School Reopening Date Set For District 65 As ETHS Remains Remote

EVANSTON, IL — Public elementary and middle schools in Evanston are scheduled to allow students to return next month for the first time since last March. Meanwhile, Evanston Township High School recently resumed some extracurricular activities, although the older students are set to stick with remote learning until further notice.

Evanston/Skokie School District 65 Superintendent Devon Horton said Wednesday that the district would begin offering an option of a hybrid of remote and in-person learning starting Feb. 16.

The hybrid learning program will continue as long as the rolling seven-day average of the coronavirus positivity rate remains below 12 percent and state public health officials do not roll the state back from Phase 4 to Phase 3 of the Restore Illinois COVID-19 reopening plan, Horton announced.

"This decision to launch our hybrid learning model was not made hastily. Nor as a result of political pressuring," Horton said Wednesday in a message to the school community. "From the very beginning, I have said that science and safety will be drivers in our decision-making. In consultation with our medical advisors, we revised our health metrics to make district-wide decisions on transitioning between instructional models (remote, hybrid, in-person)."

According to the district's website, administrators are taking into account coronavirus test positivity rates for suburban Cook County and local ZIP codes. No per capita measurements reflecting the number of new infections are included.

But according to the interim school guidance for local health departments from the Illinois Department of Public Health, metrics for school determination of community spread include the per capita rate of new cases and the rate of spread.

Families of about half of District 65 students had told district officials they would opt in to some form of hybrid learning as of last month, according to administrators.

'WHITE SUPREMACY' CONTROVERSY

Horton's announcement came a day after he publicly addressed email exchanges with parents critical of the district's progress toward reopening schools and accused a local newspaper of misrepresenting his remarks.

In one of the emails, a parent told Horton and the board's leadership that they were "disappointed and frankly disgusted" by District 65's handling of the pandemic. Horton, who is Black, accused the parent, whose race isn't clear, of making personal attacks against him.

"In the world that we live in I'm sure that you have not had to reflect on your white [supremacist] thinking and way of life," Horton responded. "I refuse to sit back and be assaulted about my decision making to not return to in person learning especially when the undertone is outright [racist]."

The exchange was first reported in the Evanston RoundTable on Jan. 14. On Tuesday, the district posted a 45-minute video discussion with Horton, administrators and board members addressing the news report. The superintendent later clarified that he does not believe that anyone who advocates for in-person learning is a white supremacist — but he does think that the manner by which some people are doing so is harmful and rooted in white supremacy.

In the video, he accused the RoundTable of misrepresenting his remarks and editorializing, describing it as "unfortunate and curious" that the newspaper did not allow him to further clarify his remarks before publication.

"It appears those words were cherry picked from that exchange in order to incite anger around an editorial narrative, especially during a time when things are so delicate in our country," Horton said.

"I want to acknowledge that in expression of my response to the communication and engagement style directed at me, I recognize the challenging task of navigating a lack of knowledge about words and statements that create a feeling of racism," he said.

"Healthy and authentic navigation of productive equity education will continue to be a focus for me and our team in the midst of these challenging times," the superintendent added. "In my use of the language 'white supremist tone' I am describing my experience of enactment that results in maintenance of the social organization of white superiority within systems, institutions, individuals and the interpersonal engagements between individuals."

ETHS NOT READY TO REOPEN

Evanston Township High School administrators are not relying on any specific metrics to determine when they will begin offering some in-person classes. Instead, the administration is relying on various, unspecified factors.

ETHS Superintendent Eric Witherspoon welcomed the announcement of District 65's Feb. 16 launch of a hybrid learning option and said he hoped it would be successful.

"They are in the same situation that all of us are in, it is dependent on so many variables," Witherspoon said Friday. "But they are acknowledging, as we are, that the metrics, that the data is moving in the right direction. And so, given what they know today, they anticipate that they will be able to move into some in-person, hybrid opportunities for their students."

Witherspoon said research shows children under age 13 are at a lower risk from COVID-19.

"So we're going to monitor closely what they're able to do and how that impacts our community and we're also going to be able to follow the research and the science about adolescents," he said.

"An elementary school is structured in a very different way from a high school," he noted. "In an elementary school, they have smaller schoolwide enrollments, but they also are so often self-contained in individual classrooms, where it's much easier to create 'pods' and to really avoid much movement around the building compared to a large, comprehensive high school that has nearly 4,000 students and over 600 employees."

With Evanston's move into Tier 2 regional coronavirus restrictions this week, district officials announced winter sports practices would resume, with schedules for "contact days" expected by early next month. Staff in charge of arts and other extracurricular activities are "making plans to determine what opportunities may be available," families were told Thursday.

ETHS Principal Marcus Campbell said administrators hoped to be able to bring students back on campus for some in-person learning before the end of the school year. Speaking during the district's video update Friday, he said the efforts to get vaccines to teachers in the state's second priority group, Phase 1b, were encouraging.

"We are hopeful that all educators in Evanston will have an opportunity to be vaccinated in the near future," Campbell said. "Hopefully, 'near future' means the next couple of weeks."