“Parents have sent multiple inquiries to the district superintendent and school board members about the inequality of instructional hours between grades. We and other parents raised concerns immediately in July when the plan was first announced,” parent Chris Marks said in an email.
The Waynesville Board of Education approved the restart plan for first graders that said “creates necessary social distancing balanced by their developmental needs."
“The first-grade team looked at the options available during a pandemic and determined it would be best for our youngest learners to come every day. A half-day schedule allows us to appropriately do that,” the district said.
Kaylee Price said she and her husband have been working half days at work and home to accommodate the first-grade plan in Waynesville. She said balancing this in a family with five children “has been frustrating.”
The Prices paid for their son to attend a private kindergarten in Springboro so that he would be able to start with a full day as a 1st grader in Waynesville, she said.
“As a household with two working parents and five school-aged children, it’s impossible to feel like our first grader is getting what he needs to not be behind next year,” she concluded.
Price and Marks, who spoke again at a recent school board meeting, also questioned why parents should be expected to pay for a half-day after-school program in school added in response to parental concerns.
“This frustrated me because my understanding was the first graders were going half day because Waynesville didn’t have room for them to be there, but they have room for daycare, which costs us additional money,” Price said in an email.
Wayne Local Schools Superintendent Pat Dubbs said the after-school program was added in response to parent survey responses.
Waynesville Elementary School has been recognized nationally as a Blue-Ribbon School. A new school is being built, while classes are being conducted in the old building, scheduled for demolition at the end of the school year.
The program for first graders more than complies with state minimum standards, said Warren County Educational Service Center Superintendent Tom Isaacs, particularly in light of changes loosening educational requirements to clear the way for locally tailored solutions permitted by Ohio lawmakers in response to the pandemic.
Isaacs pointed to Springboro, where an eighth period has been designated for on-line studies of students who otherwise are in school.
Warren County Career students are only in school for vocational labs, while completing other school work on-line, Isaacs added.
Marks continues to appeal to his local school district in hopes changes will be made for the next semester.
“The school administration has created an unequal situation, in which the youngest children, during one of the most critical years of education, were cut, while the other, older grades were given the resources that they needed in order to attend all day,” he said in an email. No other school district has implemented such an unequal plan."
Earlier this month, Dubbs said his staff is working on potential changes during the next semester in January.
“With increased numbers of students potentially returning for face-to- face instruction, we will adapt our delivery model. Safety and appropriateness will continue to be at the center of all decisions,” Dubbs said.
Dubbs said the feedback from his staff is positive; "they are extremely happy with the academic progress of our first graders.”
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