Today, LPS Superintendent Brian Ewert made the official announcement to move students at LHS and HHS to a remote learning model from Tuesday, November 10 through Thanksgiving Break. This follows the decisions of many districts such as Cherry Creek School District, who will move all schools to a remote learning environment on Wednesday, November 11.
“Littleton High School is currently experiencing an increase in positive COVID cases and quarantines of both students and staff. The staffing shortage means there are not enough staff members to provide adequate supervision and safety for students,” says Ewert.
Monday will be a non student day at LHS and HHS, and will act as a time for teachers to prepare to shift to online learning.
Unlike Cherry Creek School District, who doesn’t have a set date for return to in-person learning, the current plan is for schools to consider a return to hybrid learning after Thanksgiving Break.
On Mondays and Tuesdays, all students (A-Z) will meet with their odd period teachers over Google Meet, similar to the current model we use on Wednesdays. On Thursdays and Fridays, students will meet with their even period teachers. Students will rotate between odd and even, and will attend seminar each Wednesday.
These Google Meet sessions are intended to be more structured than the ones we have attended in the past on Wednesdays. Teachers will continue to use Google Classroom for instruction. Unlike in the past, students are required to keep their cameras on during Google Meet sessions.
The district’s “COVID Tracker”, which was intended to track COVID cases in Arapahoe County and inside our schools, has been in the red “Remote Learning” category for eight days now. On October 11, the district added two new categories to track student and staff cases within LPS schools. While these metrics were intended to display the lack of COVID within schools, both of those metrics have now passed into the “caution” category. As of yesterday, 0.157% of students and 0.8% of staff were in isolation for COVID positivity. This includes many students and staff at LHS.
The district will continue to be vigilant and monitor the COVID Tracker to decide if a return to school is safe after Thanksgiving Break.
