Hills-Beaver Creek school officials adopted an e-learning plan to combat the effects of missing school days due to inclement weather.
Last year H-BC students missed nine days.
“The e-learning plan is, in part, a result of the greater amount of missed days,” said H-BC Superintendent Todd Holthaus.
Snow days prompted schools to add days at the end of the school year or forfeit planned vacations to make up for the lost classroom time, but after the 2018-19 school year, administrators are seeking a better, less disruptive learning plan.
State statute allows districts to count up to five days as instructional days even though students did not meet in a conventional classroom.
Legislators allowed for e-learning days for the first time during the 2018-18 school year.
While the state outlined a possible policy for districts to follow, H-BC officials adopted a plan specific to the district.
Under H-BC’s new e-learning plan, on days when weather conditions are too hazardous to bus students to the buildings in Beaver Creek and Hills, they will stay home and complete lessons electronically or from an e-learning folder with paper materials.
Little Patriots Preschool students will not complete e-learning sessions.
For elementary students, e-learning packets are stored in the students’ backpacks and kept updated to maintain relevant instructional materials for two days of instruction.
For junior and senior high students, lessons will be conducted electronically.
By 10 a.m. on a called “snow day,” students will utilize Schoology, Google email and/or other electronic applications to complete electronic lessons set up by teachers for each of the students’ class hours.
Directions and tasks will also be given to students who do not have Internet access at home.
“We are still working out the kinks about what this looks like,” said H-BC Secondary Principal Molly Schilling.
H-BC school board members passed the Flexible (E-learning) Plan at their July meeting.
All e-learning lessons must follow strict guidelines in order to count for a day of school. The lessons also are required to have relevance.
“It (the lesson) has to be something that is continuing the classroom instruction — about something they are currently learning,” she said.
On an e-learning day, teachers must be available by phone or email from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Paraprofessionals will have the opportunity to make up missed workdays or take personal leave or leave without pay for the snow day.
Instructors take student attendance on e-learning days. Students who do not participate or complete the e-learning activities will be counted as absent for the day.