Essex Tech CTE Students To Return To Campus 5 Days March 17

DANVERS, MA — Essex Tech intends to bring back 75 percent of its students full-time on March 17 while developing a plan to return the remaining students to in-classroom learning soon thereafter.

Superintendent Heidi Riccio said the plan — which the school committee approved on Wednesday — will return the Career Technical Education full-time, while academic classes remain in a hybrid- or remote-learning model until a final plan for all students to return is developed and approved.

Students will have the option to remain fully remote through the end of the school year.

"As a career technical and agricultural school committed to workforce preparation, it is critical to our mission that we transition our students back to in-person learning as soon as possible," Riccio said. "We conducted a parent survey in February and nearly 90 percent of caregivers fully support our effort to return students to school.

"We are hopeful with the governor's announcement regarding vaccinations for K-12 educators that our staff will be prioritized for those who desire to be vaccinated."

Gov. Charlie Baker said on Wednesday that teachers will be eligible to sign up for appointments from state facilities as of March 11 to avoid confusion with the federal guidelines after President Joe Biden said Tuesday night all teachers across the country should have access to at least a first dose of the vaccine by the end of the month.

"We think teachers should part of the game starting next week, and they will be eligible for appointments," said Baker, noting there are still more than 600,000 state residents age 65 or older or with two or more underlying health conditions waiting for appointments. "If the feds dramatically increase supply to help states deliver on this directive from the White House that would be terrific because we have the capacity in Massachusetts to do far more vaccinating than we do actual vaccine."

CVS opened educator eligibility for the federal pharmacy program as of Wednesday morning.

"This was a challenging school committee meeting as there was great conversation related to the Phase 2 reopening plan," Riccio said. "We recognize that many educators want to be vaccinated before increasing our in-person student population. However, there is no guarantee as to when vaccinations will occur.

"Additionally, we believe we are doing this with the best interest of students in mind."

Essex Tech will make changes to transportation to allow more students to take the bus, while adhering to physical distancing, hand-washing, cleaning and masking protocols.

Riccio plans to offer summer CTE learning opportunities for students to make up for skill development that may have been lost when schools went to a fully remote model one year ago.

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(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)

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