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Staff members at Luther College High School are preparing for a new normal ahead of the school’s reopening in September.
As a part of COVID-19 restrictions, like many other schools this fall, Luther will implement a mandatory mask policy for areas where students cannot properly social distance.
“We need people to participate to help keep each other safe,” said Marc Jerry, the president of the independent school in Regina.
The province revealed Tuesday guidelines for schools who wished to move to Level 2 of the province’s return-to-school guidelines. That level involves the use of masks.
Jerry said there will be repercussions for students who don’t wear masks, but the school will provide them for students that forget them or have theirs damaged, or for any other reason.
Luther also will follow other recommendations put forward by the province.
“Lots of it follows the province’s guides around safe attendance policies, safe transportation (and) safe spaces. We have a significant number of sanitation stations that have been added, we’re restricting which doors the students can come in and additional cleaning has been put in place there,” Jerry said.
There will also be decals on the ground to direct the flow of traffic and the school has been looking into purchasing desk shields.
The school will have 430 students enrolled in the fall. Jerry said the biggest concern for Luther is its international students.
“We’re not sure or not if they’ll be able to get here,” Jerry said.
Some international students chose to stay in Regina over the summer and they will stay in the school’s dorms during the school year. The dorm policy is still being created.
Jerry said international students who can’t attend, and students who need to stay at home to self-isolate, will be able to access remote learning.
“Living in a pandemic is already creating a huge difference for people. Luther has a reputation of being a school of academic excellence and even when we went to remote (learning) in March, we had a very high participation rate compared to some of the other schools,” Jerry said.
Jerry is also dealing with all these changes early into his new position of president; he only took over the job on July 1.
“The joke is I signed on the dotted line before everything shut down so I was committed,” Jerry said. “The pandemic takes away the awkward new guy-ness because no one knows what to do in a pandemic anyways.”
