Springfield’s (brief) decision to bring back K-3 students is met with a lot of mixed emotions BY MEG KRUGEL
Six days. That’s all the time Springfield teacher Anne Goff had
with her incoming Kindergarten class face-to-face last month before a COVID-19 surge in Lane County altered everything. Her Kindergarten students had begun their school year in her classroom the week of Sept. 21, and metrics were released the day after school began that showed positivity rates had climbed higher than in-person teaching would have normally allowed. Because the district had already opened, Springfield K-3 classrooms could continue hosting in-person classes until the next round of metrics came out. Not surprisingly, the metrics the following Monday had nearly doubled in positive cases; that evening, teachers were told that the district was returning K-3 students to Comprehensive Distance Learning by the end of the week. The next day, Goff scrambled to get learning packets made for her students, knowing it'd be the last time she'd see them in person for a long while. Six days of making a face-to-face connection with an eager bunch of five-year-olds. Six days of setting the stage for what is surely going to be a tumultuous year of yoyo-ing between two models of learning that both carry their own hurdles. This abrupt move to close Springfield schools during the second week of school was coupled with devastating levels of unhealthy wildfire smoke that had already forced the district to delay opening schools a week or more. Springfield — like districts across Oregon — was off to a rocky start. 30
TODAY’S OEA | FALL/WINTER 2020
“We’re not saying we don’t want to be with kids – we do, very much – but we know it’s just not safe yet. We need a better plan and we need more time.” Heather St. Louis, Springfield kindergarten teacher
