EHS, junior highs to end blended learning Oct. 14

Enterprise Superintendent Greg Faught announced on Sept. 29 that Enterprise High School, Dauphin Junior High and Coppinville Junior High would end blended learning and return students back to campuses five days a week beginning Oct. 14.

All students that signed up for virtual learning will continue to take virtual classes but those students that originally signed up for on-campus school will now return to a traditional schedule.

“The reason why we changed to that (blended) model doesn’t exist anymore. The CDC guidelines and the health department guidelines have made it a lot less restrictive as far as sending kids home,” Faught said. “We sent one kid home last week and that child tested negative (for COVD-19). We’ve been at the same number of positive cases for the past few weeks and it looks like we can bring the kids back to school safely.”

Enterprise switched to the blended model back on Aug. 21 after state and CDC guidelines changed so that students that suffered from a broad range of possible symptoms – and all of those students seated around them – would have to be sent home from school and be quarantined for 10-14 days.

Those guidelines have been relaxed so that now only students that are suffering from three specific symptoms – and those students that have been in close contact for 15 minutes or more with that student – would need to be sent home. Those symptoms include shortness of breath, a new cough and loss of taste or smell. Those students can return to school following a negative COVID-19 test.

Faught reported that the school system had a total of 23 confirmed positive COVID-19 tests so far this school year back on Sept. 14 and said that number has not changed.

While Faught said he was pleased with how blended learning had gone, there were still some issues.

“I’m pleased with it but there are a lot of kids that are on that schedule that aren’t doing as well because they signed up to be at school and there are also some connectivity issues still,” Faught said. “A lot of kids do struggle with virtual learning, so I feel like the best option right now is to get those kids back on campus. There were also some kids that were home alone and that was causing some issues.”

Oct. 7 is the end of the first nine weeks of school and after that virtual students can opt back into on-campus learning but there will be no blended learning as of Oct. 14. On-campus students can opt into virtual learning at any point.

If Gov. Kay Ivey allows her mask mandate to expire in October, Faught also said the school system will likely continue to require masks on campus.

“We’re just glad to be able to have our kids back on campus in a more natural learning environment,” Faught said. “We are going to continue to take every precaution and strive to keep all of the kids as safe as possible.”