While parents form covert Facebook groups and teachers mull collective action over the province’s back-to-school pandemic plan, some First Nations in the province are opting for specific, hands-on approaches to curb viral spread of COVID-19 in their communities.
The Cowessess First Nation’s plan is as detailed as a recipe for a complex stew, which is exactly how education director Sandy Pinay-Schindler wants it.
“We called it recipes. The principal, Natasha Isaac, she and I have been of course talking everyday … We talked about recipes. ‘Well what's the recipe, or the steps or the checklist, for going outside for recesses?'” she said.
The community, which sits about 165 kilometres east of Regina, just north of Broadview, decided on a four-option plan through its COVID-19 task force. That team includes Chief Cadmus Delorme, council members, Pinay-Schindler and Cowessess’ other program directors.
It calls for a delayed start to the school year, Sept. 14, to allow for sanitation and procedure prep work. Students will be bussed to the Cowessess Community Educational Centre in family groups, spaced out on the bus appropriately; Pinay-Schindler said this will likely mean multiple, staggered bus runs per day.
Once classes start on Sept. 14, the school will begin with Option 1: Class sizes will be fewer than 10 students; half the school’s approximately 220 pre-K to grade 12 students will be in the building, while the other half are at home; the two groups will alternate their attendances each day.
Option 2 goes into effect when the community deems it safe to do so, according to Delorme’s Twitter page. The second option utilizes in-school learning and community or employee mentorship.
Each morning, one half of the school’s student body will do in-classroom learning, with room counts still under 10 students; the other half will be learning from a community mentor or employee. The two halves switch in the afternoon.
Pinay-Schindler said one part of the mentorship program will be students learning their traditional language, Cree. It will also include instruction in Cree for other traditional tasks, like starting a fire in the bush or snaring a rabbit for hunting, she said.
Cowessess will stagger the school’s recess times, install thermal temperature gauges on busses and provide re-usable, washable masks to students and staff, among other measures.
The First Nation has not yet recorded a COVID-19 infection.
North of Regina, the Piapot First Nation is planning for an even later start date: Oct. 5.
“The staff returned this week, so we're going to do more detailed planning on routines and procedures (until that start date), because we all have to be on the same page,” said Nicole Crowe, principal of the community’s Chief Payepot School.
She estimated enrolment will be around 220 students, registered in elementary and high school grades.
“When they do return, we're going to start small, by having two cohorts (for each classroom) of 10 students and under,” Crowe said.
Similar to Cowessess, Piapot will be using an alternating format but spread out over a four-day school week. The first cohort of a given class will be in school all day Mondays and Wednesdays, while the second cohort will be in school on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
When a cohort is on its home day, students will be assigned homework packages.
Crowe said all students will have Fridays off; teachers and school staff will use the free day to sanitize the school, prep class lessons for the following week and evaluate if procedures need to be changed.
She also agreed it’s a good opportunity for everyone to take care of their mental health. “Now I think we all need it. A lot of teachers are unsure, parents are scared. Maybe that's our mental health day to support each other. I have children that attend here as well.”
Unlike the provincial government’s direction, Crowe said students in Grade 4 and up must wear a mask while at school; those in lower grades have to wear masks in common areas, but not in their home classrooms.
All of the school’s 16 classrooms have been decluttered, Crowe said, which means there will be more room for newly-purchased compact desks to be better spaced apart.
Among the school’s other procedures, it will be assigning supervisors to school buses to take each rider’s temperature and to ensure each family group remains sitting in its own clusters.
Out of Regina, Pro Metal Industries is helping with the Pasqua First Nations’ plans; it has built 300 clear, plastic barriers to be installed on the top of students’ and teachers' desks at the Chief Paskwa Education Cetnre.
The First Nation owns the company.
“We started prototyping fairly quickly,” after getting an initial call from Chief Todd Peigan for the barriers, said company president Mark Brown. “We settled on acrylic, which is like plexi-glass.”
Along with the barriers, the company manufactured 15 hand-washing stations for all of the school’s classrooms, along with foot-pump hand-sanitizing stations.
“It means a lot that we're protecting their young children, their students and their teachers. A lot of their teachers and their principal are all band members of Pasqua,” Brown said.
