San Diego Unified School District Releases Plans For Distance Learning In Fall

Speaker 1: 00:00 The end of summer vacation is fast approaching and many parents and students are devastated by the news that schools will not be opening their doors, this full San Diego counties on the state's watch list for COVID-19. And until that changes, the governor has said, schools may not reopen, but some are pitching an idea that could be one solution to bringing students back on campus safely when the time comes, that is moving classrooms outside here to discuss this idea and what parents and schools are doing to prepare for the new year is will Huntsburg who reports on education in San Diego County for voice of San Diego? Well, thanks for joining us. Happy to be here. So of course schools are opening. They're just not opening physically. So first of all, tell us what's the plan and what are schools doing to prepare Speaker 2: 00:44 That's right, right now I'm schools are going to be open online though. Many educators have have noted throughout that online education is a poor substitute for in person education. And so the trick is to figure out when we can bring students back to school safely and how to do that. Does that mean bringing everybody back at once? Probably not. Um, does that bring main, bringing everyone back on a part time basis or does that mean bringing back our most vulnerable students who we know really need the stability of school? And so as we try to figure that out, I think a really important question in San Diego is how are we going to utilize outdoor space to do that? Because we have gray outdoor space and we have the weather to do it. Speaker 1: 01:38 We heard that San Diego city, Councilman Chris Cates, uh, sent a memorandum to several officials, um, recently suggesting that idea. What was the reaction to that? Speaker 2: 01:50 Uh, Richard Barrera, the board vice president kind of told Kate to like stay in his lane and manage the public health crisis and not tell them how to run schools. San Diego unified tends to, um, do things by consensus behind closed doors. They're going to have a plan on August 10th. And when that plan comes out, we may hear more about if they're going to try to bring special education students and homeless students back, for instance, is there a way to bring our most vulnerable students back like 20% of the population and have class with them outdoors? You know, we have not had really any outdoor outbreaks yet in San Diego of the virus and research suggests that it's 20 times less likely to be transmitted outdoors. Speaker 1: 02:38 So now the Atlantic wrote about this topic just last week and our local school district communications director, Maureen McGee, since the author statement about San Diego's position on outdoor classes, in which she said, quote, the use of outdoor space is among the options under consideration by individual schools, as they plan on how to welcome back to campus. However, effective use of our outdoor environment is not a substitute for controlling the spread of the virus. We did invite someone from the school district to come on the show and talk about it and they eventually declined. Why do you think that they're so cool to the idea Speaker 2: 03:17 Your guess is as good as mine? I think the fact that the school district doesn't want to openly talk about this is frustrating. How could it not be frustrating in San Diego? Where so many people have moved here because of the climate, frankly, on top of that, the school district in the past several years has spent more than a hundred million dollars upgrading their fields, creating new fields, upgrading their stadiums. So, you know, we know they have the space, I guess they want us to believe that behind closed doors, they're talking about how outdoor education could be a part of this. And right now, you know, we're in a world where daycares exist, camps are popping up left and right, the Y YMCA has created one, we're seeing gymnastic schools. So there is going to be care and tutoring for students who can pay for it. The real question is, is the school district going to be creative enough to try to provide for its most vulnerable students who can't pay to go to a day camp and have a tutor guide them in their online learning. Speaker 1: 04:28 Right? And then one of the other things you've written about is, is some parents who have been so frustrated by this distance learning that they're trying their own own solutions like, like pod learning. What's your assessment of that solution. Speaker 2: 04:40 Yeah. Pods are definitely something that I think we're seeing parent groups on Facebook just light up with conversation about right. You know, some people are just creating a pod where they don't necessarily hire a tutor. They're just gathering, um, four or five families together and it's like homeschool pod, but some families are actually, you know, pooling their money and hiring a tutor for their pods of children as well. You know, if you put these professional learning pods into practice, the halves are going to advance further ahead and the most vulnerable are going to fall further behind. Speaker 1: 05:15 So apparently there are some individual schools that are thinking about using outdoor spaces to help bring students back safely. Have you heard of any, I've heard of the grower school, which is a private school in North County is doing it, but any schools in the unified school district, Speaker 2: 05:29 You know, I actually spoke to a teacher at Montgomery middle who has managed the garden there for a long time. And she's a big advocate of using outdoor space more in general. Um, she's asked the district, she's reached out to the board members to say, what do you think? And she has not gotten an official response back. So for now, I don't think we're going to see any pilots like that in San Diego, San Diego unified, even though there may be individual teachers on the ground who want it very much. And finally, Speaker 1: 05:58 Have you talked through with anybody, what it would take to move classrooms outside, what it would cost? What are the considerations? Speaker 2: 06:05 The district has been relatively silent on this point, as you noted, but I did speak to the CEO of green schoolyards America. And, um, and she said, our campuses are, are more ready than most. People's. You know, we have a lot of schools where you have two doors of classrooms that actually face out onto the outside. We also have, you know, huge covered breezeways that are like outdoor hallways. We also have lots of outdoor cafeteria space. Obviously you might need tents, you might need more shade. It's not like it's just ready to go, but there is a lot of available space. Thank you so much. Will. All right. Thanks for having me. Speaker 1: 06:47 We've been speaking with will Huntsburg who reports on education in San Diego County for voice of San Diego, San Diego unified. We'll discuss going back to school next Monday, or was the 10th.