Masks on faces, a lot on minds as students return to Modesto-area schools amid COVID surge
Thousands of Modesto-area students return to school buildings this week — some for the first time in a year and a half.
Schools are offering full in-person learning amid a surge in COVID-19 cases, including an increase in cases among young children because of the delta variant.
Nearly all students at drop-off Monday morning wore masks outside, even though they’re required only inside K-12 school buildings. Students and parents said they were excited about the prospect of a better education than children experienced during distance learning last year, but still worried about safety, academic setbacks and back-to-school nerves exacerbated by months of learning in isolation.
“Fingers crossed that they’re going to get through the year without COVID showing up again” at a level that would force students back into distance learning, said Chris Verges, who has a daughter at Somerset Middle School and a son at Sherwood Elementary School.
Districts are required to offer a distance learning alternative this year for students whose parents deem in-person instruction a health risk. Stanislaus districts enrolled at most 10% of their students in online independent study before the start of the fall semester, according to numbers provided by superintendents. Many superintendents said less than 5% of their students chose independent study.
Of the more than 30,000 students in Modesto City Schools, 1,588 students indicated interest in the district’s independent study option, Modesto Virtual Academy, according to numbers provided Friday.
Safety concerns remain
Hanshaw Middle School parent Alma Ramirez said she’s still considering whether returning to campus is the right decision for her son, who has autism. He has learned remotely throughout the pandemic. They’re both nervous about the coronavirus spreading.
“Hopefully, everything is good, he’ll be OK,” Ramirez said as she watched students through the school gates.
Modesto City Schools and Turlock Unified School District have said they want local control over setting mask policies. Though their requests won’t change safety measures, the gesture has worried some families.
“I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t afraid about going back, for a lot of reasons,” said Micah Littlepage, an incoming senior at Pitman High School in Turlock.
Littlepage said he’s really missed campus over the past year and a half, but he doesn’t want to go back to school if masks are not required. He plans to wear a face covering at all times, including outside.
Sabrina Pagan has four children at Sherwood Elementary. She said she’s happy that masks and social distancing still are protocols, but is glad there won’t be partitions around the desks, “so they don’t feel too confined.”
Last year was “horrible,” Pagan said. Two of her kids were kindergartners, and teaching them lessons like numbers was tough.
Jordan Matlock said he wasn’t sure how much his two sons would remember from last year. Candice Matlock said their two Sherwood students did well with distance learning, but an older son at Somerset got “off task” easily.
“I’m hoping that will be better this year now that he’s in-person full time. I think he’ll be reminded more, be held accountable more,” she said. “As a parent, it was difficult to hold him accountable last year when we don’t really know what’s going on. They have all these different platforms to look up their grades, but they’re all done so differently and it was really difficult to keep track of his assignments.”
Jose Alcala said he hopes his children are “able to learn a bit more than last year.”
Distance learning was hard on Alcala’s family. He has three children in elementary school, junior high and high school. Both parents work, and they had to reduce their hours to help their children with online school.
Students excited to be back
Alcala dropped off his first-grader at Fairview Elementary School, where staff members cheered and waved pom-poms as they ushered students through an outdoor hallway.
“They just want to be back,” Alcala said.
Fairview second-grader Victoria Alanis-Delrio said this year she’s looking forward to learning and doing fun activities like painting. She wore a blue button-up dress and a pink backpack for her first day.
“I feel good because a lot of my friends are already here,” she said as she waited to enter school gates surrounded by blue and white balloons.
Rainey Neri, an incoming junior at Enochs High School, said she’s most looking forward to participating in clubs, which she couldn’t do last year, and seeing her friends and teachers every day.
“I’m really excited to go back to pretty much almost normal,” she said.
Before the pandemic, Neri said she took school events and in-person learning for granted.
“Now, I’m very grateful that I have an opportunity to go back to school to finish out high school,” she said.
Hanshaw Principal Debbie Butler said campus looked like the first day two years ago.
Masked students clustered outside as music popular on TikTok played over school speakers. Many of the seventh- and eighth-graders flicked their wrists in unison when Doja Cat’s “Kiss Me More” played.
“The kids are excited to be here,” Butler said. “We’re excited to have them back.”
This story was originally published August 9, 2021 at 4:21 PM.
