APPLETON, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – Appleton schools are making small steps toward bringing students back to the classroom.
“We are attempting to balance the essential academic, social-emotional, and physical needs of our students during this time of pandemic by offering limited, targeted, optional opportunities for our most vulnerable populations while we operate within our fully virtual learning model,” Appleton schools superintendent Judy Baseman said.
The school board detailed the “Fully Virtual Plus” model on Monday.
In small groups, students are able to come to school for academic support during the school day.
“Some kids are struggling. So we don’t want to wait until the quarter ends and we look at grades so we want to start now already,” Appleton schools chief financial officer Greg Hartjes said.
The district is also allowing for optional co-curricular activities outside the school day.
“We have students who need this, it’s essential for their social-emotional, for their academic needs,” Appleton schools assistant superintendent Ben Vogel said.
Those co-curriculars also include sports workouts.
If the district sees success with their mitigation strategies, they are able to add more groups of students.
Some board members are happy with the plan moving forward.
“Everything that we can do safely we should do,” Appleton school board member Leah Olson said.
It may not be enough for Appleton parents.
Parents protested outside the district office during Monday night’s meeting.
Some parents are upset with the way the district has handled their plans to bring students back to school.
The Appleton school board hopes this will act as a test to see if the district is ready to bring more students back.
“I do like the one step at a time. I really do. So we’re going to test ourselves as we go. We’ll take step one and see how it goes and then two and then three, I also think that this approach will be a good way to test of our ability to mitigate,” Appleton school board member Jim Bowman said.
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