They will not be alone in making this decision.
Fort Bend ISD campuses will remain closed for the rest of the school year, Superintendent Charles Dupre said Tuesday, becoming the region’s first traditional district to declare its facilities will not re-open this spring.
Dupre’s announcement comes one week after two of the Houston area’s largest charter school networks, KIPP Texas Public Schools and YES Prep Public Schools, made the same decision. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said he expects to decide this week whether to extend his statewide school closure mandate, which currently lasts until May 4.
Fort Bend is the region’s fourth-largest school district, with an enrollment of 77,800 students.
“There are several factors we took into consideration, with safety and security being our top priority,” Dupre wrote in a letter to the district community.
“We know that, even if Governor Abbott allows schools to reopen as of May 4, many families and staff members will be reluctant to return to school and work to avoid potential exposure to the virus. Additionally, because there are only three weeks remaining of instruction after May 4, we believe it will be even more disruptive to our students, staff and teachers to ask them to pivot back into our buildings and the traditional classroom environment.”
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Several of the region’s largest school districts, including Houston, Aldine and Spring ISDs, announced in recent weeks that they will remain closed “until further notice.”
Houston ISD Interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan said last week that district officials are building multiple contingency plans based on when schools could safety re-open, which remains far from known.
I’ve been operating on the assumption that schools will not reopen until the fall, despite the restarting the economy nattering that’s happening right now. Doesn’t seem worth the effort or risk for another three weeks of classes or so. Hell, at this point, I’m not sure schools will fully reopen in August. It would not surprise me at all if there’s some kind of modified in-school/remote learning plan that tries to give students the hands-on experiences that are truly needed like science labs, combined with minimizing exposure to the general population. The main thing I know at this point is that no one really knows what to expect.