The Beckman High football team was eager to finally participate in its first football practice of the season — even if it was a little light on football.
Prep football games that were supposed to kick off this week have instead been pushed back to January by the pandemic. But, as the Orange County Register reported, athletes are now permitted to take part in outdoor conditioning drills. On Wednesday, Beckman players returned to their campus for a practice that featured temperature checks, social distancing and face masks.
“We had four months off between seeing each other and doing an actual workout together,” running back Jett Daviss told the Register. “It’s nice for us to be around each other again.”
And here are some of other education stories from the week ending Aug. 28:
- Say goodbye to the COVID-19 watchlist. Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday announced a new color-coded system for tracking county progress based on new case rates and testing positivity percentages. Orange County will debut in the most restrictive category, but the local health officer says K-12 campuses should be in a position to resume on-site instruction as early as Sept. 8 if OC’s numbers continue trending in the right direction.
- State health officials released new guidance for smaller cohorts, including settings that provide small-group learning for students with special needs, after-school programs, child care programs and “hubs” for distance learning. The Orange County Register had a story with reactions from parents and educators.
- Even though Orange County’s COVID-19 rates are improving, transmission rates continue to exceed state thresholds in specific ZIP codes, creating localized hotspots that are of concern to public health officials, writes OC Superintendent Al Mijares.
- The Huntington Beach Union High School District announced reopening plans for athletics and performing arts programs that were paused at the outset of the COVID-19 crisis.
- As schools finalize plans for on-site instruction, public health officials have expressed concern that many local children have fallen behind on their vaccinations during the pandemic.
- Zoom, the super-popular video-conferencing platform used by schools for distance learning, experienced technical difficulties across the country on Monday, causing headaches for local teachers and students. The Laguna Beach Unified School District said it was forced to cancel Zoom sessions on the first day of school.
- The California Supreme Court has agreed to hear a pair of lawsuits seeking to reopen schools for in-person instruction, including one filed by the OC Board of Education.
- Teachers took temperatures and offered air hugs to students on the first day of on-site instruction at Fairmont’s Historic Anaheim Campus, which qualified for a waiver to reopen in person.
- Distance learning may be necessary, but some parents with autistic children say it doesn’t work well for their kids, and they’re asking for help.
- For nearly 15 years, OCDE’s Family & Community Partnerships network has been building relationships between schools, homes and communities. The network’s services, now mostly virtual, have become even more important during the pandemic.
- Schools across the country are reporting shortages of laptops and other devices needed for distance learning, the Associated Press reported.
- And finally, the Anaheim Union High School District, in partnership with Waste Not OC and Impact the Change, unveiled a fully sustainable solar-powered freezer to store thousands of frozen meals for people in need.
This is the part where we encourage you to keep up with local education news stories by bookmarking the OCDE Newsroom, subscribing for emailed updates and following us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.