Board members for District 205 were given an update on the plan to bring students back for full in-person learning at their February meeting Monday night.
Last month, the board approved a return-to-learn plan that started bringing students back into classrooms to start the month of February. The hybrid approach saw students in classrooms two days a week while remote learning the remainder of the week.
The plan, according to Superintendent Dr. John Asplund, was to get students back into classrooms every day very quickly, citing lowering grades among students. Dr. Asplund told the board that the plan was to start with a hybrid approach and then move forward fully in-person by February 22nd.
However, there were some logistics issues that needed to be resolved. Asplund told the board at the January 26 meeting that First Student was short on drivers for the routes planned and was unable to hire and train because of COVID-19 restrictions. The district only had 27 drivers for 34 planned routes.
At the Monday meeting, Asplund told the board that First Student had hired their drivers and was training and they’d be available to start on time, February 22.
The next step, Asplund told the board, was to start on a callback plan for getting food service workers and paraprofessionals back into position. He said that a special meeting would be held Friday morning, February 12, to get that started as well. Additionally, there were some outstanding impact negotiations with the Galesburg Education Association that would hammer out a few more details before the special meeting.
Finally, he told the board that there was a plan in place for feedback for students staying remote as the district transitions into more in-person learning.
