Five Towns schools await state Covid guidance

After months of awaiting requirements for school operations from the New York State Department of Health and State Education Department, the school districts and schools in the Five Towns received the needed guidance and have developed reopening plans.

As the story went to press, new Gov. Kathy Hochul announced she plans to mandate masks and vaccinations in schools.

The Lawrence School District plans to continue indoor masking for students and staff in their buildings and on the school buses. Masks will be supplied by the district, with roughly 50,000 having been purchased.

Students will be granted mask breaks – designated times and outdoor areas where they are allowed to remove their masks. Lawrence Superintendent Dr. Ann Pedersen said that the mask breaks are at the teachers discretion. “The teacher in the classroom gets a feel for the kids,” she said, adding the teachers will evaluate classroom conditions and determine the students comfort levels.

The Hebrew Academy of Long Beach used a parent survey to help design its fall reopening plan, with the majority of parents favoring in-person learning. HALB includes kindergarten through eighth grade school in Woodmere, Davis Renov Stahler Yeshiva High School for Boys, also in Woodmere, Stella K. Abraham High School for Girls in Hewlett Bay Park and the Lev Chana Early Childhood Center, also in Hewlett Bay Park.

Indoor masking at the high schools will be implemented, and student desk shields will be used for grades five through 12, allowing students to remove their masks when sitting at their desks during low risk scenarios.

HALB’s elementary and Lev Chana classes will be broken up into fixed groups so that if an infection occurs, only the infected group has to quarantine. HALB will be using an app to collect home health screening data and will require individual temperature and symptom screenings before entering its schools.

In an Aug. 20 email to the Hewlett Woodmere School District community, Superintendent Ralph Marino Jr. outlined the district’s protocols. Indoor masking is required and a distance of three feet will be maintained between all students, staff and visitors.

Mask removal will only be permitted outdoors. Schools will be providing masks to those who need them. No home health screening data is required anymore and no notification letters about Covid positive members in the school community will be sent..

Both Lawrence and Hewlett-Woodmere ended the use of student-desk shields, giving classrooms increased normalcy. Lawrence and HALB school teachers’ desk shields will remain up to allow one-on-one conversations, based on school plans.

Pedersen acknowledged parent concerns concerning students who may not be consistent with their mask wearing because of issues such as anxiety. “We are always going to be responsive to student needs,” she said, adding that the district will have its mental health support team work with students who need extra help and teachers regularly practices positive reinforcement to verbally reward students for good behavior and mask-wearing.

Marino noted several mental health resources in the email, including school counselors, social workers, school psychologists and a partnership with Northwell’s Behavioral Health Center in Rockville Centre. “The social and emotional well-being of all of our students will continue to be a primary focus at all of our schools,” he stated in the email.

To help ensure their students are doing OK, HALB staff will be trained in mental health and trauma support, actively encouraging their students and peers to normalize asking for guidance and the schools have planned for high risk Covid scenarios, according to its reopening plans.

Hewlett-Woodmere and Lawrence will continue to assess conditions and implement new plans as needed based on the SED’s Health and Safety Guide, district officials said.