With vaccinations increasing and COVID-19 cases decreasing, the state of Arizona is beginning efforts to return the state to some- thing approaching normal.
On March 3, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey released an Executive Order requiring all school districts to be open for in-person learning in the next week.
“The updated guidance [from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] further states that at any level of community transmission, all schools can safely provide in-person instruction [either full or hybrid], through strict adherence to mitigation strategies,” the Executive Order states. “All districts and charter schools shall return to in-person, teacher-led instruction no later than the Monday following a scheduled spring break, or March 15, if there is no scheduled spring break.”
Most of the schools in the Verde Valley have already opened for in-person learning and have vaccinated their teachers and there- fore do not have to make significant changes to their setup, according to Yavapai County Superintendent of School Tim Carter.
“The reality is if you’re already open you’re open,” Carter said. “It impacts going to some [school districts] statewide but not here in the Verde Valley.”
Local superintendents agreed with Carter’s assessment, seeing the order as mostly irrelevant to them at this point now that schools have reopened, though it does also mean that school administrations and school boards can no longer close down due to a rise in COVID-19 cases as they have in the past.
- “Not at all whatsoever,” Clarkdale-Jerome School District Superintendent Danny Brown said about the order’s effect.
- “One good thing about coming back to school was that the mandate didn’t affect us,” Camp Verde Unified School District Superintendent Danny Howe said. “We’ve been one of the few schools that’s been open pretty much since August since the get go. We closed down there for a couple weeks around Christmas because we had so much teachers getting sick.”
- The governor’s order does not lift mitigation requirements from schools, meaning that masks will still be required, along with ramped up cleaning regimes. It also allows districts to retain hybrid- learning models that allow families to keep their children remote if they choose to, which local districts have been doing.
- “Not really any effect. We’re back. We’re doing mitigation like we’ve been,” Mingus Union High School District Superintendent Mike Westcott said. “If we were to get to the high end again and cases were to increase we could potentially ask the county health [department] to weigh in, but I think for all intents and purposes, it’s kind of saying if you’re in person stay, unless cases were to really get high at your school.”
- The order does affect charter schools. American Heritage Academy, which is on spring break this week, did not respond to requests for comment. The charter school, which has locations in Cottonwood and Camp Verde, has not made any new announcements of its plans for reopening at press time.
- The only public school district in the area that may be significantly affected by the order is Cottonwood-Oak Creek School District, which has since reopening been operating on a four-day schedule, with Fridays being used for at-home work for most students and supple- mental help for students who need it or request it.
The Arizona Department of Education released the following clarification on school weeks with regards to the order:
“If a school typically operates on a four-day week calendar schedule, then they should offer four full days of in-person instruction with virtual or remote options for families. If they typically operate a five-day week calendar schedule, then they should offer five full days of in-person instruction with virtual or remote options for families.”
Cottonwood-Oak Creek Superintendent Steve King said that if the district needs to return to five-day instruction, it can do so by the required date, but is also meeting with representatives from the Department of Education on Wednesday of this week to determine the district’s path going forward.
“That’s what we’re trying to determine,” King said.
King stressed that the district has gotten positive feedback from many parents and feels that there is value in the 4-1 setup. “If they say to us, you got to go back Fridays, no matter what, just like it is every other day, that’s OK. We’re ready to do that if we have to.”
