Park City schools open Thursday to in-person learning with $1.7 million worth of COVID-19 mitigation efforts in place. Ninety percent of parents surveyed said they want their children in school, with face-to-face learning this fall.
Most Park City school district students in kindergarten through 12th grade will be back in the classroom this week. Superintendent Jill Gildea says they’re staggering the first day for Treasure Mountain Junior High and Park City High School to give kids a chance to practice some of the new protocols for distancing.
Ninth and tenth grades start Thursday while eighth, eleventh and twelfth grades begin Friday.
Teachers are on the front lines of the pandemic as they manage the return of students to their classrooms, spending extended periods with dozens of students in close quarters five days a week.
Gildea points out the success of childcare facilities remaining open for much of the pandemic. She says if you have the rationale and do the practice, the kids will be responsive and follow the new rules.
“So, we do know that most of our early learning environments have been going throughout,” she said. “You know that is a parallel scenario where you have little kids, you know with a long day, you know in a classroom-type environment. We also had a number of very successful summer camps this year and activity, is some of those indoors, some outdoors, rainy days and things like that. So, we have seen other environments where kids have come back [and] they've been together.”
Gildea says 10% of students will be participating in the virtual, at-home model offered by the school district. They’ve had multiple stakeholder groups working since mid-March to define a variety of learning models. They’ll continue their weekly emergency operations calls and watch the county COVID-19 numbers carefully.
“While we are working with our return to school model, getting kids back to school, having robust remote options, we also have, depending on the conditions, everyone could move to remote,” she said. “Kids could be in hybrids for a couple of weeks at a time depending on case counts. You know, we are prepared for all of those scenarios.”
Most teachers, with a few exceptions, are returning to the classroom this week. Thirteen new teachers join the staff to replace those who were scheduled to retire.
Gildea says they have personal protective equipment for teachers including medical-quality masks, plexiglass screens and face shields, scrubs for school nurses, improved technology and cleaning protocols. They’ve also updated HVAC systems to improve outside air circulation in all the schools.
This year, the district has an additional 200 students, too.“We are up to 4,925 kids. We’re typically right around 4,725. So, we are up a bit, but certainly have room for those kids. We did graduate a class of 437 and we have about 250 kindergartners this year. So we definitely have some room in there.”
The school board has postponed its scheduled Aug.18 meeting until Wednesday, Aug. 26. It will be live-streamed on pcschools.us beginning at 4 p.m.Park City schools open Thursday to in-person learning with $1.7 million worth of COVID-19 mitigation efforts in place. Ninety percent of parents surveyed said they want their children in school, with face-to-face learning this fall.
Most Park City school district students in kindergarten through 12th grade will be back in the classroom this week. Superintendent Jill Gildea says they’re staggering the first day for Treasure Mountain Junior High and Park City High School to give kids a chance to practice some of the new protocols for distancing.
Ninth and tenth grades start Thursday while eighth, eleventh and twelfth grades begin Friday.
Teachers are on the front lines of the pandemic as they manage the return of students to their classrooms, spending extended periods with dozens of students in close quarters five days a week.
Gildea points out the success of childcare facilities remaining open for much of the pandemic. She says if you have the rationale and do the practice, the kids will be responsive and follow the new rules.
“So, we do know that most of our early learning environments have been going throughout,” she said. “You know that is a parallel scenario where you have little kids, you know with a long day, you know in a classroom-type environment. We also had a number of very successful summer camps this year and activity, is some of those indoors, some outdoors, rainy days and things like that. So, we have seen other environments where kids have come back [and] they've been together.”
Gildea says 10% of students will be participating in the virtual, at-home model offered by the school district. They’ve had multiple stakeholder groups working since mid-March to define a variety of learning models. They’ll continue their weekly emergency operations calls and watch the county COVID-19 numbers carefully.
“While we are working with our return to school model, getting kids back to school, having robust remote options, we also have, depending on the conditions, everyone could move to remote,” she said. “Kids could be in hybrids for a couple of weeks at a time depending on case counts. You know, we are prepared for all of those scenarios.”
Most teachers, with a few exceptions, are returning to the classroom this week. Thirteen new teachers join the staff to replace those who were scheduled to retire.
Gildea says they have personal protective equipment for teachers including medical-quality masks, plexiglass screens and face shields, scrubs for school nurses, improved technology and cleaning protocols. They’ve also updated HVAC systems to improve outside air circulation in all the schools.
This year, the district has an additional 200 students, too.“We are up to 4,925 kids. We’re typically right around 4,725. So, we are up a bit, but certainly have room for those kids. We did graduate a class of 437 and we have about 250 kindergartners this year. So we definitely have some room in there.”
The school board has postponed its scheduled Aug.18 meeting until Wednesday, Aug. 26. It will be live-streamed on pcschools.us beginning at 4 p.m.
Park City schools open Thursday to in-person learning with $1.7 million worth of COVID-19 mitigation efforts in place. Ninety percent of parents surveyed said they want their children in school, with face-to-face learning this fall.
Most Park City school district students in kindergarten through 12th grade will be back in the classroom this week. Superintendent Jill Gildea says they’re staggering the first day for Treasure Mountain Junior High and Park City High School to give kids a chance to practice some of the new protocols for distancing.
Ninth and tenth grades start Thursday while eighth, eleventh and twelfth grades begin Friday.
Teachers are on the front lines of the pandemic as they manage the return of students to their classrooms, spending extended periods with dozens of students in close quarters five days a week.
Gildea points out the success of childcare facilities remaining open for much of the pandemic. She says if you have the rationale and do the practice, the kids will be responsive and follow the new rules.
“So, we do know that most of our early learning environments have been going throughout,” she said. “You know that is a parallel scenario where you have little kids, you know with a long day, you know in a classroom-type environment. We also had a number of very successful summer camps this year and activity, is some of those indoors, some outdoors, rainy days and things like that. So, we have seen other environments where kids have come back [and] they've been together.”
Gildea says 10% of students will be participating in the virtual, at-home model offered by the school district. They’ve had multiple stakeholder groups working since mid-March to define a variety of learning models. They’ll continue their weekly emergency operations calls and watch the county COVID-19 numbers carefully.
“While we are working with our return to school model, getting kids back to school, having robust remote options, we also have, depending on the conditions, everyone could move to remote,” she said. “Kids could be in hybrids for a couple of weeks at a time depending on case counts. You know, we are prepared for all of those scenarios.”
Most teachers, with a few exceptions, are returning to the classroom this week. Thirteen new teachers join the staff to replace those who were scheduled to retire.
Gildea says they have personal protective equipment for teachers including medical-quality masks, plexiglass screens and face shields, scrubs for school nurses, improved technology and cleaning protocols. They’ve also updated HVAC systems to improve outside air circulation in all the schools.
This year, the district has an additional 200 students, too.“We are up to 4,925 kids. We’re typically right around 4,725. So, we are up a bit, but certainly have room for those kids. We did graduate a class of 437 and we have about 250 kindergartners this year. So we definitely have some room in there.”
The school board has postponed its scheduled Aug.18 meeting until Wednesday, Aug. 26. It will be live-streamed on pcschools.us beginning at 4 p.m.
