BLOOMINGTON, Minn. — Bloomington Public Schools will start the school year in distance learning, after initially hoping to offer a hybrid learning option for students.
The Bloomington School Board opted during its meeting Monday night to make the change.
"We just couldn't make the models work with the available staffing," said Rick Kaufman, Executive Director of Community Relations and Emergency Management for Bloomington Public Schools.
Kaufman said the district surveyed families and staff members. He said about 70% of families preferred the hybrid learning option. Meanwhile, Kaufman says about 25% of staff members, including teachers, requested to work from home due to health reasons.
While that would leave about 75% of the district's teachers and staff to accommodate for the 70% of students who wanted hybrid learning, Kaufman says it's not that simple, especially due to the specialization of classes in the upper grades. For example, he said, multiple high school math teachers might request to work from home, leaving only one to handle the in-person classes.
"When you line those two up, the learning model preferences that parents chose with [those of] the staff, we just didn't have adequate staff to make those models work," Kaufman said. "And we were not and we do not want to create a situation where it's not a quality education experience for students."
Kaufman says they've been working on improving the distance learning model from what it was in the spring. He says it will include some in-person learning for students who need it.
The district has also expanded its Bloomington Online School. Pre-pandemic, the online program taught by BPS teachers was only offered to high school students. Because of the pandemic, the district has opened it to all grades.
It's different from distance learning in that it requires a year-long commitment, whereas students in distance learning can move back to in-person classes, if that becomes an option.
Sarah Page chose the online school for her son, entering the first grade.
The district says they'll be reevaluating the situation in late September or early October...with the hope of being able to offer the hybrid learning option again.
"We chose that as the first option, because it just seemed like the most stable and reliable option for this year that would have the least amount of variability and changes," she said. "With two full-time working parents, we felt like one of the biggest challenges for us would be the unknowns of what's happening tomorrow, next week."
Page says her son was initially placed on a wait list for the online school, due to high demand.
The district says they'll be reevaluating the situation in late September or early October with the hope of being able to offer the hybrid learning option again.