said Mrs. French, who expressed more input from the community would be really appreciated on this plan in the works.
The survey will be put out through the GCSD Wildcats Facebook Page. If there is no response from Facebook, there is a team of 20 people who will be calling families in order to ensure that there is 100 percent participation opportunity for the survey.
“I do understand it is very hard to put a survey out on Facebook because you have populations of people who do not have access to quality technology, which is why we will do a check off, the survey will be due by Friday, as it is going Live tomorrow at 11 a.m. On Friday, if we do not have a response then we will start triaging those names between the twenty people who have volunteered to collect the data. Family engagement should be very constant,” said Mrs. French, who gave Nurse Bev Martin and Harold Simmons credit for being substantial in knowledge of health and safety.
The school district is looking at hands free hand sanitizer dispensers to help with controlling and eliminating contamination. The air flow meets the safety concerns and regulations in the Middle School and Elementary, which is wonderful news. The High School needs to a closer look to make some changes.
“There are all sorts of things we are going to have to be doing in terms of taking trainings and so Bev Martin has to do hygiene and respiratory health and mask wearing.” said Mrs. French, who stated that Mrs. Martin is in fact making videos to help with education in these areas.
Parents will be asked to take their child’s temperature every morning before sending them to school as a precaution to ensure that no sick children are sent to school.
“We are purchasing three cloth masks for every teacher and every student. They will be washable so they can go home and be laundered. If a student comes to school and has forgotten their mask, they will be given a disposable mask for the day. The district is looking at ways in providing students with breaks from wearing the masks in safe manner.
Social distancing will require us to be careful of the exchange in the hallways. Students are pretty much going to be delegated to certain areas of the school.
We have no resolved lunch yet. Some of the other schools with whom I’ve spoken are actually taking the extra time and are setting up in the gymnasium and social distancing lunch that way.” said Mrs. French, who again stated these areas really need some feedback from families and staff so the school is prepared with what the community would like to see and what would make them feel comfortable. Gouverneur Elementary is looking at lunches being held in individual classrooms.
Parent pick-up is another avenue that needs to be explored.
“We are working with bussing 61% of students, we are also looking for parent commitment transport because we might actually be able to do bus runs differently,” said Mrs. French.
Mrs. French explained the concern with splitting half days with various running around from parents as they try to keep up with the differing schedules if they have multiple children who all go to different schools in the District. It could cause a lot of chaos, confusion and frustration.
Mrs. French said details like one staircase is for going up and one for going down is being looked at to lessen the possibility of contamination in the High School.
“We’ve set up restricted areas in terms of someone comes to school and doesn’t feel well. That child is set up in an isolation room. That is something we have to set up under certain perimeters. With testing we have different sources available where testing can take place. What we have to do in what order and how long. This is probably going to be one of the biggest areas in Gouverneur as far as compliance. I think it is very important that people understand why we are doing what we are doing.
Right now we are limiting when teachers and support staff can come in the building. The reason for that is, if I come into the building and I turn out to test positive for COVID, and I used the faculty lounge to do some xeroxing and I went to the bathroom and into the kitchen to get water out of the cooler and then went into my classroom; then someone later on followed some of my same patterns and touched surfaces that I may have touched, if we don’t know who’s been there, we can’t accurately trace the individuals that were there after me. It’s going to be very important that we know when people arrive at the building, are in the building and leave the building,” said Mrs. French.
Mrs. French stated that work is aggressively being done so teachers have the ability to set up their classrooms and get ready for the upcoming school year. This includes getting rid of items no longer allowed that have potential to spread the virus.
Mrs. French stated that many items will have to be thoroughly gone through including toys, calculators and items that are frequently handled and touched.
The school district is looking at UV cabinets to store items so they can be disinfected properly and used again.
Mrs. French stated that food is vital to be provided and students will be able to take home their lunch for the portion of the week they are not at school.
“Probably the biggest concern not only for teachers and administrators but for families as well is the social, emotional well-being of each scholar. This is not an easy situation to be in, so we have counseling planned, we have the trauma team and social workers. Our staff has been generating
“We are giving parents the opportunity to look at this and say to themselves, what best meets the needs of our family, our scholars and the resources we have. They will then make a commitment on the survey as that comes out. If no one responds to this survey on Facebook, we figure it would take each one of us making 78 phone calls. We know we will have a lot of good response from people,” said Mrs. French.
Mrs. French stated in conclusion,
“Do parent have a choice? Yes they do,” said Mrs. French.
She went over what had been stated previously, “Letters of the last name, A-K and L-Z in terms of what days they come in on. We will work with blended families to put in one group. We will provide transportation; however these are going to be commitments. They are not going to be opt in or opt out, we cannot do that when we have to socially distance kids,” said Mrs. French.
Mrs. French explained she really needed the Board of Education to have the opportunity to listen to the information and ask questions pertaining to the reopening of school for the 2020-2021 school year.
Mrs. Laurie Roberts, GCSD Board of Education Member, asked about those families who do not have thermometers at home and are unable to obtain one.
Mrs. French stated the school is looking into helping those families out and providing them with the thermometer to use to ensure everyone is checked daily.
The District is also required to social distance during fire drills, ensuring students stay the six feet apart. The one circumstance where this will not be necessary is in the case of a real fire. This will also be the case for shelter in place drills, the students will be socially distancing, unless there is an actual real threat.
When it comes to remote learning Mrs. French said that dependent on grade level it will look very different.
High School students will have a work level more closely related to college students, while younger grades will have less expectations on them and more interactive.
The District has been looking into a way to work with families to make the work at home less stressful than the period from March to June this past school year. Many parents were concerned it was too much busy work and Mrs. French and the staff at Gouverneur Central are looking into ways to alleviate this concern. Offering more fun and different looking models and experiences, as they now have more time to plan such learning.
As the meeting continued many areas are being discussed and looked into to make the most of this upcoming school year with the circumstances as they are. The District has many strict guidelines to follow and is doing their best execute and effective plan.
All parents are asked to participate in the survey as to give the Gouverneur Central School District a better grasp on what exactly will work the best for families and students to ensure a successful school year for all.