By the numbers

COVID-19 data for Hancock County

  • 641 cases
  • 38 deaths
  • 10,254 individuals tested
  • 6.3% positivity rate
  • 5 new cases on Aug. 6
  • 0 new deaths
  • 176 new individuals tested between July 21 and Aug. 6
  • 4.9% seven-day positivity rate between July 25 and 31
HANCOCK COUNTY — Mt. Vernon High School students will start the academic year later this month attending classes in person on some days and virtually on others.

The change, which the district’s school board approved Friday, Aug. 7, will result in fewer students being in school at a time when classes commence on Aug. 17. Officials say it will allow students to distance more and make contact tracing easier if any test positive for COVID-19, which is already known to have occurred in two of Hancock County’s three public school districts that have started the 2020-21 year.

Casey Dodd, principal of Mt. Vernon High School, explained at Friday’s board meeting that students will be split into two groups by last name. One group will attend school in person on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and attend virtually on Tuesdays and Thursdays while the other group does the opposite. The following week, they’ll switch days.

The change will be in effect for the first semester, during which it will be revisited and reassessed, Dodd said.

Dodd said instead of having close to 1,400 students in the high school at one time, there’d be close to 580, after taking into account students who have chosen to start the year taking part solely in virtual instruction.

He said many of the high school’s classes have up to 30 students in them, sometimes more, making it difficult to maintain the 6 feet of social distancing that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recommended throughout the pandemic.

“What this would allow us to do is have that greater physical distancing while allowing in-person instruction to take place,” Dodd said. “Essentially you’d have about half of your students in a classroom at a time. It’s not perfect, because we go by alphabet, and of course they’re going to different classes throughout the day, but it does allow us to reduce those numbers down to where realistically we’re able to provide 6 feet between all of our students now in classes.”

The change will also mean fewer students in halls, in the cafeteria and on buses, Dodd said. He added traffic will be reduced in and around Mt. Vernon’s main campus as well, which along with the high school includes Mt. Vernon Middle and Fortville Elementary schools.

Having fewer students in the high school at a time would make contact tracing easier if a student ever tests positive, Dodd also said. He added it’s more difficult for a high school to split up and group students than a middle or elementary school.

“Because they are moving from one class to the next, they can’t stay in one group nearly as easily,” he said. “You could have a freshman and a sophomore in the same class, so you can’t just keep all the freshman together or all the sophomores together, and so on.”

Kellie Freeman, president of the school board, agreed.

“Maybe there won’t be any big outbreaks, and let’s hope there’s not, but this will make everything so much more manageable, which will in turn keep us from having to shut the whole thing down and going virtual all the way,” Freeman said.

Dodd also said exceptions to the hybrid schedule would be able to be made in certain cases, including for students receiving special education. He added it’s possible students receiving special education would be able to attend more, if not all school days a week in person.

All high school students, including those doing solely virtual instruction, will continue to be able to participate in extracurricular activities, Dodd said. He said the school is considering transportation options for students attending school from home on days they have activities, which could include buses picking them up at assigned locations.

Dodd said a calendar will be provided to high school families outlining the new schedule and messaging will be dispersed regularly throughout the semester reminding students which days they attend classes in person and which they attend virtually.

He also referred to a survey that drew almost 1,450 responses from high school families and staff members indicating the majority support the hybrid model.

Dodd told the Daily Reporter that teachers will be able to adapt to the change well, as they’ve already been preparing to teach students who have opted to start off the year virtually.

“Our teachers are already going to be conducting their classes virtually with students who have elected to do that, so now we would be following that same process, just with half your students in your classroom, the other half outside,” he said.

Along with Freeman, school board members Tony May and Shannon Walls voted in favor of the new schedule. Mike McCarty and Beth Smith were not present. The emergency meeting was held at 8 a.m. Friday.

“I think that Mt. Vernon has been ahead of the curve as far as preparing our district to return safely, because we want students in our buildings, and I think this is just another example of us doing the right thing to get as many kids in on a daily basis as safely as we can,” Walls said.

It’s the second big change Mt. Vernon has announced concerning the start of the school year in recent weeks, after deciding late last month to push the first day of school from July 29 to Aug. 17.

Greenfield-Central Schools started on July 30 and reported a student in attendance had tested positive for COVID-19. Southern Hancock and Eastern Hancock started on Aug. 3. Southern Hancock reported a student who tested positive for the virus had been in attendance on the first day.

Jennifer McCormick, the state’s school superintendent, said during a webinar Thursday that she thinks schools can safely reopen despite mounting reports of students and staffers testing positive for the coronavirus within days of returning to the classroom in some districts. She said that she thinks it’s best for medical experts to determine if, when or how schools should reopen.

The state health commissioner, Dr. Kristina Box, said Wednesday that she thinks it’s safe for schools to reopen during the pandemic and that having a positive case of the virus in a school “should not be a cause for panic or a reason to close.”

The Associated Press contributed to this story.
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