Nevada charter school board lifts in-person learning cap

Nevada’s public charter school authority voted Friday to remove a cap on how many students can attend in-person classes at any given time.

The Nevada State Public Charter School Authority’s board voted unanimously on the change. It means schools in counties with elevated levels of COVID-19 transmission — including Clark County — have the option of bringing more students back to buildings or offering more frequent in-person classes.

The board’s decision comes as a result of Gov. Steve Sisolak’s emergency directive last week that raises capacity limits in school buildings.

“These directives do provide more flexibility for in-person learning in schools,” Executive Director Rebecca Feiden said.

In August, the charter authority’s board approved a distance-learning mandate, saying schools in counties with high levels of coronavirus transmission could provide in-person instruction for up to 25 percent of their students at any given time. In November, the board relaxed the requirement, allowing schools to bring up to 40 percent of students to campuses.

Now schools don’t have a limit on how many students they can have on campus beyond those spelled out in Sisolak’s emergency directive.

The charter authority sponsors a few dozen schools — some of which have more than one campus — with a total of more than 50,000 students.

A school’s ability to have full-time in-person classes depends on school building capacity and what its school board decides, Feiden told the Review-Journal this week.

Feiden said the authority will review school plans, but it won’t be an approval process.

The decision comes as the Clark County School District prepares to transition to a hybrid model — two days a week in person and three days with distance learning — beginning Monday for preschool through third-grade students.

Under Sisolak’s new directive, schools that have operated for at least 20 days with in-person classes can increase to 75 percent capacity or 250 people in any given space. That’s up from 50 percent or a 50-person limit.

Schools also are now required to have 3 feet of social distancing space between all students. Before that, 6 feet was required for high schoolers.

Many Las Vegas-area public charter schools began the school year with 100 percent distance education but started bringing a limited number of students on campus in October under a hybrid model — either with half-day sessions or alternating days when students attend in-person classes.

Some schools switched temporarily back to full distance learning after Thanksgiving break, but many have since brought at least some students back to campus.

Schools operating with some level of in-person classes now have significant experience with mitigation measures, contact tracing and “all of the pieces of operating in person during the pandemic,” Feiden said.

School leaders have said they want to continue increasing in-person learning, she said, while raising concerns about students’ academic development and mental health.

“In the last month, Nevada has seen a significant decline in COVID-19 cases and the test positivity rate, though rates continue to remain high,” Feiden wrote in meeting materials posted online. “In addition, in each of the counties in which SPCSA-sponsored schools are located, educators are now eligible for and receiving vaccinations.”

Only 17 schools in the state aren’t currently offering least some in-person learning, Feiden said. Of those, three are full-time distance learning schools normally and several are Nevada State High School campuses.

Feiden said Friday the authority also plans to transition to have some in-person component to board meetings, including have some board members attend in person in the authority’s Southern Nevada office for the March meeting.

Girls Athletic Leadership School (GALS) Las Vegas, which has nearly 100 sixth and seventh graders, currently has about 40 percent of students on campus five days a week.

Now, the school – which is housed at the Boys & Girls Clubs of Southern Nevada’s Gaughan Club at UNLV’s campus – plans to reach out to parents next week to gauge their interest in having more students return in person.

The school could likely accommodate nearly all students in person under the state’s 75 percent occupancy cap, GALS Executive Director Jennifer McCloskey told the Review-Journal.

As for the board’s vote Friday to remove the cap on in-person learning, “of course, we think it’s wonderful,” McCloskey said, noting the school has advocated for in-person learning. “We believe that the best chance for the academic growth is for the in-person learning to occur.”

At Coral Academy — with six Las Vegas Valley campuses and about 3,750 students – the decision to lift the 40 percent cap on in-person instruction “gives our students the opportunity to resume hands-on learning and regain the in-person socialization that is critical to their continued health and success,” Executive Director and CEO Ercan Aydogdu said in a statement to the Review-Journal.

Legacy Traditional School, which has more than 4,500 students at three local campuses, was able to “successfully bring additional students back to campus when authorities permitted throughout this school year,” Deputy Superintendent Jennifer Hackett said in a statement to the Review-Journal. “For us at Legacy, increasing the 40 percent cap means continuing to be strict about mitigation efforts and ensuring the school communities understand expectations and the proper safety measures in place.”

During the meeting, the charter authority also:

—Provided conditional approval for a new charter school, TEACH Las Vegas.

The board denied the school’s original application in December, saying it didn’t meet minimum state requirements. The school is part of the TEACH Public Schools network, which currently has a few campuses in Los Angeles.

—Approved a charter amendment for Coral Academy of Science Las Vegas to allow the school add a seventh campus in the Las Vegas Valley.

Coral Academy, which currently has about 3,885 students, plans to open a campus in east Henderson beginning in the 2022-23 school year.

The new campus will be near the Pittman and Cadence neighborhoods, and would initially serve preschool through eighth grade students, but later expand through 12th grade.

Contact Julie Wootton-Greener at jgreener@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2921. Follow @julieswootton on Twitter.