After a difficult year, LI schools look ahead with hope

This week's top stories

1. 'Hope and promise' as more students return

Long Island educators said they are already building the bridges they hope will lead schools out of the COVID-19 era. A year spent largely away from school — struggling to master remote and hybrid learning — has taken a hard toll on students mentally and academically, educators said. They also said the combination of mass vaccinations and safety protocols is gradually bringing students safely back into the classroom full time, helping them reconnect with their peers and teachers.

"The future is happening now," said Caren Gough, a lecturer in the science education program at Stony Brook University. "Merely getting them back to school, where they will have some routine in their lives, will have a huge effect."

Moving forward, Kishore Kuncham, superintendent of the Freeport school district, predicts this fall will be a time of "hope and promise." By then, the Island should be well on its way toward achieving herd immunity and the great majority of students back in school five days a week, he said. Sports, clubs and other activities largely will resume, with some safety precautions. The use of masks, desk guards and social distancing — albeit with shorter safety distances — likely still will be in place, too, he added.

The pandemic also exacerbated issues like absenteeism. This past year has been challenging for educators and students alike, especially in low-income communities. Districts have seen high absenteeism among students, as well as loss of learning and emotional problems. Educators said they are working to address these issues, including extra counseling, remedial coursework and student wellness forums.

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2. A year after schools closed, what lessons were learned?

One year ago, as COVID-19 quickly closed in, students and educators across Long Island were evicted from their schools. Coronavirus cases were surging, hospital beds were becoming scarce — and the news that schools would need to shut down left children with an unexpected break. But educators were rattled.

• The decision disrupted the education of Long Island’s 430,000 K-12 students. What happened in the months since, amid an unprecedented shift to remote learning, has put a spotlight on educational inequities and an urgency to address children’s mental health.
• Educators say the pandemic also has revealed the importance of integrating technology with education, and forced districts to adapt to new teaching methods. "We were forced to completely reinvent the system that’s been in existence for 150 years, basically overnight," Baldwin Superintendent Shari Camhi said.
• "There have been disparities across Long Island for many years. The coronavirus only magnified that in terms of access to technology, to Wi-Fi," Uniondale Superintendent Rhonda Taylor said.

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3. Two more LI Catholic schools are closing their doors

Two more Catholic grammar schools on Long Island — including one nearly a century old — are closing largely because of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, church officials said Tuesday, bringing to five the number shuttering in a year.

• St. Thomas the Apostle School in West Hempstead and St. Raymond School in East Rockaway will close in June, at the end of this academic year, said Sean Dolan, a spokesman for the Diocese of Rockville Centre.
• The diocese shut three other grammar schools last June and will be left running 33 others in Nassau and Suffolk counties after the latest closings.
• "Unfortunately, enrollment loss combined with the impact of COVID-19 on both parish offertory collections and fundraising efforts has made it clear that it is not feasible to maintain these schools financially," Dolan said.

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4. A scholarship in the name of an 'exemplary human being'

Jeanine Brogan teared up as she read a typed proposal in a folder handed to her by six of her late husband’s former students. It was shortly after dinner around Christmas 2019. The group wanted to create a scholarship fund in honor of her husband, Jack Rice, a Bellmore-Merrick Central High School District teacher who died in 2016, and they wanted her to be a part of it.

• The website of the nonprofit Jack Rice Memorial Scholarship Fund was launched last month. Rice, who died at 67 from prostate cancer, taught in junior high schools and high schools in the Bellmore-Merrick district from 1971 to 2003, except for the school year between 1989 and 1990.
• The first scholarship was awarded last May to Casey Fahrer, a graduating senior at Wellington C. Mepham High School in Bellmore.
• Rice "was an exemplary human being," said Nick Licata, of upstate Pine Bush. To Licata and other former students who later became Rice’s lifelong friends, their teacher was a mentor and a role model.

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5. What does the $1.9T relief package mean for LI schools?

