By JAMES BELL
Hays Post
"Things are going better than I ever could have expected," said Rachel Wentling, Holy Family Elementary principal, about the 2020-21 school year.
While the Catholic elementary school has had to adapt the year to the ongoing pandemic, now that the year has begun, students and staff are focusing less on the mitigation measures that were put into place and more on creating a learning environment that is as close to normal as possible.
"Getting this school year off the ground has been harder than usual," Wentling said. "I often compare the beginning of the school year to the launching of a space shuttle. Despite all of our other complications, this year has been especially difficult, but after we have gotten started it is going much better than I ever expected."
Getting the mitigation measures in place was the biggest challenge while preparing for the year.
"In order for us to be able to have school in person, we had to implement a lot of mitigation strategies," Wentling said. "That has taken a lot of work by a lot of people in my building."
Given building limitations, they worked to find the safest way to provide the best education possible for the students — requiring effort from the entire staff.
"We were not able to distance the students the full six feet that most people recommended," Wentling said. "So were are using all kinds of different strategies to help us."
But overall, the students have adapted well to those measures she said.
"I don't want to say it feels normal," Wentling said. "I don't ever want to say it feels normal, but I think it is becoming a little more normed, in that (the mitigation measures) are no longer the focus."
The students and staff she said are beginning to focus more on interaction and academics than the novelty of the mitigation measures.
"Our students have adapted beautifully and we are starting to see what their normal orneriness come out," Wentling said. "That's not at all a bad thing. That means that if their normal orneriness is coming out then these things that we had to put in place that everybody was so worried about are beginning to fade into the background."
She said while the year is settling in, they are still answering some questions and are not sure when thing will completely return to normal.
And they are also looking for ways to continue to improve the year with the measures in place.
"I think the general consensus is that it feels good," Wentling said.
While most students returned to in-person learning at the beginning of the year, a few opted for a remote learning environment.
For those students, the school partnered with the Smoky Valley Virtual Charter school in Lindsborg.
"We already had a working relationship with them on some other school-related programs," Wentling said. "So they were able to us with those virtual online students."
While students working remotely are enrolled in both Holy Family and the charter school, some services are being provided by Holy Family, including monitoring test-taking.
Students who are temporarily out of class due to coronavirus exposure or mandated isolation also work virtually with their classroom teacher in order to stay caught up with their class.
So far, Wentling said some students have already had to quarantine this year, but there have been no confirmed cases in the school.
If a case does get confirmed, they are ready to adjust as needed to keep the year on track.
"We are going to do everything we can to keep the kids in class," Wentling said.