The Las Cruces Public School District is working on a plan to switch from the current all online teaching style into a hybrid model. Superintendent Karen Trujillo spoke to the Las Cruces School Board Tuesday on the current progress.
“Up until last week when Doña Ana County was listed as a green county, we were sure that we were going to be yellow and if not even red,” Trujillo said, “As we were designated as a green county, now we're able to kind of put all of our planning in play to start looking at what that yellow plan looks like. We scheduled a reentry task force meeting for September 9 to get more input from them to look at our yellow plan and update it with any new changes from CDC or the Department of Health guidelines.”
The information from the reentry task force will be presented to the Las Cruces School Board September 15. In the meantime, three district employees have already tested positive for the virus. The superintendent addressed these cases, all of which originated from the same elementary school.
“Las Cruces Public Schools has three confirmed new COVID cases,” Trujillo said. “They were all at Fairacres Elementary. Through contact tracing an additional 13 individuals were contacted and will quarantine for 14 days. The building was closed and will reopen on September 15.”
Chief Human Resource Officer Miguel Serrano told the board multiple teachers have decided not to return to the classroom due to the pandemic, with the most recent teacher leaving within the last week.
“We have had a few people let us know in their resignations, and by talking to them, that some of the reasons that they are leaving the district are due to COVID concerns. A lot of them are ready to retire, we just had one this week leave for that purpose,” Serrano said. “And a lot of them are saying…that in the future they can come back. So, they're leaving on good terms.”
NEA Las Cruces President Denise Sheehan brought up many teachers are facing childcare concerns.
“I've also had many teachers contact me about, you know, the timeline of reentry, how we're going to give teachers that time. A lot of them have lost their daycare spots,” Sheehan said. “So, you know, there's that worry about what are we going to do with our children that need to go back to daycare if we’re back at work.”
While some teachers are questioning what to do with their own children when they return in person, certain parents in the district are worried what will happen to their children if schools remain closed. In a public comment, a concerned parent asked the board to consider opening schools as quickly as possible.
“I'm having difficulty helping my son navigate his classes. There is absolutely no way that he can navigate Canvas and complete his assignments without my help,” the comment read. “He absolutely will not and cannot do online learning without my direction and help. I feel as if I have had to become his full time teacher, and I do not have the time, energy or background in middle school education to be his full time teacher, while working 30 plus hours a week, taking care of a home and having two other children younger than him to take care of as well.”
The district is heeding those concerns and working on positive steps to physically make schools safer, including putting up plastic barriers where needed. Deputy Superintendent for Operations and Leadership, Gabe Jacquez, spoke about additional measures such as new air purification methods.
“We're looking at systems that would go on every single HVAC unit that we have,” Jacquez said. “It actually will take the air that's coming into the building, but it will also clean out throughout your ducts and kind of circulate. I was super excited about it because I think it's something that is cutting edge and it's something that's not only going to help us with that, but it will help us with flu, it will help us with mold…We're looking at that for every single unit on every single building within our district.”
