A reopening proposal in a South Bay school district that would provide just one hour of on-campus instruction per week has sparked outrage among parents, who are staging a rally Friday calling for more in-person learning.
The two high schools serving 3,500 students in the Los Gatos-Saratoga Union High School District have been shut since the pandemic began in March. A group of parents have been pushing since late summer to begin reopening schools.
In late January, Superintendent Michael Grove sent an email to the community introducing the proposal in which all students could return to campus for a portion of the day in morning and afternoon cohorts. In the following weeks, further details were discussed by the school board and shared.
But parents said they were shocked when the district this week announced the agreement it had reached with its teachers union.
The school reopening controversy was just the latest in the Bay Area. The slow pace in the San Francisco Unified district has prompted a lawsuit by the city attorney and helped fuel an effort to recall three board members. In the Oakley district in the East Bay, the entire school board resigned after members were caught on camera disparaging parents who wanted to reopen schools.
Research has confirmed that school closures have caused learning loss and damaging mental health effects for teenagers, putting more pressure on school districts to reopen. However, battles have erupted over many elements of such plans, including vaccinations, logistics and timing.
Under the plan for Los Gatos and Saratoga high schools, one cohort of students would come in from 9 to 10 a.m. on Wednesdays, and the other would come in from 1 to 2 p.m. the same day.
The plan would allow students and staff to safely return to campus and have time to learn safety protocols and transition to hybrid learning, Grove said an email Tuesday to The Chronicle.
But Suzanne Nestor, a leader of a parent coalition pushing for reopening whose daughter is a ninth-grader at Los Gatos High School, called the plan “absurd” and a “total joke.”
“It’s a slap in the face to parents desperate to have kids on campus for months now,” Nestor said. “They keep saying they want to give kids a chance to get back on campus, but one hour a week is useless. What kids need is regular social interaction with their peers. You would spend as much time getting to and from campus than you would spend being there.”
Rob Gabel, a parent with a sophomore and senior at Los Gatos High, said he thinks the plan makes no sense.
“The only reason I can think of is it runs out the clock on the school year,” he said. “If you do the math, by June it’s over. Combined with no written plan for (the next phase), it’s a little frustrating as a parent. I don’t want to put anyone at risk, but I don’t want to be the last school in the state to reopen.”
Mike Roberts, a parents coalition founder whose child is a freshman at Los Gatos High, said the plan is a “waste of time.”
“There is still no plan as to what the students will be doing on campus for this one hour a week,” he said. “It’s outrageous.”
During the Feb. 9 board meeting, Kristofer Orre, a teacher on special assignment for the district, said the hour-long periods would allow teachers to do “social and emotional community building activities,” re-teach topics that are harder to address virtually, and run hands-on activities with safety protocols.
This plan would be implemented only after either Santa Clara County moves to the state’s red reopening tier and all staff have the opportunity to be vaccinated at the recommended doses, or the county moves into the orange tier, in which case staff vaccinations would not be a condition. The district would provide at least two weeks’ notice to prepare for returning to campus.
Grove said the district anticipates being in under the plan, known as Phase 3A, for a short time — estimated at three weeks — so staff and students can “practice” being back in person before transitioning into Phase 3B, a full hybrid model where students would return to campus two days a week. He said ideally, Phase 3B would be implemented shortly after spring break, which runs April 5-9.
The K-8 Los Gatos Union School District has allowed K-6 students to return to campus in phases, with the youngest and some sixth-grade students being allowed to go back Feb. 1, and older students returning on Feb. 8. K-5 students in the Saratoga Union Elementary School District are in hybrid learning, and sixth-grade students are scheduled to return to campus starting March 4.
The state’s school reopening map shows most Bay Area public high schools still in distance learning.
Grove said the high school plan was developed with input from district and site staff, board of trustees, and an advisory committee including staff, students, parents and representatives from employee associations.
“Our staff continue to have serious concerns about their own safety, as well as the safety of their families,” said Carrie Bosco, associate superintendent for curriculum and instruction for the district, during the school board’s Feb. 9 meeting. “Waiting until vaccinations are in place or until we are in the orange tier mitigates those risks.”
Grove said educators were eligible for vaccines on Feb. 28, so he is hopeful those who want can get vaccinated by the end of March or early April. The academic year for both schools ends June 3. Santa Clara County was still in the purple tier after this week’s latest assignments.
Amy Obenour, president of the Los Gatos Saratoga High School District Teachers Association, said in a statement Tuesday:
“No one wants to be back in classrooms with students more than educators, who know there is no equal substitute for regular in-person learning. Phase 3A is the first step to safely bring students back to campus. Our team is working collaboratively with the district to ensure when we bring more students back, we need to do it in a manner that ensures the health and safety of all students and staff.”
School board members did not respond to a request for comment.
Cynthia Zhang, a senior at Saratoga High School who is the student body president, said during the board meeting that she liked the 3A plan.
“I like how slow it is,” she said. “Not only for the anxiety around the health and safety, but also because as a student, frankly, I think stamina for going to school and building up that endurance is something that isn’t really talked about, but I think it is really important in easing back into that.”
Nestor said her daughter used to love going to school, but it’s now hard for her to get motivated to learn remotely. She said her daughter “laughed out loud” at the proposal.
But Nestor plans to send her daughter to school if the 3A plan is implemented because, she said, it is still an opportunity to do something.
The parents coalition is hosting its socially distanced rally to reopen schools Friday at Los Gatos High School at 4:30 p.m.
Kellie Hwang is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kellie.hwang@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @KellieHwang
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A Bay Area school district plans to reopen for one hour a week. It isn’t going over well - San Francisco Chronicle
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