Decorah School Board begins discussion of weather-related closure remote learning

This past June, Iowa law was changed to allow school districts to use remote learning on emergency closure days in place of make-up days at the end of the school year. At Monday night's meeting, the school board initiated the first steps in figuring out if and how the Decorah district will take advantage of this new law.

In his most recent email on November 6th to families, students, and staff, Superintendent Mark Lane wrote, "Because each of our students is issued a technology device, and we have the Canvas Learning Management System in place, we are well positioned to use this option."

To the board, Lane said, "We have three viable pathways with this change to the law." He explained option one is to say there won't be any changes to the way it's always been done.  Once the district has dipped below the required 1080 hours of instruction due to weather-related cancellations, those hours will be made up at the end of the school year. This option has tallied 14.6% of approximately 300 surveys that have been already been submitted. According to Lane, one survey responder, perhaps feeling a bit nostalgic, commented that snow days are for sledding.

Option two would mean developing a plan for engaging in remote learning for weather-related closure days, and deploying the plan any time the district has a full-day weather-related closure. This option has support from approximately 46% of submitted surveys, with some responders noting that the district should maximize the learning time.

Finally, option three would entail coming up with a plan to engage in remote learning for weather-related closure days, and deploying the plan for any full-day weather related closures that occur after the district is below the 1,080 hours of instruction required by Iowa law. 39% of the submitted surveys say this is the best option. The district started the school year with a 30-hour cushion of instructional time built in. Because of a handful of early-out releases, the district has eaten into a little bit of that cushion.  

Lane, the board of directors, and the administrative team would appreciate more feedback from families, students, and staff regarding these three options. So far, 184 parents, 82 employees, and 27 students have responded. The survey is linked in Lane's email from Friday. "We are doing preliminary work right now and will bring plans to the board meeting in December," Lane said.

As the community figures out what option to vote for, Lane would like to note that remote learning would not mean staff and students are engaged in remote learning for a normal 6 1/2 hour school day. The district would develop plans similar to what is in place now for remote learning due to COVID-19 related factors.  He said, "Students and staff would need to engage in some learning activities during the day.  Those activities would be aligned to coursework, developmentally appropriate, and flexible to accommodate for student access to the internet, and learning needs."

Lane concluded the agenda item saying, "We will continue to gather feedback and have conversations and look to places that have have been successfully implementing this kind of remote learning."

The board will continue their discussion at the next meeting on December 14th.