By Melanie Petrucci, Senior Community Reporter
Shrewsbury – The Shrewsbury Public School (SPS) announced Aug. 6 that they would be reopening Tuesday, Sept. 15, with a hybrid model of in-person and remote learning distributed among four cohorts.
At the Aug. 26 School Committee meeting, Superintendent Dr. Joseph Sawyer shared that 31 percent of families have chosen full remote learning and 69 percent opted for the hybrid model.
To meet the needs of Cohort D, full remote learning at the high school, Edgenuity, a third-party educator, will most likely be the vendor. Some families have expressed their concerns on social media. And this comes at a great cost – upwards of $1 million, according to Sawyer.
“We are scrambling in a variety of ways trying to make this work,” he said. “Based on the ratio of remote to hybrid, we have major challenges due to changes in the ability to staff efficiently.”
To meet the guidelines set by the School Committee, they will need to hire more teachers for the lower grades even though class sizes may be smaller and more teachers will need to be hired to meet the needs of teaching all the various cohorts. This becomes even more complex at the high school level.
In-person preschool programming has been prioritized. As such, remote programming to students without disabilities will not be available.
Students in Cohort D (all remote), kindergarten through grade eight, will be taught by SPS educators who will teach the SPS curriculum in a mix of live and “asynchronous” learning (students will use the same material but at a different time from peers).
Sawyer said that there is “a wrinkle” at Oak Middle School with the way numbers broke out. One of the teams will be a mix of seventh- and eighth-grade students.
Assistant Superintendent Amy Clouter stated that they were mandated to offer the full remote option, but strongly encouraged students return to in-person instruction.
She reiterated that students in Cohort D at the high school will be taught by different educators than those instructing the hybrid model. However, Cohort D students in kindergarten through fourth grade will be taught the SPS curriculum by SPS educators.
She shared sample class schedules and noted that students will be assessed according to state standards and will be held accountable on attendance and coursework.
Assistant Superintendent Meg Belsito reported that students’ Individual Education Plans (IEP) and 504 Plans will be delivered. How services will be executed will be shared closer to the start of the school year.
The costs associated with the remote options such as Edgenuity will not be covered by the Cares Act. Sawyer said that the cost of a third-party educator to serve the students at the high school is high and an additional several hundred thousand dollars is needed to meet the needs of others in Cohort D.
“I’m not sure we have a million dollars to do that frankly,” he said. “We are talking about a really challenging dynamic of what we can afford to do and what we must do.”
