COLUMBIA — Richland County’s two school districts are preparing for five-day classroom returns in March, as administrators say decreasing COVID-19 transmission rates in their facilities and new public health advisories are allowing for the transition.
The timeline also coincides with when teachers may be eligible to start receiving their vaccines.
Beginning March 8, Richland School District One elementary students will move to a five-day schedule, with middle school pupils following suit on March 15 and ninth through twelfth graders to follow on March 29, Superintendent Craig Witherspoon announced.
Since early November, Richland One elementary school students have been in class four days a week, with middle and high school pupils getting two days of in-person learning.
Meanwhile, Richland Two is anticipating a return to normal operations within the next two weeks, though officials did not provide a clearer time table than that. Currently, the district is on a hybrid model that sends students to schools two days a week.
Combined, the Richland districts educate 52,000 students in South Carolina’s capital county. Lexington-Richland 5 moved to a five-day, face-to-face model on Feb. 1. As of Feb. 26, just one of the state's 79 traditional school districts was operating online-only.
Both Gov. Henry McMaster and state Superintendent of Education Molly Spearman support full-time reopening of schools.
"Hundreds of thousands of people are going to to work every day across the state safely. Our classrooms may be the safest place from the virus," McMaster said during a Feb. 4 press conference. "We know that we have lost significant learning progress due to simply being out of the classroom. So we must fix this. This must change, it must change now."
Teachers and other essential workers could become eligible for COVID-19 vaccines in mid-March, state Department of Health and Environmental Control director Edward Simmer told lawmakers on Feb. 23. His agency plans to move to the second eligibility phase once residents 65 and older no longer fill available appointments.
The 1.3 million South Carolinians currently eligible for a shot as part of the initial Phase 1A include anyone 65 and older, health care workers, and medical first responders. Nearly 560,000 residents had gotten at least their first shot by Feb. 23.
During the next phase, called 1B, an estimated 573,000 people will be eligible for a COVID-19 shot, including teachers, day care workers, bus drivers, grocery store clerks and manufacturing employees.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Feb. 12 released new guidelines calling for a phased approach in re-opening K-12 schools nationwide, defining four color-coded categories:
• Schools in areas with low transmission rates fall into the blue zone; those in areas with moderate transmission rates are in the yellow zone. Both categories qualify for in-person learning, according to the CDC.
• Schools fall into the orange zone if they are part of communities with significant transmission rates and are encouraged to operate on a hybrid or reduced attendance basis.
• The red category means area transmission rates are high. Elementary schools that conduct regular testing of students and staff, including those who are asymptomatic, can operate hybrid or reduced-attendance classrooms. Middle and high schools should operate virtually. Schools that do not conduct regular testing should stick with remote learning only.
• “Low transmission” means nine or less new cases per 100,000 are recorded over the previous seven days, and less than 5 percent test positive, according to CDC Director Rochelle Walensky. She noted that just 5 percent of the nation’s counties are experiencing low transmission levels while more than 90 percent have high levels.
Richland leaders said in statements the updates helped inform their decisions to restart schools full-time.
As of Feb. 25, Richland One had 24 active COVID-19 cases among students and staff, and since the start of the school year have recorded 503 positive cases, while Richland Two logged 18 positive cases between Feb. 23 and Feb. 25.
In all, 13,306 coronavirus cases have been associated with South Carolina schools since the start of the academic year, according to Feb. 25 data kept by DHEC.
Both Richland County districts will continue their yearlong virtual learning options.
“On a related note, Richland One is working closely with Prisma Health on the vaccination process with a goal of supporting district staff vaccinations as quickly as possible when the state moves to Phase 1B. We look forward to collaborating with Prisma Health to provide this opportunity for all educators and staff,” Witherspoon said in a statement.
Lexington One high school students remain on a hybrid model that has them behind desks four days a week, while five-day learning resumed across Lexington Two on Jan. 19.
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