What may your child face when public schools reopen?

How about busing and availability of meals at school?

Can they stay home and attend classes online?

Will they attend in staggered shifts to permit classroom distancing?

School officials are considering all these questions.

SC Accelerate Ed members met virtually this week to discuss recommendations for the new school year.

The recommendations will have to be adopted by all school districts across the state.

The task was divided into 3 groups to determine what the 2020 school year will look like.

Scott Turner, of the Accelerate Ed Task Force, says, “We’re trying to balance the needs of working parents who may not have the option of not staying home from work and the health and safety of students whether they be home or in our buildings.”

The 1st recommendation is that schools have personal protection equipment for teachers, a full time nurse and enhanced cleaning procedures.

When it comes to classroom time, schools are to focus on core lessons students need in case the semester is shortened.

3 learning models are proposed.

“For Plan A we go back to school as normal with safety precautions, Plan B is a hybrid of some sort an A-Day and B-Day we don’t know how that will look just yet, and then Plan C is we go back to complete remote learning,” said Sherry East of the Accelerate Ed Task Force.

A 3rd group looked at a school’s operations and how daily routines need to change.

Students may need to eat in classrooms.

Changing classrooms for separate subjects may be limited.

Where you drop off and pick up your child may also change.

Some school entrances may be entry points and others exit points.

These recommendations are based on CDC and DHEC guidelines.

They could change as new data and information becomes available.

These recommendations give districts some flexibility.

The number of students, number of buildings and size of buildings vary from district to district.