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Though many of their peers in Humboldt County are taking an extra two weeks to quarantine after the holidays, Del Norte’s K8 students will return to campus on Jan. 4.

The Del Norte Unified School District Board of Trustees reached this conclusion on Thursday after hearing from parents who said it felt like their children were being punished for other people’s worries about the novel coronavirus.

But staff were more worried about their coworkers and how their jobs would be covered if they needed to self isolate or quarantine after the holidays. Paige Thompson, lead negotiator for the Del Norte Teachers Association, said she was absent for two days before the Thanksgiving break and there was no one to sub for her.
That shortage in substitutes continues, Thompson said.

“When we come back on Jan. 4, every available adult in the district should be ready to sub,” she said. “I know Mr. Harris has subbed some. Coleen Parker has subbed some. The district administration should clear their calendars for two weeks so we have coverage.”
DNTA met with representatives of local California School Employees Association chapter and district administration Wednesday to discuss returning to school after the holidays.

On Thursday, DNUSD Superintendent Jeff Harris mentioned that while Humboldt County’s public health officer advised districts to engage in distance learning for two weeks after Thanksgiving and two weeks after Christmas, Del Norte County’s public health officer didn’t offer an opinion one way or the other.

“He was more along the lines of, we need to make sure that mitigations are in place, that we’re taking things seriously along the lines of masking and physical distancing and cohorting,” Harris said.

Harris said DNTA and CSEA representatives indicated that if students are brought back to school on Jan. 4, they wanted to ensure that cohorting and social distancing protocols were “tightened up.”

“We want to minimize to the fullest extent possible people going from class to class,” Harris said. “That we are focusing on making sure classes aren’t doing things in the same time in the same spaces. We may come back to rain, we’ll have to watch out for what’s going on in gyms.”

This discussion came after the district urged families who traveled or hosted loved ones from out of the area during Thanksgiving to take two weeks off to self isolate before sending their youngsters back to school.

On Thursday, Harris, who introduced the slogan “hands, face and space,” said if students do come back on Jan. 4 it’ll be up to the district to hammer that message home. It will also be up to the district to urge families to keep their kids home if they’ve been exposed to someone who tested positive for COVID-19 or if they have traveled or hosted someone from out of the area.

Sarah Mitchell, vice president of CSEA’s Great Northern 178, which represents DNUSD’s classified staff, said there were many staff absences following Thanksgiving break and those that remained were put into multiple classrooms. This has happened more often, especially since people are resigning, Mitchell said, adding that there are about 61 vacant classified positions currently.

“What’s happening right now is the staff that remain are being asked to be mixing with more and more cohorts and being exposed to more and more people,” she said. “If we know schools are going to close if we don’t have enough staff members, how do we mitigate that? What’s best for kids is that they are in school.”
Marcus Endert, who works at Smith River School, echoed Mitchell’s concerns, saying it’s difficult to find classified staff.

“I’ve heard some of the discussion, likewise there seems to be a double standard for teachers versus the rest of the community,” he said. “What the community needs to understand is we’re considered to be essential workers. As a matter of principle, I’ll have my children self quarantine for the first two weeks.”

Several parents argued for having their children come back to school on Jan. 4, saying their students’ grades have fallen during distance learning. One parent, Amber Gonsalves, a state employee, said her employer closes down the office and sanitize it and then she’s back to work the following day if there’s a COVID-19 exposure.

“Our kids shouldn’t be held to a lesser standard than me as an adult that suffers more from the virus,” she said. “We should be going forwards not backwards.”

Jessica Curry, whose son has special needs, said he is unable to get those needs met via Zoom. She said she worked with school administrators to get her son a new instructional assistant, who he responded to, but since COVID-19, he’s been struggling.

To Curry, extending the break will give some people more opportunity to party.

“There are people that follow the rules — I’m one of them,” she said. “I’m going on vacation on Sunday and I’ll be gone a week that way my children can quarantine before they go back to school.”

Sommer Fitch, whose husband is a teacher and who has two children in DNUSD’s K8 schools and one in high school, also advocated for the youngest students to come back to the classroom.

She pointed out that there’s a long period of time between Christmas Day and Jan. 4. For those that aren’t comfortable with having their youngsters back in class, Fitch said, they can go on independent study.

“My suggestion is to make those packets available on the Monday of returning and make it easy for parents to choose to keep their kids home for those two weeks or one week or whatever it is,” she said. “But for people that are comfortable or who didn’t travel out of the area, those children should not be subject to punishment and banned from school when they followed all the rules.”

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