BY SYDNEY HOOVER
This is the second story in an occasional series exploring K-12 education in the time of covid. Our first story here featured parents ready to return their students to in-person school. This story explores parents choosing the remote learning option.
When Jessica Webster first told her daughter, Khloe, she would be learning from home this semester, the fifth grader was “dramatically unhappy.”
While her fourth grade and second grade sons, Camdyn and Ryder, were fine with the decision, she described Khloe as a “social butterfly” who was disappointed she won’t be at school with her friends for the time being.
“I just kind of explained that, you know, that this can make us very sick, and there's even people who are sick and don't even know it,” Webster said. “So while they may think that their friends are not sick, their friends actually could be sick, and then it could get them sick, and it could be very, very bad.”
Although some families are relieved to send their children back to school, Webster made the decision to keep her three children home this semester and learn remotely as the coronavirus pandemic continues to spread.
Khloe and Ryder both have asthma, among other health concerns in Webster’s house, which was one of several reasons she chose to keep them home.
While she’s working from home, Webster’s children will go between grandparents’ houses on school days since she won’t be able to give all of her attention to their school work during the day. She also enrolled Khloe in a small weekly dance class to help with her social and emotional health.
“That concern is biggest with my daughter, just because of the anxiety and how much she wants that interaction,” Webster said.
For Devina Garrett, her part-time job allows her a lot of time to focus on helping her seven children, ranging from preschool to 12th grade, with school work. She and her husband chose to keep their kids home because she felt they could not guarantee they’d be safe at school.
“We need to learn to adapt until such a time as it is safe to go back to normal life,” Garrett said. “I think someday COVID will be like a second flu, but right now it's not, because we don't have it under control. So we want to err on the side of caution.”
Brandon Barnhart said he also had to explain to his freshman son, Nathan, that online schooling this semester would not be the same as last — he still has to log his attendance and do school-related activities for the whole day, whereas in the spring, he had a lot more free time.
Barnhart said if his son wanted to go to school in-person, he would let him, but he would have to take extra precautions because of health conditions in their family. He said keeping him home would also provide some continuity, as he expects schools to switch to hybrid or remote learning at some point in the first quarter.
“There's so much unknown,” Barnhart said. “Things are going to just change continuously. It's going to be hard for not just the students, but for the parents, for siblings, teachers, family.”
Though Douglas County moved into “yellow,” recommending a hybrid model to start school, the Eudora School Board voted last week to continue with an in-person learning model. Webster said she was disappointed the board went against an initial plan stating phase yellow would include a hybrid model for schools.
Webster said going forward, it’s not clear to her whether those making decisions will do so based off the plan they originally adopted or on their own opinions.
“When they decided that even though we were one color, they're going to follow the green, that just shows that you're not going to stick to the plan. And that's a scary aspect, too. So if they made a plan, they need to stick to the plan,” she said.
Garrett said she hopes the School Board and district will take as much caution as possible going forward to keep students safe, even if that means not being face-to-face.
“Eudora has an amazing school system, but if we try to please the people who say this is not a big deal, then we're putting our kids at risk,” Garrett said.
Reach reporter Sydney Hoover at eudoratimes@gmail.com.
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