Students may be able to return to classrooms at Montgomery County Public Schools on Feb. 1 for the first time this academic year during the coronavirus pandemic.
The county school board tentatively approved a plan Tuesday to allow pupils to shift from online learning to partial in-person instruction at the start of the second semester if certain coronavirus health metrics are met.
Classrooms can reopen if the county’s 14-day average new case rate is less than 15 cases per 100,000 residents and the 14-day average test positivity rate is less than 5%.
The first group set to return includes students in pre-kindergarten, kindergarten, sixth grade and ninth grade, and those in select special education classes. The second group includes students in first, second, seventh and 10th grades, and the third group includes students in the remaining grades.
“Students will return to schools on a rotational schedule for in-person learning, with reduced class sizes and reduced numbers of students in the buildings,” according to the school district’s website.
The initial return-to-school plan was for children to begin going back starting Jan. 12.
DOCUMENT: MCPS Health Metric Matrix
• Emily Zantow can be reached at ezantow@washingtontimes.com.
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