City schools adjusting classes to pandemic needs but hope to return to classes April 20

New Albany city schools are maintaining online classes with good attendance and working to compensate for the disruption the coronavirus pandemic is causing.

“Right now we’re still set to come back on the 20^th,” Superintendent Dr. Lance Evans told school board members Monday. “No one in the governor’s office has said otherwise.”

Evans said last week he had been in three different meetings with the governor, lieutenant governor and speaker of the house. The lieutenant governor had alluded each time to how he didn’t know how we could come back but it’s the governor’s office that makes the decision.

Hosemann said he “thought it would be tough,” but Evans stressed that Hosemann did not say students would not be going back to school.

Evans said the meal pickup program is continuing and will as long as it is prudent, but the schedule is changing. Now, Monday and Tuesday meals are picked up on Monday and Wednesday through Sunday meals are picked up on Wednesday.

“I think we handed out 540 breakfasts and lunches today,” he said, adding that the district may be the only one out of a three or four county radius that is doing it.

“We have our administrative team, they are the ones that are distributing the meals every day. Each of the food services managers is preparing the meals,” he said.

Evans said the program is a success and is appreciated.

“We’ve had several people come up and make statements like ‘I didn’t know what I was going to do to feed my family until I realized y’all were doing’ this and if nothing else we’re going to keep doing it as long as we can until where it’s just not safe for our people,” he said.

“We have very strict protocols in place,” he said. “We do temperature checks every day, obviously we have the masks, we have the gloves.” Parents drive up and staff members ask them how many meals they need. Those meals are placed on a separate table and the parents get out of their vehicle to pick them up so there is no direct interaction.

Although the focus has been on distant learning, Evans reported that some construction continues at the schools. “It’s slowed down. There’s a lot of inside stuff,” he said. They have done some final inspections and are close to being done except for a couple of big things, he said.

The school offices are open from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. for calls, but no one is really in the offices other than to accept deliveries. “We have the phones in each of the schools forwarded to administrators so that way the calls are getting answered,” Evans said.

“I knew one of the things we would have to address pretty quick was the social and emotional well-being of our students and our parents,” Evans said. “A lot of times people forget that part of it.”

Administrators have worked with counselors and the school website has information and ways for students and parents to reach out to counselors and the schools’ behavioral therapists are checking in every day. Speech therapists are working with students using Zoom or other teleconferencing software.

“We’re having school every day,” he said. “We have adjusted our schedules.”

Evans said teachers also have adjusted to the online means of teaching. He said it was easier scheduling for the high school because they were already on a block format but the others had many more classes to deal with.

“Our teachers are in classes just like we are right now with every single one of our kids,” he said. “It is a face-to-face learning environment.” There’s maybe only one other school district doing it like that, he added.

Financially, the district continues to be within budget plans and Director of Accounting Services Suzanne Coffey said tax collections have been good.

Thanks to the pandemic and classes not being held in the school, the district is saving money on substitute teachers, utilities and fuel for buses. The district may also get some reimbursement on worker’s compensation payments with staff on administrative leave.

However, Coffey cautioned that any savings need to be put toward next year when it may be needed more. “We could have some hard economic times,” she said. “I feel cuts may come. I feel like we will be feeling the effects for several school years.”

Trustees approved some policy changes needed to allow the superintendent to allow administrative leave, and others that affect graduation and retention. Generally, the district is trying to avoid penalizing students for the lost time, freezing some grades that were in place at the end of the third nine weeks, but also allowing students to better them if they can.

“We are doing everything in our power to see that a student is promoted. But we won’t promote just to promote,” Evans said.

In personnel, trustees approved:

• The resignation of Shane Ard as teacher at NASTUC effective at the end of the school year.
• The resignation of Shane Ard as assistant football coach at New Albany High School effective at the end of the school year.
• The resignation of Jay Cotton as bus driver, central office, effective April 5.
• Hiring Trent Hammond as assistant football coach, New Albany High School replacing Shane Ard.
• Hiring Trent Hammond as teacher at NASTUC replacing Shane Ard.
• Hiring Madison Wilson as teacher, New Albany Elementary School, replacing Barbara Crotts.
• Hiring Mary Latham, teacher, New Albany elementary School replacing Grace Siegert.
• Hiring Kelsey Gibson as teacher, New Albany Middle School.
• All certified staff at all five city campuses.
• Earlier in the meeting during the information part of the agenda it was stated that Allie Spears would be transferring from the middle school to elementary school and Emily Henry would transfer from the elementary school to the middle school.

The next city school board meeting was scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Monday, May 4, in the boardroom of the central office. That could change depending on the current situation with the coronavirus.