Mary Jane Ramos, 13, and Steffon Lanus, 14, spent Thursday morning putting the finishing touches on their Popsicle-stick robots that used a simple hydraulic system controlled by water levels adjusted with syringes.
They were learning about Pascal’s law and how force works as they studied physics in Christopher Skinner’s summer school session at Escalante Middle School. Later in the day, they matched their robots in combat to see whose contraption was most adept moving at their Popsicle-stick arms up, down and sideways to jab, poke and push their opponent’s creation into submission.
It might not be apparent at first, but one big factor behind Skinner’s lesson plan was COVID-19.
“I thought of all the lesson plans I’ve taught, and this allows some semi-social distancing,” he said. “Last week, we did kites that took some space, too. The robots take up about 3 feet, then there’s 2 feet of tubing, so you’re guaranteed to be at least a few feet apart,” he said.
Like Skinner, teachers, administrators, parents and students are preparing for a school session unlike any taught before, a year of learning complicated by the novel coronavirus.
On Friday, Durango School District 9-R released its draft plan to return to school on Aug. 25, and it will begin a series of meetings seeking comments from teachers, staff members, parents and community members before it is finalized. Everything from social distancing, minimizing personal contacts, mask wearing – all the intricacies of life with the novel coronavirus must be taken into account.
District 9-R officials have already said any plan to return to school will have to be constantly modified as the epidemiological situation in Durango evolves and as more is learned about the nettlesome pathogen that has complicated everyone’s lives.
“It definitely is a huge asset to us not only to get kids back, engaged and learning but also to really put our systems into place,” said Superintendent Dan Snowberger. “Now, it’s easier to do that with 70 kids at the high school rather than a thousand kids and a full staff. We’ll still have to be constantly learning and refining, but this definitely helps us get in a trial run.”
Escalante Middle School Principal Jeremy Voss compares working on a schedule for the upcoming school year to solving “a giant math puzzle.”
“I never thought in my career I’d be working on a three-block schedule, but that’s what I’m doing right now,” he said.
Voss received guidance for dealing with COVID-19 for the upcoming school year Tuesday from the Colorado Department Education, and that set him off penciling out his first schedule and developing procedures for Escalante for the upcoming year.
“We’re looking at how many programs we can run through a three-block schedule, how to separate our kids into cohorts, how to minimize contacts, how to maintain as much distance as possible, the safest traffic flows. It’s not really something you can do in an hour,” he said.
Voss is grateful he has two weeks to tweak his model before the first kid walks through Escalante’s doors in fall.
“It’s a great big puzzle. It’s like a math problem and you have to lay out your formula, but you really won’t know if it works until the students show up,” he said.
Guillermo Mioni, 10, a student in Sarah North’s middle school math summer class, said he was happy to be back working with real teachers instead of interacting with them through computer and paper assignments delivered to his home.
“I prefer being in school. A teacher is right there to explain something to you,” Guillermo said. “It’s kind of boring sitting at home doing school work. You don’t see friends and you can’t work with people.”
North said summer school has been valuable because for the first time since March a teacher is present in flesh and blood to help students practice the essential, basic math skills they’ll need to tackle geometry in eighth grade.
“If you don’t use them, you lose them. Just like anything else,” North said of math skills.
Students have been more than happy to wear masks during summer school when they are told why they are necessary, she said.
“Sometimes you have to remind students to stay 6 feet apart,” she said. “No one’s really fighting the masks; sometimes you have to remind them to put their mask back on after they’ve had a drink of water.”
While working on her robot, Mary Jane said she prefers to be back in school, although she also found beneficial aspects to working remotely, mostly online last year.
“I prefer to come here, to school. I get to see my friends,” she said. “At home, you could work on your own time and take more time if you needed to. But I’m looking forward to coming back to school, to see friends and teachers. I learn better with teachers rather than following instructions on paper.”
parmijo@durangoherald.com
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