Hoover elementary, middle schools to return to 5 days in-person instruction
Hoover elementary and middle school students whose parents chose in-person instruction for them will be allowed to return to school five days a week beginning, Monday, Feb. 1, school officials said Tuesday.
But students at Hoover and Spain Park high schools will have to wait longer to come back five days a week. School officials said they hope high school students will be able to return to school five days a week in early to mid-February, but the situation remains fluid.
Hoover schools have been on a staggered instruction schedule since Nov. 30 due to increased spread of the COVID-19 disease and staffing shortages associated with that spread.
“After consulting with health experts and seeing the number of COVID-19 positive cases among students and employees go down across the board, we felt the time is right to make this decision (regarding elementary and middle school students),” said Alex Derencz, Hoover’s new public relations coordinator.
Interim Superintendent Tera Simmons said in a YouTube video released Tuesday that bringing students back five days a week has been the goal all along, but school officials want to make sure they can do that in a safe manner.
They are “beyond excited” to have the elementary and middle school students coming back now, but plans are always subject to change depending on what happens with the virus, Simmons said.
Derencz said middle school administrators have found creative ways to adjust student schedules to limit the number of close contacts students have with other students and will continue to enforce social distancing and other health guidelines to keep students safe.
Some parents have been pleading with school officials to bring the students back to school on regular schedules, saying it has been negatively impacting their students’ academic performance and mental health and making life very difficult for parents who need to work.