It was Friday, March 13th 2020 when my district (and my kids’ district) announced two weeks of distance learning, followed by a week of spring break, to deter the spread of the novel coronavirus.
On March 15th 2021, almost exactly one year from our first real day of shelter-in-place, our school will be welcoming half of the 6th grader class for in-person orientation. Tuesday the second half of the 6th grade class will come for in-person orientation and Thursday and Friday the 7th and 8th graders will come as well. The following three weeks we will see students in two groups (AM and PM) on Mondays. In mid-April, if our county has not re-entered the purple, we will begin true hybrid learning (mornings at school and afternoons on zoom).
After so many months of everything being exactly the same, the idea of such stark changes are more than I can wrap my head around. I’m excited to see my students again, even if it’s just my Advisory class once a week for a few weeks. I understand the desire to start slow and I think it’s a good idea at the middle school level. Our elementary schools will return to hybrid much sooner than we will, and that makes sense too (our district does not include high schools so we don’t have to figure that out, but I haven’t heard that the high school district we feed into is going back in any capacity).
We don’t really know what hybrid will look like, but I am certain I won’t be teaching my classes in person because I’m an elective teacher and they won’t mix the cohorts for elective classes. Also I teach three grades on two campuses, so I’m DEFINITELY not seeing my students in my classroom. So my actual teaching won’t change much, but I’m happy the students are coming back in some capacity.
And of course they aren’t all coming back. About on fourth to one third of them have opted to stay entirely online, and once our hybrid schedule kicks in this will be very hard to manage. Our MOU states that we will not teach students in person and online simultaneously, so I’m really not sure how they are going to pull it off. I’m really glad it’s not my job to put those puzzle pieces together.
My own kids will not be returning to the classroom this year. SFUSD might manage to bring K-2 back at the “Wave 1” schools but my kids’ school is not a Wave 1 school so my first grade son won’t be included. My daughter is in 5th grade and there are no plans to bring them back. If we’re being totally honest, there aren’t really plans to bring back students at the Wave 1 schools – they haven’t even reached an agreement with the union, so I’m really not holding my breath.
I consider myself (and my kids) very lucky that they are experiencing less learning loss than most, and no serious mental health issues. My son is struggling, but he is young and resilient and I believe he will ultimately be okay. He’s angry all the time, and it’s not pleasant to spend so much time with him, but I do think he’ll come out of this relatively unscathed. My daughter is doing as well as any parent could hope for. Yes, I want them back in classrooms, but I would also support any proposal that brings back students who need to be back more than they do. I wish SFUSD wasn’t failing all the kids that really need to be in schools, because there are A LOT of them (and the majority have indicated they would go back if given the chance).
In late March we find out if our son got the Spanish Immersion school we want to move him to. If he doesn’t get that transfer we will very seriously consider moving him to my district. We may even consider it for our daughter if she doesn’t get one of the schools on our list. It would suck for them to have to commute with me, and for all their friends to be 30-45 minutes away. I hope it doesn’t come to that.
I got my first shot this week. My second will be in late March. It’s a relief not to think about it anymore. I’m very grateful to have an opportunity to be vaccinated. I’m relieved that everyone will have a chance by late May (or so promises Biden) so my husband can be vaccinated too.
Our second trimester ends this Friday, so I’ll be up even later than usually scoring work and updating our leaning management system next week. The next week I have to be on campus every afternoon, which means my poor husband, who has already been taking off two days a week, will have to take more time off. By the week of the 22nd I think things will be settling down.
This weekend we are showing Raya and the Last Dragon in our backyard for my daughter’s friend. I’m excited to see a new movie. And it’s coming out ($30 on Disney+ while it’s also in theaters) just in time because once we spring forward it gets dark too late (and it’s too windy and cold) to watch movies in the backyard.
San Francisco is opening up in a lot of ways – they will even allow indoor dining at 25% capacity soon (maybe already?), but nothing in our personal lives will change. Obviously seeing students in my classroom (or hopefully outside when the weather permits), will be a massive change for me, but nothing will change for our family. We’re still living the quarantine life, and we probably will be for a while still.
Is anything in your life changing as case numbers go down and states open up?