SUMMIT COUNTY, Colo. — A little more than a year after the Summit School District first went to at-home learning at the start of the novel coronavirus pandemic, the district is gauging how soon more students will be able to return to more days of learning in classrooms.
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On Friday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated its COVID-19 guidelines to recommend the minimum required physical distance in classrooms shift from 6 feet to 3 feet.
That theoretically means more students, and desks, are able to be in classrooms. The CDC said the change can be safely implemented regardless of whether community COVID-19 transmission is low, moderate, substantial or high, though the federal agency kept the 6-foot recommendation in place for middle and high school students within communities with a high rate of transmission.
When asked what the CDC’s 3-foot update means for the Summit school district, spokeswoman Mikki Grebetz said in an email that the district “is committed to analyzing metrics and data, monitoring COVID-19 updates from public health experts and government officials and adjusting the (district’s) ’Return to Learn’ plan at regular intervals to be responsive to our continued evolving COVID landscape.”
Grebetz said the district board of education will receive the next “Return to Learn” update from Superintendent Marion Smith Jr. and district Chief Operations Officer Drew Adkins at Thursday’s school board meeting on March 25. At the board’s most recent meeting on March 11, Adkins and Smith shared much more detail on where the return to classroom learning situation stands.
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