The Hillsboro R-3 Board of Education voted Tuesday evening (Nov. 10) to delay expanding the number of in-class instruction days for its younger students, at least until the start of the second semester, which is Jan. 19.
The district began the school year in August with about 80 percent of its students following a hybrid class schedule that has students in class two days a week and learning online from home the other three days. Of those students, half take classes in-person on Mondays and Tuesdays, and the other half on Thursdays and Fridays. All students take classes online on Wednesdays, when the buildings are thoroughly cleaned and sanitized.
The other approximately 20 percent of the district’s students are learning entirely online from home.
Last month, Hillsboro school officials agreed to expand in-class instruction to four days a week for students in kindergarten through sixth grade who are enrolled in the hybrid system, beginning Nov. 15, and then expand the number of days for the older students at the start of the second semester.
However, that plan has changed because of an uptick in district staff and students testing positive for COVID-19, as well as staff and students being quarantined after possible exposure to the virus, Superintendent Jon Isaacson.
“We’ve had a small increase in positive COVID tests and a larger number in quarantine,” Isaacson said Wednesday (Nov. 11). “We’re going to remain in the hybrid system until the end of the first semester.”
As of Nov. 10, eight staff members were out due to positive COVID-19 tests and 17 were out on quarantine. In addition, 11 students were out due to positive tests and 84 were out on quarantine, Isaacson said.
“There have been no quarantines due to classroom contact. All quarantines are from out-of-school contacts,” he said. “As a district, we are really struggling on the staffing end of it with 25 staff members (either with positive tests or in quarantine).”
Isaacson said Hillsboro is having a difficult time hiring enough substitute teachers to cover for teachers out for COVID-19 or other reasons.
He said a decision whether to expand to a four day per week in-person class schedule for the second semester likely will not come until the start of 2021.
“Right now, we don’t know,” Isaacson said. “We should make a decision around the first of the year.”
The district has more than 3,300 students and about 450 employees, he said.
On Oct. 15, the school board voted 4-3 to expand the in-class instruction to four days for the younger students, with Jon Schuessler, Angie Oshia, Rob Kruse and Erick Stephenson voting in favor and Lisa Welker, Beth Petry and Rene Sucharski voting against.
At Tuesday’s meeting, the vote to delay expanding the number of days in class was 5-1, with only Schuessler voting against. Kruse was absent from the meeting.
