San Diego Unified leaders launched their “phase one” reopening this week to help the district’s most vulnerable students. But the launch appears to be wildly uneven – with some schools not even participating.
Donis Coronel is the executive director of the local principals union. She told me that in the lead-up to phase one, she talked to 25 to 30 elementary school principals.
“At least half of the principals I’ve talked to said they maybe have one teacher or zero coming back,” said Coronel. “It is an equity issue. You may have a school with 70 percent of staff returning and others with none. It’s challenging.”
The reality on the ground clashes with the narrative pushed by district leaders: that phase one services will be available to as many as 12,000 students as often as they need them. Phase one, district leaders have said, is designed to even the playing field for students who aren’t doing well in distance learning. It is meant to include in-person services for special education students, as well as those who have fallen behind academically.
Yet the plan seems to have created new inequities, in that services are available for students at some schools, but not others.
Principals have directly contradicted some of the claims made by district leaders about how CONTINUE READING: Some Schools Have No Teachers Willing to Return for ‘Phase One’ Reopening — Voice of San Diego
