AMHERST — After 11 months of entirely remote instruction, which for many students in the Amherst and Amherst-Pelham regional schools could extend through the remainder of the current school year, school leaders are pledging to have all students, teachers and staff back in classrooms this fall.
The Amherst-Pelham Regional School Committee, joined by the Amherst and Pelham school committees, on Tuesday adopted a resolution promising in-person instruction when schools reopen after the summer break, conditioned on input from local health officials.
The resolution states that as long as safety guidelines of local public health officials are fully adhered to, the schools “will provide full-time in-person learning for the full 2021-2022 school year for all students. The Superintendent will manage this plan and any shift back to remote learning based on a continuous assessment of health conditions in direct consultation with local public health officials.”
In addition, Superintendent Michael Morris “will collaborate with and gather input from faculty and staff leadership, the School Committees and student families to inform this plan.”
But the resolution, receiving significant support from parents in both oral and written comments, doesn’t factor in the continued rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine for teachers and students.
Amherst School Committee member Peter Demling drafted the resolution, which was adopted unanimously, with some abstentions from his colleagues.
William Kaizen, a parent of a kindergartner and fourth grader at Wildwood School, said Wednesday that the resolution will help reassure members of the school community that the public schools will be open for in-person learning on Day One of the 2021-22 school year.
“I hope this commitment is enough to keep families who were considering leaving in our district,” Kaizen said. “It would be very unfortunate to lose more families from our district to neighboring districts, charter schools or even to private schools right here in Amherst.”
Prior to the meeting, Renata Shepard, parent of a second grader at Crocker Farm School and a 10th grader at the high school, praised the resolution. “Such commitment should be made this upcoming spring, too,” Shepard said.
“Not committing to in-person learning will have dire consequences on our community in the future and will only continue to harm our children who have now been in online instruction for almost a year,” wrote Rebecca Dingo, parent of students at Fort River School and the middle school.
“Such a statement would do much to alleviate my fears — and those in the wider ARPS community — that come fall 2021, Amherst will be a remote-schooling exception among in-person schools in the Pioneer Valley,” wrote Christiane Healey, parent of Fort River children.
Pelham representative Margaret Stancer said significant improvements have already been made to the ventilation in school buildings and protocols have been adopted to keep children and teachers safe.
Regional School Committee Chairwoman Allison McDonald said any decision on remote instruction, hybrid education models and in-person learning is part of core education, and a legal opinion her committee received is that it can’t be bargained over or negotiated with the Amherst Pelham Education Association.
Kaizen said this was important, as a memorandum of agreement that sets health metrics for keeping schools open, negotiated with the teachers union, has left the education remote for most of the year.
“It was significant to hear that this decision will not be up for negotiation or bargaining with the teachers union,” Kaizen said.
Parents who objected to the resolution included Jennifer Page, parent of a Crocker Farm sixth grader, who said it undermines the collaboration with teachers and possibly makes promises that can’t be delivered, and Amber Cano-Martin, who said many families will likely find in-person education an unacceptable risk in the fall.
“The pandemic, and the debate about in-person vs. remote learning, has demonstrated that no one model of learning, and no one system of support, works for all students and families,” wrote Will Snyder, a Wildwood School parent.
Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.
