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Bettendorf Schools Return to In-Person Fulltime

Thanks to a new state law, beginning this week Iowa schools must offer in-person learning five days a week. Since the fall, students in the Bettendorf schools have followed a hybrid schedule with 2 1/2 days a week in school, and learned remotely the rest of the time.

Superintendent Michelle Morse says students will be required to wear masks and to wash their hands frequently. But social distancing is going to be difficult.

"As we've communicated to parents, we're going to try to create as much social distancing as we can, in the classrooms, outside of the classrooms, and at lunch time, but we can't guarantee that we will always be able to maintain that six feet."

Seating charts will be used to keep elementary and middle school students apart at lunch time.

Credit Bettendorf School District
Bettendorf Superintendent Michelle Morse

"Not ideal for students who sometimes like to eat with different students on different days but that way if we should have a student test positive we can identify close contacts very quickly and hopefully have it to a limited group instead of more students."

Doctor Morse expects most of the district's 4,600 students will come to class in-person - a survey in January before the state law was passed showed 83 per cent of parents would choose full-time learning for their children, while 17 per cent would choose remote learning only.

Because of the holiday Monday, Bettendorf schools won't resume a full-time schedule until Tuesday.

A native of Detroit, Herb Trix began his radio career as a country-western disc jockey in Roswell, New Mexico (“KRSY, your superkicker in the Pecos Valley”), in 1978. After a stint at an oldies station in Topeka, Kansas (imagine getting paid to play “Louie Louie” and “Great Balls of Fire”), he wormed his way into news, first in Topeka, and then in Freeport Illinois.