Date: 10/6/2020
WEST SPRINGFIELD – Residents in the town of West Springfield have found themselves on opposing sides in a battle for what is best for the town’s children. Since the West Springfield School Committee’s Aug. 10 vote to return to school remotely at the beginning of the 2020-2021 academic year, parents have been torn on whether that decision preserves their children’s health or robs them of a quality education.
Mayor Will Reichelt addressed the town’s residents in a video message posted to Facebook on Sept. 28. In the video, Reichelt called on parents to respect each other’s opinion.
“Rarely are people going to agree on every issue in any community, especially one as emotionally charged as the debate to reopen our schools during a global pandemic,” Reichelt said. He acknowledged that not everyone agrees COVID-19 is a “real threat,” while others are concerned about their family’s health. Overall, he stressed that everyone wants what is best for the students, even if they don’t agree on what that looks like.
Reichelt also attempted to explain in the video that reopening schools is a complex process with many working parts, including staffing, funding, logistics and making sure in-person and remote students are receiving the same quality of education.
Superintendent Tim Connor and Reichelt conducted a listening session on Sept. 29 to hear from people in the community on how they think remote learning is going and their opinions on pivoting to a hybrid model. The vote on whether to move to a hybrid learning model was originally scheduled for Oct. 26, but as data on the pandemic and case numbers change rapidly, Reichelt said the vote will likely be moved up.
Residents aren’t the only ones pressuring the school district to return to an in-person learning model. On Sept. 18, the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) Commissioner Jeffrey Riley sent a letter to 16 of the school districts in the state that returned with a remote learning model, including West Springfield. In the letter, Riley informed the districts that if their municipality is categorized as “low-risk, with transmission rates of less than four cases per 100,000, the district is expected to use a hybrid or in-person learning model.
In response, Reichelt drafted a letter with the input of the school committee pointing out that school committees were instructed to make reopening decisions for their districts, but are being admonished for doing exactly that.
“Rather than having a collaborative and interactive dialogue, DESE chose to publicly question West Springfield’s decisions without any investigation or additional information,” Reichelt wrote. “While we are happy to provide you with any information you seek, this type of approach does not seem cooperative nor does it seem like DESE has any intention of supporting the decisions that are made locally based on the needs of our community.”
In the letter, Riley was reminded that DESE’s “Guidance for Districts and Schools on Interpreting DPH COVID-19 Metrics” was issued on Aug. 11, after West Springfield’s school committee had voted on what model and schedule would be used to return to school.
“Given the late issuance of such guidance (three days prior to the deadline for reopening plans to be submitted to your office), we were not able to have the benefit of such guidance before our decision was made,” Reichelt wrote to Riley. It was further emphasized that the district’s decision to return remotely for the first month and a half of school was within the law under 603 CMR 27.08(2).
Reichelt took Riley to task for publicly singling out some districts and not others based on an “arbitrary” date of when they would vote on whether to switch learning models. He also called out DESE for not providing enough funding to districts to help reopen safely. “We certainly would welcome any resources that the state would like to provide, which have been minimal to date,” Reichelt told the commissioner.
The mayor ended the letter telling Riley, “It is difficult to feel supported when DESE made the decision to publicize and politicize this particular issue.”
A vote on updating the reopening plan was scheduled for Oct. 6.