Back to School for Matty

Matty returned to school on Thursday, 3/25. He was feeling quite nervous that morning, but he did great and is now getting back into a groove. The day before he was set to return, he learned that his close buddy Will was not going back to in-person learning. I walked in the door from a meeting with our contractor, and Matty was sitting at his computer crying. Poor buddy. Matty and Will are in the same class this year, and Will is Matty's closest friend in the class. All of his other buddies have different teachers. Well, it turned out that too many children in their class chose to return to school for in-person learning. Mrs. Kallevig can only hold 16 students in her class in order to keep everyone six feet apart, and 18 students opted to come back. As a result, two of the 18 were being moved to a different class/different teacher in order to keep the students socially distant. Will was one of the two students. Will's mom is very ill and has been in the hospital or a rehab facility for the better part of a year, so if there is one student whose life should not be disrupted, it is Will! I called Will's dad and he said he decided to keep Will remote (and still in Mrs. Kallevig's class because the 4th and 5th grade teachers are live-streaming their classes, unlike grades K-3) as opposed to forcing him to change teachers. So, the boys still have the same teacher, but one goes to school and the other does not. What a cluster!

Both boys seem to enjoy being back to school. It is far from normal. They are home by 12:45 every day and still have some meetings over zoom in the afternoon. When they get on the bus in the mornings, they have to sit one child per seat and they must wear a mask at all times. Sometimes when the bus pulls away from the bus stop, I feel like I am sending my boys away on the prison bus.

I hope and pray our school district finds a way to make this work for all students and teachers and to have some level of normalcy in the fall. The past 13 months have been awful, and the teachers' union is making it ridiculously difficult for our district to get a plan in place.

Secondary students return on 4/15, starting with the latter half of the alphabet on 4/15 & 4/16. Taylor's first day back will be 4/19. She will go full day on Mondays and Tuesdays for the remainder of the year. I am beyond excited for her. It has been a LONG 403 days. This morning, I took her to Maywood Middle School for a quick tour of the school. She was in and out of the school within 10 minutes, but you should have seen the smile on her face when she walked out! Strangely, several of her friends also have last names that start with "B & C" - Bailey, Brown, Brown, Crumpacker - so she was able to go to orientation with familiar faces (the orientation times were spaced by last name). The other moms and I took the girls for donuts afterwards. It makes me so happy to see my little socialite feeling more and more normal now.

More to come!