The Orange County Schools district will be welcoming back some of its students in March instead of in April, as the system had previously planned.

During a specially-called Board of Education meeting Friday, the board approved a schedule return some students in grades 2-12 for in-person instruction beginning on March 8. The shift in schedule, which had initially planned for in-person instruction for those grades to resume in April at the end of the academic quarter, was approved unanimously.

The district cites the change in plans to Senate Bill 37, a piece of legislation working its way through the North Carolina General Assembly that requires public school systems to offer some form of in-person instruction to students. After the Senate approved the bill on Tuesday, the state House made amendments and passed a revised version on Thursday. The bill is expected to be negotiated in a joint committee in the coming days.

There’s no clear indication whether North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper would sign the bill, but he and other state leaders recently encouraged schools to offer in-person instruction with the recommended public health guidelines in place.

Most Orange County Schools students have been operating in a remote learning model since March 2020. The hybrid, in-person instruction model for kindergarten and first-grade students has been used since January 25, the first day of the current academic quarter. Students in grades 2-12 were initially included in the hybrid learning plans, but the school board voted on January 11 to extend their remote learning due to elevated COVID-19 trends following the winter holidays.

Once 2-12 students begin returning to classrooms in two cohorts, the groups will rotate weeks between receiving in-person instruction and remote, with Fridays used as asynchronous learning days. Cohort A will receive in-person instruction beginning on March 8, while Cohort B will return to classrooms on March 15.

More information for the Orange County Schools district’s Plan B model can be found on the school system’s website.

Photo via the Town of Chapel Hill.

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