San Diego Unified welcomed back tens of thousands of students Monday for its first day of school, marking the first time the district is open for full-time in-person learning since the pandemic began.
This time COVID testing, mask wearing and other precautions dominated the first-day-back activities and discussion.
The goal is to have as many students learning in-person at school as safely as possible, said Howard Taras, a UC San Diego pediatrician and the school district’s in-house physician.
“No one wants another year like last year where so many children were learning from home,” Taras said at a news conference Monday morning.
In order to allow all students onto campus, schools have to compromise social distancing and double down on other COVID safety measures, Taras said.
The three most important measures are masks, ventilation and COVID testing, he said.
San Diego Unified is requiring all students and staff to wear masks both indoors and outdoors while on campus. State rules currently require universal masking only while indoors.
Per state rules, all San Diego Unified school staff also must be either fully vaccinated or undergo weekly COVID testing, whether showing symptoms or not.
All San Diego Unified students will also undergo COVID testing at their schools once a week, except for students whose families opt them out of regular testing, said San Diego Unified School Board President Richard Barrera. The point of such surveillance testing is to detect COVID cases before they spread in schools, experts say.
Not all students are choosing to come back to school. State law requires San Diego Unified and all public schools and districts to offer a remote learning option for students who don’t want to attend school in-person due to COVID concerns.
The vast majority of San Diego Unified students are choosing in-person school. Fewer than 800 out of the district’s roughly 100,000 students signed up for the district’s virtual school, said Interim Superintendent Lamont Jackson.
What’s still up in the air for San Diego Unified is how exactly schools will continue teaching students who have to isolate or quarantine at home, either because they test positive for COVID or because they come into close with someone at school who does.
State rules say students and school staff must stay home for up to 10 days if they test positive for COVID or if they come in close at school with someone who tests positive.
Close s don’t have to quarantine at home if they are asymptomatic and fully vaccinated. They can also stay at school if they’re asymptomatic, if they and the COVID-positive person were wearing masks at the time of exposure, and if they undergo twice-weekly testing.
San Diego Unified’s back-to-school guide for parents currently says that for students who must stay home for 10 days due to a positive COVID test or close , “an independent study contract can be requested for the student to complete.” But it’s unclear what kind of instruction the student will get or from which teacher.
As of now, students’ classroom teachers, the district’s virtual school teachers and district resource teachers will help teach students who are at home, Barrera said, but the person who teaches students may vary by school and by student.
Jackson and Barrera said ideally students would get live instruction from a teacher while quarantining or isolating at home.
The district is negotiating with the teachers union now about a more definitive instruction policy for students who have to isolate or quarantine at home, Barrera said.
At some area public schools, separating for the first time since the COVID pandemic was emotional for students and parents.
Jahmaika Edwards gave her son one last hug with tears in her eyes before he entered his first grade classroom at San Diego Cooperative Charter School in Linda Vista.
The mother of two hasn’t been apart from her children since the military family moved from Virginia to San Diego last year, so she was feeling a lot of emotions, she said, aside from any concerns about COVID.
“I just want them to be safe,” Edwards said, after wiping her eyes. “I want them to be growing and happy.”
Dozens of kids wearing colorful masks filled the charter school’s playground. Some parents said quick goodbyes before dropping off their children and others stuck around, even ing Zoom meetings on their phones, to watch their kids interact with other students and teachers.
“My heart is just bursting,” said Sarah Saluta, executive director of San Diego Cooperative. “They make me so happy, and being in a school with no kids is a lonely place.”
Usually parents are allowed to stick around in the classrooms, but this time, to keep everyone safe, parents had to stay outdoors on the first day of school, Saluta said. Parents will still be allowed to volunteer in the classrooms, but they will have to show proof of vaccination and sign up for a time slot.
Other COVID precautions involve temperature checks for students every day, onsite COVID testing for any kids or staff with symptoms and parents are asked to screen their children at home prior to arriving on campus.
Tnhin Giang spent the morning videotaping his son’s first day in kindergarten. He said his son is used to COVID-19 precautions and wearing a mask, because it’s pretty much what he had to do in daycare.
“It has a feel of normalcy to it,” Giang said.
At Mira Mesa High School hundreds of students swarmed the school’s campus. Mask compliance was high among students; essentially everyone seen in the school’s main quad was wearing a mask.
Several students said they are glad to see their friends again and be back at school, where some said it’s easier to focus on schoolwork.
Other students said they were nervous and hesitant about coming back.
Lauryn Rosemond, an 18-year-old senior, said she’s worried because COVID case rates have been rising and there might be people on campus who are not vaccinated. She worries about bringing COVID home because her mother runs a daycare, and none of those kids are old enough to get vaccinated.
Rosemond said she thought she was going to spend the rest of her high school career learning from home.
“It just feels surreal to me,” she said. “I never thought I’d come back.”
Many Mira Mesa High students said they don’t mind wearing masks throughout the school day; they feel safe on campus because everyone is wearing one.
“It’s the bare minimum,” Rosemond said. “I feel like it’s what everyone should be doing.”
So far there have been 17 outbreaks in K-12 schools in San Diego County involving 84 COVID cases from July 19 to Aug. 22, county officials said Monday. The first San Diego County school districts went back to school in mid-July.
