Four new members of the New Hanover County School Board were sworn in at last night’s meeting. After the induction ceremony, the board fell into a contentious discussion about reopening elementary schools. Incoming board members noted that they would have preferred to have had more time to consider the plan before it was put to a vote.
Editor's Note: On Saturday, December 12th, the Board voted to transition to Plan A (only for pre-k-5) on Tuesday, January 19th.
On Tuesday night’s New Hanover County School Board meeting, Stephanie Walker, Stephanie Kraybill, Hugh McManus, and Pete Wildeboer were officially sworn in as the board’s newest members. Board member Stefanie Adams will continue on as chair and Nelson Beaulieu is now vice-chair.
One of the first presentations the board members heard was from the ABC Science Collaborative. New Hanover County Schools recently entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the collaborative’s scientists, who aim to help them deal with the coronavirus in the school system.
Researcher Dr. Ibukun C. Akinboyo presented the following synopsis to the board: National data indicate low transmission rates of the virus among younger children in schools, but as virus cases continue to rise in the county, there is an expectation that we’ll see more cases in schools.
After Dr. Akinboyo presented, New Hanover County's health director and assitant health director, Phillip Tarte and Carla Turner, discussed New Hanover County’s Covid-19 data. Turner said that for the month of November, the county saw an average positivity rate of 6.85%. That’s lower than the statewide average, but higher than local officials want it to be.
When it was time for board members to ask questions, Hugh McManus said, “With all the information that you have, would you feel comfortable with sending your kid back to school if the board approved returning to schools in January?”
Turner responded, “Well, Pender County schools returned to Plan A for elementary schools, and with the information I have, they have not seen any significant increases in positives amongst those students. I also have full confidence in our school nurses and in our schools and in their ability to help in any way needed.”
New Hanover County Schools Assistant Superintendent Julie Varnam and Director of Student Services Kristin Jackson have also worked on ‘a decision matrix’ with Turner and Tarte. This matrix would effectively help staff to determine whether or not the schools should continue with a full in-person model or to scale back to a hybrid or even a remote model.
But when Turner and Tarte finished presenting this new tool, board members Stephanie Kraybill and Stephanie Walker asked to see it, saying it was the first time either board member had heard of its existence. Julie Varnam briefly walked them through the matrix, which has yet to be finalized.
After the public health presentations were completed, Superintendent Dr. Charles Foust introduced his newest transition plan: pre-K-5 students would return to school full-time starting on January 11th, with an option for fully-remote learning
Middle and high school students would remain on their hybrid schedule of both in-person and remote learning, but the district would start strictly enforcing when they show up to each. According to Foust, there have been issues with teachers being able to accurately take attendance. For example, a student might be assigned to be in-person on Monday but choose to remain at home in a remote session. With the new plan, they would no longer have that choice.
Foust also said that for high school students who are failing, they would be able to come to school five days a week.
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New Hanover County Schools ... by Ben Schachtman
After hearing Foust’s presentation, Judy Justice made a motion to move the vote on the reopening plan to the board’s retreat on Saturday, December 12th. Stephanie Walker immediately seconded the motion. A debate among the members quickly ensued.
Walker addressed Foust directly about voting on the plan that evening, “I haven’t talked to you in two weeks. The first I heard of a lot of details of this was this morning. I just think that, you know, I feel a little bit taken aback that I haven’t had the opportunity to speak with you about it.”
In defense of re-opening elementary schools, newly-elected Board Chair Stefanie Adams responded:
“We’ve been tackling this for a lot of months, and tonight the information that was given to us was scientific data, and what we’ve seen is that our school system transmission rates have not been occurring. But here’s where I’m struggling, our students are falling behind.”
Earlier in the evening, board members did listen to a presentation from Assistant Superintendent LaChawn Smith about failure rates for elementary school children. She reported that these rates are slightly higher than the previous year, and that there’s a larger share of these failures among minority students.
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K-5 Failure and Reading Data by Ben Schachtman on Scribd
Foust told board members that he’d been hearing from elementary teachers and principals that teaching both asynchronously and synchronously was not sustainable and that they were going to lose staff if they didn’t change soon. He also said that the vote needed to happen that evening so that the operations team would have enough time to plan for the January 11th reopening.
At one point, board member Hugh McManus asked Foust if he had polled all elementary teachers and principals on whether or not they wanted to fully reopen. He said that he didn’t, but had spoken with them about it.
Board member Judy Justice then withdrew her motion about the Saturday vote and changed it to one within the next 48 hours. That motion failed, too.
Then the time finally arrived to vote on Foust’s plan. Chair Adams and Vice-Chair Beaulieu approved the motion; Walker voted no and Judy Justice voted to abstain because she said didn’t agree with the vote being held that evening.
For votes from Hugh McManus, Stephanie Kraybill, and Pete Wildeboer, it was more complicated. They all more or less supported the Superintendent’s plan but said they wished they could have had more time to decide. Chair Adams reminded them that the time for discussion was over and that they needed just state their vote.
Another wrench in the night’s meeting was the move of the ‘Call To The Audience’ agenda item until after the board’s official vote. A school official said they moved it because of the swearing-in ceremony.
Several of the night public speakers were upset by the fact they couldn’t be heard until after the vote. One of these audience members, who called in a recorded message earlier in the day, was Barbara Anderson. She said, "When this is read, the vote will be done. Either you have voted for the safety and welfare of our staff and students, as well as our community, or you have not. If it is the latter, you have broken trust with all of us."
Most of them also expressed concerns about the return to a full reopening for elementary schools and raised questions about the timing of the vote after New Hanover County Commission Chair Julia Olson-Boseman said she wanted elementary students back in school as quickly as possible at their Commision meeting the previous afternoon.
But despite the contentious discussion on reopening plans, the board did unanimously approve a holiday bonus to all district employees. The New Hanover County Board of Commissioners provided matching funds so that the total bonus came to $1,500, which will be dispersed on December 15th. (Article continues below.)
The board is set to have a retreat this coming Saturday -- and their next meeting is scheduled for January 5th.