Jordan School District Classes Move Online Starting Monday
Nov 12, 2020, 2:14 PM
WEST JORDAN, Utah – Thousands of students in the Jordan School District are now moving to online learning.
Fourteen more schools made the switch at the district level.
There was no school Thursday at the West Jordan Middle School, and on Friday students will have their regular remote learning day. Their official first day of online school, though, starts Monday.
“The school is close … go home,” said parent Frank Quintana, who was outside the school Thursday morning. “That’s pretty much what they told (my daughters) in the hallway, so they didn’t get to go in.”
WJMS is among more than a dozen schools in the district that will now be online only until the end of the mont due to a spike in COVID-19 cases.
“Last night we received an email saying it was canceled starting Monday,” Quintana said. “So I brought them to school and then we get this.”
Fortunately, his girls didn’t need anything from their lockers. According to the school’s Facebook page, Thursday was a teacher prep day, and students were allowed to enter the building for materials.
The switch to online came following an emergency district meeting Wednesday. The school district’s dashboard showed more than 400 active COVID-19 cases and more than 3,400 on quarantine district-wide.
West Jordan Middle School currently has 10 active cases and 42 people in quarantine. Those numbers don’t quite meet the health department’s threshold, but district leaders said the board makes decisions based on how many teachers, staff and students are on quarantine and the stress that puts on educators and students at each school.
“They’re teaching all day with the kids in their classes and spending all night with the kids on quarantine,” said Tracy Miller, Jordan School District Board vice president, during Wednesday’s meeting.
The switch is a challenging one, especially for parents balancing full-time work.
“I’m not a big fan of online because (my daughters) tend not to do their work,” Quintana said. “It’s hard to supervise them when you’re not home.”
His girls, on the other hand, said they like being at home but they miss their friends.
In-person learning will resume Nov. 30.
