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The California Department today released a 62 page guidebook for school districts about how to reopen schools in the fall.

It’s different from the state health guidelines released last week (see STATE OF CALIFORNIA RELEASES SCHOOL REOPENING GUIDELINES – IT’S GOING TO BE A HELL OF A FALL) and, to tell the truth, probably less helpful.

This new document is primarily a list of questions that districts have to answer, and it’s unlikely that they haven’t been asking themselves all of them already. If they haven’t, I’ve got to question the competence of the leadership at those districts.

At the same time, however, I don’t really think they could have come out with anything much better at this time. What we really need are answers, and no one is going to have them for awhile longer as we all await both data from schools reopening around the world and learning if the federal government is going to deliver more money for schools in a stimulus package.

However, there are a few answers the state could provide now.

It could provide information on issues like attendance and instructional minutes requirements, along with state assessment expectations.  Now, that information could help districts answer some of those questions the new document lists.

As this headline from The San Francisco Chronicle article about the new document says, California’s guide to reopening schools prompts more questions than it answers.

The article also contains what I think is a pretty bizarre statement from the Superintendent of the Manteca school district saying they will be releasing a detailed reopening plan in the next week or two announcing precisely what they will be doing. That sounds pretty crazy to me.

The San Jose Mercury News has a pretty good overview of the document at Coronavirus: California Department of Education releases guidance for reopening schools.

I’m adding this post to THE BEST POSTS PREDICTING WHAT SCHOOLS WILL LOOK LIKE IN THE FALL.