There is an end date to Seneca Valley students' full-time online learning — at least for now.

Under a tentative plan passed by the district's school board Monday, primary students will learn remotely through Jan. 4 and then transition back to the cohort model, while secondary students will learn remotely through Jan. 12 before shifting to blended learning.

The longer time frame for the older students is because, according to superintendent Tracy Vitale, the district has seen higher levels of COVID-19 cases among secondary students than primary students.

“That gives us more time, with the teenagers, to assess COVID cases and the spread with teenagers,” she said. “As we know, the percentages with children ages 11 and up are much higher to date than they are with our ages 5-10, so we need more time to assess, with our secondary students, the potential of holiday spread and winter break spread and how many cases we have.”

The plan is tentative because Butler County could very well still have high levels of COVID-19 transmission in January. Currently, more than 300 residents per 100,000 in the county have contracted the illness in the past 14 days, and the positive test result rate is nearly 13%.

“I know everyone would like a plan that would be solidified and in stone, but as we know these updates from our state, and the rules keep changing weekly based on community transmission and based on other factors,” Vitale said. “...There are a lot of factors that have to take place and need to occur this month in order for this to happen, but our intent is and will always be, for those who choose the (in-person) instructional model, that we have an option for them.”

It's also not only the spread among students that must be considered. A large factor in the district's move to remote learning this semester was the number of teachers and other employees who were either ill or in quarantine after being informed by the state health department that they were a close contact of an infected individual.

“With both K-6 and 7-12, we need time to assess: Do we have the staff?” Vitale said. “Because even if our staff is being very careful at work, there is so much community spread — as I reported earlier, we have seven staff that have COVID and children aren't in session — and so we need to make sure that when staff returns on the fourth, that we have the available staff to teach.”

Seneca's tentative plan also remains vague about what learning model will be utilized for primary students after the semester break on Jan. 18, and for secondary students after Jan. 26. In a letter sent to parents Monday, the district said the learning models at those points “are to be determined.”

For the district to move to five-day-a-week in-person learning, Butler County must be in the “moderate” level of COVID-19 transmission for at least two weeks, according to guidance from the state Departments of Health and Education.

“We need to have less than 100 new cases in a seven-day period, and we need to hit other benchmarks, like the PCR positivity rate — it needs to be lower than 10% — in order for us to be in a five-day-a-week, in-person model and to have that as an option,” Vitale said.

The Department of Education has also updated guidance for schools during the time of the coronavirus based on the size of the school. Seneca Valley's grades K-6 schools are in the “medium” category, while its 7-12 schools are in the “large” size designation. Seneca's letter to parents stated this recommendation will be followed by the district when it comes to school closures based on cases in the buildings.

For medium-sized schools, buildings should be closed for three to seven days if four to six students and staff in the building test positive in a rolling 14-day period while the county is in the “moderate” or “substantial” range; if the county is in the “low” transmission range, the building should be closed for three to five days. If more than seven students and staff test positive during that rolling two-week period, buildings should close for 14 days, according to the education department, regardless of the county transmission.

At large-sized schools, these numbers are a bit higher. Schools should close for three to seven days in the event six to 10 students and staff test positive in a 14-day period while the county is in the “moderate” or “substantial” range, or three to five days in the “low” designation. The 14-day closure recommendation is to be used when 11 or more students and staff test positive in a two-week period.

Vitale said that while Seneca believes in-person learning cannot be replaced by virtual or blended models, state guidance makes it difficult to keep open in person without significant disturbances.

“We'd like nothing more than to have the children here with us, and we do know they're safe with us and we want to do everything we possibly can,” Vitale said. “But if you listen to the interviews by Dr. (Anthony) Fauci (director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases), the CDC and many other public health leaders in the state, when you have high community spread, it will come into your buildings and it will be disruptive. No matter how many mitigations we have, these temporary closures will continue to be disruptive.”