Wake County Schools

Wake schools work to balance safety, socialization with return to the classroom

When the Wake County Board of Education voted Tuesday by a 5-4 margin to bring students back to the classroom next month, it set off what will be weeks of planning with some worry mixed in.

Posted Updated

By
Joe Fisher
, WRAL reporter
CARY, N.C. — When the Wake County Board of Education voted Tuesday by a 5-4 margin to bring students back to the classroom next month, it set off what will be weeks of planning with some worry mixed in.
“I understand there is a lot of emotion tied around this both ways," said Andrew Livengood, principal of Pine Hollow Middle School.

He won't see his students until Nov. 9. Grades 6-8 are the second group to return. They'll rotate to learn in the classroom one week and at home two weeks for the rest of the semester.

Students in pre-kindergarten through third grade will begin their three-week rotation – learning two weeks online and one week in person – on Oct. 26.

Grades 4 and 5 would return Nov. 16.

Grades 9-12 will remain in remote learning for the fall semester.

Elementary and K-12 special education programs could begin full-time in-person classes by Nov. 16.

When the doors open at Pine Hollow Middle School, Livengood says just 150 students will be in the building at a given time, meaning smaller class sizes.

“It will be much, much smaller, which of course helps certainly maintain social distancing,” he said.

Even parents who support getting their kids back into the classroom have reservations.

“You have to balance public health, and you have to balance the greater good,” said Tara Hun-Dorris. She is a single working mother who plans to send her third and sixth graders back to school.

“I have noticed that they are suffering from the social deficits of being stuck inside for over half the year,” she said.

The school system plans for students in Pre-K through 3rd grade to return to class everyday beginning Nov. 16, but students in 4th through 8th grades will stay on their three-week rotations through the end of the semester.

The North Carolina Association of Educators calls the change a mid-semester distraction.

“Even if it is harder, kids are in a stride where they are learning content, and we are going to interrupt that content learning to teach routines and procedures," said Kristin Beller, president of the Wake County NCAE.
Livengood says his top priority will be keeping students and staff safe.

“They have a lot of questions, and they’re nervous, and we just want to make sure everyone feels good about this plan going forward,” he said.

School leaders say they have secured 900,000 face masks and have put hand sanitizer in every single classroom. They say additional PPE will be ordered just as soon as school buildings reopen.