HOULTON, Maine — With remote learning continuing for the foreseeable future, the RSU 29 school board voted on Monday to approve a distance learning plan for its students.
The RSU 29 school board met using the teleconferencing website Zoom, with a relatively small agenda. The lone action item was to approve the continuation of the district’s remote learning plan, which is both to address the current pandemic and any future school closures of this magnitude in the future.
The goal of the learning plan is to “implement an alternative instructional process that is flexible yet provides students in RSU 29 with continuity in learning during a time when the district must be closed,” according to the document.
Achieving this goal requires several objectives and also an understanding that this plan may look different at the elementary, middle and high school levels.
The criteria of the learning plan states that all of the work being done remotely must be “meaningful” and connected to essential learning objectives.
RSU 29 Superintendent Ellen Halliday explained there was a need for equity of learning opportunities for students who may not have internet access in their home. In addition, students with disabilities need to be provided services and accommodations to the greatest extent possible.
“Given the circumstances and what we all have on our plates, I think we have done all right,” she said. “There is no real guidance for this [distance learning] and what it looks like is a little bit different over the state.”
She said many of the schools the size of Houlton and larger have tended to look at learning opportunities being mostly grounded in review and extensions of concepts that students already learned.
“The reason for this is we have to be continually cognizant of the fact that we have students in our communities that don’t have devices to learn online, or internet access at home,” Halliday said. “We have a special education population that for whom it’s difficult to give the same accommodations we would normally give.”
According to the remote learning plan, RSU 29 teachers will “survey students to determine who has online access but will plan as if students do not have online access. Students will be provided with resources to continue learning and reviewing content covered in classes. Teachers will be available to answer questions and communicate with students and families as needed.”
Only students in grades six-12 are able to take their laptops home with them, but not every student was able to do so, Halliday explained. Students in RSU 29 must pay the insurance fee to be allowed to bring their devices home. She said some students may have also lost their privilege of taking their devices home with them for a variety of reasons.
Students in grades pre-kindergarten through fifth grade do not have individual devices at the school. Those students have been receiving paper packets with homework assignments.
Halliday added she was amazed at how well the staff and students came to embrace the remote learning environment.
“The teachers dug in and did exactly what they needed to do,” she said. “The ed techs, kitchen staff, bus drivers, custodians, you name it, every facet of this operation buckled down. It goes to show what an amazing district we have here.”
Student representative Nolan Jacobs said the senior class was naturally curious what the future holds for things such as graduation, prom and the spring sports season.
“Obviously it is not too easy for us,” Jacobs said. “But I think we are all working through it. We understand the situation and why it is happening. We have faith in the administration. We know everybody is working really hard for us. [Graduation] might be delayed or in a different way, but it is all for the right reasons.”
Board chairman Fred Grant echoed his praises for the district’s staff and administration.
“I want to thank everyone in the district as we enter new territory for education,” Grant said. “I never in a million years thought we would be in a place like this. But we are all managing through this pandemic in our own individual ways. It is remarkable to think of all of the efforts that are going into a closure of this magnitude and how quickly people adjusted to make it happen.”
