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Two Boyertown School Board Members Sour on Full-day Opening

Written by Bradley Schlegel, Staff Writer
2020-07-22

Two members of the Boyertown Area School Board who initially expressed support for implementing full-day schooling for the new school year changed their minds on Tuesday night.

Brian J. Hemingway announced his support for a scaffolded approach highlighted by Superintendent Dana Bedden during a special meeting.

"I needed to explore the everyday option," Hemingway said during the meeting, hosted on Zoom. "I wanted to see if it could work."

Another member, James H. Brophy, conceded to the supervisors that a full-blown opening was not an option.

The members did not vote on any proposals to open schools. Bedden asked the board to consider approval of a health and safety plan for the start of the upcoming year at another meeting on July 28.

Bedden told the board that if the district opened all its schools under normal circumstances, it could not meet any of the standards set by the Pennsylvania Department of Health to contain the spread of COVID-19. He said that under a full opening, school officials would lose the ability to create social distancing. The superintendent added that the district would not have a desk for every student if the school opened that way.

Seven days earlier, Bedden presented the board with four options for opening schools next month. Administrators favored the scaffolded proposal, which relocates fifth and sixth graders to the middle school and has seventh, eighth and ninth graders share the high school with sophomores juniors and seniors on an alternating schedule. Roger Updegrove, Christine Neiman, Ruth Dierolf, Hemingway and Brophy expressed support for the option of reopening for all students and staff.

On Tuesday, numerous parents and residents expressed their opposition to the proposal. One woman who worked on the district's pandemic committee stated that a vote for total in-person instruction would be the most irresponsible choice.

Andrew Heizmann, a New Hanover resident with four children and who described himself as a public school teacher, told the members they "don't get to gamble with our children."

Christian Fowkes, who also worked on the task force, said that allowing a full-blown opening would be risking the lives of every family in the district. Fowkes said they would be playing Russian roulette with the children.

"To the COVID five, you are wrong," he said. "Let the task force do its work."

Donna Usavage, an Upper Frederick resident with 31 years of public health experience, told the board to respect the experts and allow the administrators to analyze the pandemic data. Additionally, he said students would be forced to sit at desks only two feet apart.

"You are required to balance the safety of the students, faculty and staff with the need to learn," she said.

According to Bedden's proposal, a full opening would create a multitude of health issues. He said each building would lose the ability to identify a student quarantining area. At the high school, administrators would be forced to serve a full lunch and would lose the ability to control the flow of traffic between classes.

The superintendent argued that the committee's preferred plan maintained a physical distance of between four and six feet where feasible, as required by the Pennsylvania Department of Education. The proposal calls for holding five days of classes for all elementary school students. Bedden described the ability to reconfigure the building as a key component of the scaffolded plan.

"It gives us a better chance at success," the superintendent said.

All secondary students would attend the high school on alternating days. Bedden said the adjustments would reduce the number of students in the school each day from 2,400 to between 1,500 and 1,600. According to the superintendent, lunch could also be served in the auxiliary gymnasium and the auditorium at the high school. The meal would likely be served in all buildings between 10:30 a.m. and 2 p.m.

Rising cases may force the district to reconsider its plan to hold in-person classes for elementary school every day, according to Bedden. He expressed the need for the district to enhance its online learning program. To that end, the superintendent asked the board to consider delaying the start of the new school year one week to Aug. 31.

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