Long Island school leaders say they have good reason to be cautious in assessing the impact on their districts of President Joe Biden's financial rescue package — a plan representing a historic windfall for many schools nationwide.

• One question that remains is exactly how federal money for schools will be distributed in Nassau and Suffolk counties, local leaders point out. Another question is whether New York State and its school districts will be able to pick up the slack two or three years down the line, when relief money runs out.
• Overall, the $1.9 trillion rescue plan, which the president signed last Thursday, provides nearly $122 billion for K-12 schooling nationwide, with nearly $9 billion set aside for New York State schools. The funding is widely described as the biggest single federal investment in public education in history.
• "It sounds great," said Lorna Lewis, superintendent of Malverne schools and a past president of the New York State Council of School Superintendents. "But we don't know how that will impact us until we see the actual dollars."

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Resources for you

• Children’s Hearing Institute has resources and programs for parents of children and teens who are deaf and live in the tristate area. Among the free resources is a comic book, Sound Effects, which features Marvel Comics' Iron Man as he teams up with Blue Ear, a superhero with hearing aids, and Sapheara, a super girl with bilateral cochlear implants. Visit childrenshearing.org.
• Banzai, a financial literacy education tool, teaches teens budgeting skills like how to track every income and expense with the double-entry method, which helps them learn financial trade-offs: Spending more in one area means spending less in another. Visit teachbanzai.com.
• Hippo Campus provides free resources for students in middle school to college in specialized areas, such as calculus, physics and economics. Visit hippocampus.org.

Round of applause

Two Garden City High School students have created a web series that portrays a variety of real-life issues and critical topics for teens.

Sarah Fetherston and Ryan Murphy, both seniors, spent a year and a half engaging in all aspects of film production — ranging from writing and directing to starring in the series — to bring awareness to the film's themes.

The eight-episode series, called "Lockdown," tells the story of 11 teenagers in an active-shooter situation and involves such topics as abortion, gun control and mental health. It is available for viewing on YouTube. Filming for the project wrapped up in early 2020.

"We wanted to foster a community where teens are comfortable talking to parents about their issues," Fetherston said. "We really wanted to talk about what people are going through and not romanticize it."

Your questions answered

Have questions? Send them to ednews@newsday.com. Newsday’s education reporting team will pick one to answer in this space each week.

Three feet, 6 feet — how far should people be distanced in schools?

As a national debate emerges over how far apart people should be in schools — 6 feet or 3 feet — Long Island school leaders say they're waiting for the state to update reopening guidelines before considering changes to COVID-19 distancing protocols.

Educators agreed that they want more students back in schools. Six-foot distancing guidelines, however, don't allow them to bring all students back at once, due to limited space in classrooms.

"What we have to do, and what we’ve always done, is follow the science. And it seems like there’s a growing body of research saying 3 feet would be an appropriate distance in schools," with physical barriers such as desk shields in place, said Lawrence Superintendent Ann Pedersen.

A study released earlier this month in the medical journal Clinical Infectious Diseases found positive coronavirus rates among students and staff were similar in districts that adopted 3-foot physical distancing rules and those that adopted 6-foot distancing. It stated that "lower physical distancing policies can be adopted in school settings with masking mandates without negatively impacting student or staff safety."

CDC leaders are now considering whether students can be seated closer together with masks and other physical partitions. Many districts have been adhering to CDC standards in addition to state guidelines when implementing reopening procedures amid the pandemic.

Some Long Island district leaders, including Commack's Donald James, have asked the state to shift to a 3-feet distancing rule for districts that follow mask rules and use protective shields in their classrooms.

The state Health Department left it up to the local districts again in a statement Tuesday.

"School district leadership must engage their community of educators, families, students, local governments and local departments of health to develop a local plan to operate schools safely," read the statement. "Ultimately, this is a local decision and school districts across the state have successfully and safely reopened following these parameters."

— Find the latest education news at newsday.com/long-island/education. Catherine Carrera can be reached at catherine.carrera@newsday.com or on Twitter @CattCarrera.