School districts pause reopening plans as California pumps brakes

SAN JOSE, Calif. - Some school districts are having to pause plans after the majority of California's counties moved to the state's most-restrictive tier of the state's reopening plan.

As of Tuesday, 41 counties in California were in the purple tier.

"So the vast majority of our students are still in distance learning right now," said Daniel Thigpen, California Department of Education spokesman.

Under the purple tier, classes that had resumed in-person and campuses that had opened for as of Tuesday can continue.

But for the majority of California school districts which are still doing distance-learning, those re-opening plans are now on hold.

According to state guidelines, schools still waiting to reopen must now wait until their county is two weeks in the red tier.

Schools with grades K-6 can also apply for a waiver.

"Primarily this has the largest impact on districts that were putting their plans in place for a return in 2021," said Thigpen.

Magret Nunes is the president of the John Swett Education Association.

The union represents about 75 teachers working in the John Swett Unified School District in Contra Costa County which is doing distant learning but was considering reopening January 22.

"That's not going to happen," said Nunes.

            She says negotiations are under way and the next opportunity to make a decision about returning in-person is in March. She plans to push for not reopening at all this school year.

"This moving to the purple makes even a stronger argument that we should not consider going back at all," said Nunes.

            That sentiment was echoed by Jeff Freitas, the President of the California Federation of Teachers which represents 120,000 school employees.

            "We call on school districts throughout the state to immediately halt all plans for physically reopening schools before the end of the calendar year. For schools that are currently open, school districts should immediately plan to transition to distance learning,“ Freitas said in a released statement.

"It is frustrating for sure and I'm a parent of two young kids myself so I get it. I'm ready for them to go back also. It really is unprecedented times," said San Jose Unified School District spokeswoman Jennifer Maddox.

            San Jose Unified is Santa Clara County's largest school district.

            It was planning to resume some in-person learning in January but under a stricter threshold than the state--only if the county was in the orange or yellow tier.

"We are continuing to plan and prepare for that. We still have several weeks before we'll be at the point where we'll be ready to make a decision on whether or not that's going to be postponed," said Maddox.

            Most districts were looking at a hybrid model so even if infection rates drop, education leaders say there is still going to be some form of distant learning in the months ahead.