Plans to get students in the San Diego Unified School District back in the classroom for in-person learning have been delayed.
Phase 2's implementation would have begun on January 4, after winter break. Board Vice-President Richard Barrera said the district decided to delay the reopening based solely on the spread of the virus, not on a contract with the teacher’s union or federal money for the testing and tracing program.
He said the district wanted to give parents a heads-up that the scheduled reopening was unlikely, if not impossible, given the timeline for the county to get out of the purple tier.
“If they had more students on campus, they would have already technically been an open school, which would have given them the opportunity to continue on, even if in the purple tier, “ said Leslie Hofmeister who sent her child to a private school, but is still involved in the issue, belonging to a group called Open Schools, San Diego. “I think they are using the purple tier to blame their irresponsibility and mismanagement in order to continue delaying opening the schools.”
“I honestly don’t think the district had a choice,” she said, “I was not surprised, our caseload is abysmal. We are in the purple tier, we continue to see spikes," said Parent Daniel Stewart.
He is with a group called San Diegans for Science-Based School Reopenings, and has been concerned all along schools were not safe enough to open.
Local
The district is going to reassess the current conditions and provide an updated timeline on January 13.
