Lauderdale County schools consider reopening options

Published 2:00 pm Wednesday, June 17, 2020

The Lauderdale County School District is proposing plans on reopening schools for the 2020-2021 school year. 

Campuses were closed in March as the COVID-19 pandemic spread through Mississippi.

Superintendent John-Mark Cain discussed the plans, which include recommendations from the Mississippi Department of Education, during a meeting with community leaders Wednesday. 

The district is looking at three formats: traditional, hybrid or virtual.

Under the traditional format, students would attend school but would be  separated by six feet in the classroom, in the cafeteria, on the playground or on buses. A hybrid schedule would involve students attending school on alternating days.  

A virtual format would involve online leaning, but that arrangement would be challenging, Cain said. 

“We have a lot of issues of being a total virtual school at this point,” he said.

The challenges include internet access in rural areas of the county, the lack of technology and the difficulty of teaching online. 

“It’s hard to teach a kid to read on a computer,” he said. “You need that interaction of that veteran teacher who has seen kids struggle and can make it work.”

Another focus is providing mental health services for students and staff who are being affected by the pandemic. The district plans to use a grant from the Phil Hardin Grant to hire two additional behavioral therapists and to provide two additional sick days for workers. 

To minimize the spread of the coronaviurs, the district has purchased additional hand sanitizers and sneeze guards, Cain said.  

June 29 is the tentative date for staff to return to campus, he said. 

Survey responses

Cain also discussed the results of surveys sent to families and school staff.

According to the family survey, 37 percent of the respondents were comfortable allowing elementary students to return to school for in-person instruction. The number was 37 percent for middle school and 38 percent for high school. 

According to the staff survey, 52 percent of the staff who responded feel comfortable returning to school on a normal schedule in the fall.