Warden schools to start school year online

WARDEN — School will start online in the Warden School District.

“The first four weeks, that will be virtual, and we will be petitioning for some high-need exceptions to come in,” district superintendent Dave LaBounty said. District officials must receive the OK from Grant County Health District before bringing kids on campus, LaBounty said.

“If virtual learning is not going to work (for a student), then we have to look and consider how we are going to serve those needs,” LaBounty said. That will include some kids in the district’s special education program. “But it doesn’t rule out some of the limitations that we might have on kindergarten,” LaBounty said.

“We’re still formulating and we’re still working with families,” he said.

School starts Sept. 2.

Warden schools were closed, along with all other schools in the state, in March as a measure to combat the COVID-19 outbreak. The closure eventually was extended to the rest of the school year, and school districts have been working on plans for reopening throughout the summer.

The high school and middle school schedules have been changed so that students will have three classes one day, three classes the next day, each about 90 minutes. One class, about one hour, will be on the schedule every day.

The goal, LaBounty said, is to ensure students will be getting instruction no matter if they’re online or getting in-person instruction. “We have to have a system that’s flexible enough to go from virtual learning, right to in-person hybrid, right to full (return to school) without changing any schedules,” he said. “We want to be flexible enough that we don’t stop instruction.”

Warden School Board members approved a plan Aug. 13 that includes in-person teaching half time, and online instruction half time, called the “hybrid” model. Warden administrators had announced a tentative plan to start school in the hybrid model, but LaBounty said the district’s coronavirus infection rate is such that the GCHD advised against any in-person instruction.

LaBounty said district officials are taking the opportunity to increase access to the technology available to Warden students, and the technology will continue to be part of instruction after in-person classes resume.

“We went to a device (computer) for every kid. We secured that last spring, whereas before we didn’t have that,” LaBounty said. Kids who don’t have access to reliable internet are supplied with a hot spot.

“We’re keeping it (technology) embedded to enhance our instruction from this point forward,” he said. LaBounty said a lot of the money to pay for the additional technology comes through a capital levy approved by voters in 2019.