BUFFALO, N.Y. (WBEN) - School officials in Western New York are cautiously optimistic that planning for next school year will be much easier than it was a year ago, but they are still waiting the official state guidance from the New York State Education Department.
The planning for next year became more confusing for officials after New York's COVID-19 state of emergency ended Thursday, which also ended the governor's unilateral control.
"How the legislature or governor provides guidance in this new framework, I'm not really sure," Hamburg Schools Superintendent Michael Cornell, who is also President of the Erie Niagara Superintendent's Association, said. "We're just kind of waiting to see what happens."
Governor Andrew Cuomo said prior to relinquishing his emergency powers that New York will continue to follow CDC guidance. According to CDC guidance, updated school guidance will be released "in the coming weeks."
Some of the questions school leaders have include whether or not school employees and students will have to fill out daily reports about their health, the mask policy, social distancing, isolation rooms, and more.
"There are a lot of open-ended questions that we still need to really work through and communicate to our families," Niagara Falls Superintendent Mark Laurrie said. "Do we need to offer remote learning as an option? The silence, to me, tells me we don't need to offer it and that's what I'm supporting. We can use a remote-learning option on a case-by-case basis for individual students in need. Otherwise, starting in September, the expectation is that all students come back five days in school in the regular 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. hours."
The Erie Niagara Superintendents Association previously sent a letter to the governor's office asking for fall guidance to be released earlier this month. It didn't happen. Cornell said the June 4 goal would have given the district ample opportunity to address stakeholders about the plans and whatever their concerns were.
"Here we sit (today) and we don't have any guidance for schools next year," Cornell said. "The guidance that we get has to be based on the science. One of the areas of frustration...was that following the guidance for schools we have gotten from the state hasn't always meant the same thing as following the science. There have been times people haven't been able to identify what the scientific basis was for one piece of guidance or another. While we wait for guidance, generally, we also anticipate generally having guidance that has a scientific basis."
Sam Radford, a parent at Buffalo Schools and Co-Chair of the organization "We The Parents", said student safety needs to be a priority for the fall.
"I think the CDC guidance should be considered," Radford said. "Ultimately the focus has to be on the children reading, writing, doing math...and being career-ready in a healthy environment. The CDC guidance, I think, should be followed. I think that's more challenging if you have to mask and socially distance. Hopefully, collectively, we can do the things we have to do as a community so that our children can be in schools without masks and without having to social distance."
