Saskatchewan schools to reopen in the fall for 2020-21 school year

Students and staff members are to go back to school in Saskatchewan in the fall.

On Tuesday, Education Minister Gordon Wyant announced in-person classes are to resume in prekindergarten to Grade 12 schools in the 2020-21 school year.

“We’ve certainly heard from many teachers and many parents across this province that they want to see their kids return to school,” Wyant said during a media conference.

“We think that in-class learning is the best way for children to gain their education, notwithstanding the fact that we’ve had some success with online learning and other delivery models over the last number of months.”

Schools in the province were closed March 20 as part of the government’s response to COVID-19. Classes then were offered remotely to provide instruction to students.

On May 7, it was announced that schools physically would remain closed for the rest of the 2019-20 school year. Teachers continued to lead classes virtually for students who wanted to keep learning.

The plan now is for schools to open as early as Sept. 1, based on the plans of individual school divisions.

“As we prepare our plan for instruction to take place within our schools, our priority continues to be the health and safety of our students, our staff and caregivers,” Wyant said. “We’ll continue to take the advice and recommendations of our chief medical health officer (Dr. Saqib Shahab).

“As Dr. Shahab has previously stated, maintaining physical distancing is less practical with young children. Our focus is on reducing risk though minimizing physical contact and putting in place protections not only for students but caregivers and staff.”

The government noted that while the plan is for a return to the classroom, contingency plans will be put in place in case there’s an increased risk of transmission that would mean in-class learning can’t start, either regionally or provincially.

As early as next week, the Ministry of Education is to distribute public health guidelines that currently are being developed with the help of Shahab.

Wyant said the guidelines could include things like separate entrances into schools, staggered classrooms, rescheduled classes, fewer children in classrooms or even some online learning.

Everything depends on the state of affairs with the coronavirus by the time school is scheduled to start.

“If the ongoing risk (of transmission) is significantly minimized, then things will be a little bit different than if the risk factors were higher,” Wyant said.

“Some of the considerations that are going to have to go into this are really going to be quite flexible in terms of ensuring that what we provide is a safe learning environment for our children and a safe working environment for teachers and staff.”

Shahab said if we do see a second wave in the fall, the province really doesn’t want to go into full lockdown again.

“In the rare increase where we see a significant increase in transmission that may impact schools, but also other sectors, but we really don’t think we would go there unless there was a significant increase in transmission, which we hope we can control by other public health measures,” said Shahab.

Shahab explained that they’ll look at transmission trends, which sectors are causing it. He said there would possibly be a push to make more use of personal protective equipment even in the home.

Explaining what a second wave or significant transmission would look like, Shahab said it would be even higher numbers of cases than we’d seen in most of the province, excluding the outbreak in the northwest.

“We were so successful in our public health measures and everything that we did individually, that we never really saw a significant wave in Saskatchewan, except in the northwest in La Loche and area.”

Shahab said significant transmission would look like dozens of cases a day in a town or community, and more than a hundred cases a day in the province.

The province’s Education Response Planning Team — which includes representatives from the Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation and the Saskatchewan School Boards Association — is to provide guidance to school divisions throughout the reopening process.

The union reacts

The president of the Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation says educators are “cautiously optimistic” about returning to the classroom in September.

Patrick Maze told 650 CKOM he heard several positive items from Wyant during Tuesday’s news conference, including concerns for teacher safety.

However, Maze said “the devil’s in the details.”

He noted concerns over crowded classrooms.

“Many of our classrooms right now are at capacity, many of our schools are over capacity,” Maze said. “Social distancing will be almost impossible.”

He said while teachers are a bit nervous about safety from the virus, it’s a positive step to see Wyant taking advice from the educational response team — which has teacher representation.

Maze added he doesn’t mind that the provincial government is taking its time in coming out with detailed rules.

“Sometimes less news is better in the sense that let’s watch and see what’s happening, and make sure we make moves that are in the best interests of Saskatchewan teachers and Saskatchewan students,” he said.

While teachers have made do in trying to educate kids online, Maze said physical classroom teaching allows teachers to be more in tune with each child’s needs.

“They’re used to being able to monitor through facial expressions how students are doing, whether they’re coping, whether they’re coming into classrooms fed … or being able to check in within a moment’s notice whether the student is understanding the lesson or not,” he said.