STATEVILLE, N.C. — North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper says elementary students will return to in-person instruction on October 5th, and the Iredell-Statesville Superintendent is ready.
Iredell-Statesville Superintendent Jeff James says, “We are excited to welcome back all elementary school students five days a week. We will use the next two weeks to solidify plans and schedules to ensure a smooth transition.”
Principals of these schools will work on classroom schedules, cleaning schedules, transportation schedules, and the logistics of heading back to the classroom to ensure the safety of their students and staff.
“It will be important to continue with our COVID-19 protocols as much as possible,” says Dr. James. “In order to safely bring all our elementary students back to school full-time, we will continue to enforce enhanced cleaning and sanitizing as well as mask wearing. We’ll offer mask breaks when students are six feet apart, and we will encourage schedules that keep students with their classmates to limit potential exposure as much as possible.”
Dr. James says their data of bringing students back to school, shows the process of keeping students and staff from contracting COVID works, and he attributes this success to social distancing and wearing face masks.
Parents of students in Pre-K through 5th grade will learn more in the upcoming days on how transitioning back to school in Plan A will look like, according to a news release.
“In many ways, this is sort of like the first day of school all over again, but we are excited to adjust schedules and bring back those students whose families feel comfortable to do so,” explained James.
On October 5th elementary families will be given the option to move forward with Plan A or to stick with Plan C and continue to learn remotely, according to a news release.
Dr. James says after the 5th families must stick with their chosen option until the beginning of the second semester which starts on January 5th, 2021.
“Families need to have discussions now about the remainder of the first semester. Students can either come to school full-time or learn virtually full-time. We simply don’t have the resources to allow families to switch back and forth between Plan A and Plan C,” says Dr. James.
