Parents and teachers weigh in on South Bend Community School Corporation in-person class plan

SOUTH BEND, Ind. - South Bend Community School Corporation (SBCSC) has been operating under virtual instruction for the entire school year up until now. Coronavirus case numbers are to a point where district leaders want to move to a hybrid model of in-person and virtual learning for teachers and students. Two school board members, Rudy Monterrosa and Stuart Greene held a virtual listening session Sunday night to get the public's input on the idea.

"I feel like we're making a huge assumption that the in-person learning that we'll get in a hybrid model is going to automatically be superior to e-learning," said Riley High School Teacher Katherine Meier. "I'm not really convinced that's the case."

Meier said she is concerned the hybrid model will overwhelm teachers like her forcing them to prepare for their in-class sessions and virtual lesson plans at the same time. She feared it would "double my workload."

One parent said the district should give parents more options before moving to a hybrid model.

"(We need) More creative solutions to make sure that every student had what they need and not put that burden on our teachers and not put that burden on our families," said Riley High School Parent Delila Huerta.

Huerta said the district should give virtual learning more time.

"Yes, there are many families who need somewhere for their students to be," Huerta said. "It doesn't necessarily have to be in our schools. There are so many resources here, and I wish we should be spending more time creating those partnerships to really give the entire community an entire semester to get through this very difficult time."

Another parent, Amanda Mccray has two kids in SBCSC. She said it is time for them to get back into the classroom.

"The kids are just going stir crazy," Mccray said. "Trying to get them to keep up on their work has just been really difficult, and then, once they get far behind, it's really hard to get them caught up."

Another parent said he wanted to see the district ramp up its testing procedures.

"I haven't heard anything about testing, and I guess we just gave up on testing because it was too expensive," SBCSC Parent Brad Ogdale said. "One of the things I think of is the whole Notre Dame football team. All the reason we probably know if they even had it, I think they were asymptomatic. So, we're going to have a bunch of asymptomatic students, possibly teachers in the building, and we won't even know."

The school board is expected to vote on moving to a hybrid model of learning for students and teachers on Monday.