Chester School District Readies Three Back To School Plans

CHESTER, NJ - While we may be dealing with scorching weather the return to school for the fall is being prepped across the Garden State and Chester is no exception.

According to Chester School District Superintendent of Schools Dr. Christina Van Woert, there are three options on the table:

• Option 1: Full Return to School with All Students
• Option 2: Limited Return to School with Smaller Student Cohort Groups
• Option 3: Distance Learning Plan for Virtual School for All Students/Or for Students Who Choose this Option

"I am confident that we are well on our way to drafting three potential options that will maximize learning for our students, prioritize the health and safety of our students and faculty, and be sufficiently malleable to thrive in whatever public health climate exists on or around Aug. 26, 2020," Van Woert said.

Van Woert shared her thoughts on each option in a letter to parents:

Option 1

"At this time, I do not see an immediate return to school with all students on Aug. 26th as the most likely choice. Plain and simple, we have been given detailed and complex guidelines to ensure the health and safety of all of our students and faculty members in the middle of a pandemic. While we are planning diligently to eventually return all of our students to school, we need time to study how well these protective measures work in practice with actual students, faculty members and administrators back in the buildings. The time to test these measures and analyze the results is crucial for us to learn where perhaps our systems may need to be refined or amended before bringing all students and all faculty members and administrators back to school at the same time. It is most definitely our goal to bring everyone back to school as soon as possible, but in a safe and sensible manner.

Depending upon the public health climate at the time, I am very hopeful that this will occur sometime in the month of September, but we cannot be sure as of yet when it will be safe and prudent to do so."

Option 2

"In studying the benefits and drawbacks of various hybrid models, we have been focusing on one that allows us to maximize our students’ time in school at 50 percent while still maintaining the appropriate CDC guidelines of 6 ft. of social distancing. This plan allows us to divide our student population into two halves by alphabetical order
to allow for continuity of planning for our families - For example, ALL children in families with last names A - K would attend school on Day A followed by ALL children with last names L - Z attending on Day B. This approach also allows us to maintain social distancing on our buses as well. So, our students are very likely to start school in August in two groups that rotate from Day A to Day B on continuous repeat. A schedule would be published in advance so that students and parents can plan accordingly.

Our tentative plan includes a slightly abbreviated school day to allow for additional cleaning measures and time for our teachers to connect with their cohort of students who would continue learning at home via our Distance Learning Program with additional teacher support when it is not their day to be present in the school building. Black River Middle School would run on a schedule from 8 a.m. to 1p.m. and Dickerson and Bragg Schools would run on a schedule from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m."

Option 3

"While a full Distance Learning Model is not planned for at this moment for all students, there is a possibility of our returning to our Distance Learning Program depending upon the rate of spread of the virus in the State of New Jersey at any time. However, Option 3 will likely be a possibility for any of our students and parents who are simply not comfortable sending their child(ren) to school in person just yet. As noted, there are many details still to be worked out regarding our three potential options for our return to school."

Van Woert also said that the information was provided to give the community a greater understanding of the direction the district is moving in.

"Additional details on all of our plans will be forthcoming soon, and we will have a Board of Education meeting on July 28 to discuss the options further," she said.

Thanks for reading! Learn more about posting announcements or events to your local Patch site. Have a news tip you'd like to share? Or maybe you have a press release you would like to submit or a correction you'd like to request? Send an email to russ.crespolini@patch.com

Subscribe to your local Patch newsletter. You can also have them delivered to your phone screen by downloading, or by visiting the Google Play store.