SUDBURY -- Like many parents, teachers and students, staff and senior administrators at Sudbury's Rainbow District School Board are wondering when classes will resume.
Now that Premier Doug Ford has said publicly students will not be going back to class on April 6, Norm Blaseg with Sudbury's Rainbow Board says there are options being explored around virtual learning.
"We have principals, we have coordinators, consultants, we have staff in general looking at how we facilitate distance learning and that's really our big challenge because we're trying to measure and take stock in terms of how can we facilitate this knowing full well that we have a number of complications," said Blaseg.
He adds those complications include not knowing what parents of staff have in terms of devices and access to internet.
"We've been surveying our parents first of all to establish what are the needs within our community. We're trying to find out through our principals, through our teachers, have contact with families what technology they currently have or not and then we will come up with a plan to figure out how we are going to service folks," said Blaseg.
School officials say while students are at home during this pandemic, they should be maintaining english and math skills.
"Those are the two areas we would want to focus on, bearing in mind that when we're cooped up like we are we need to have some levity and we need to incorporate some physical activity." said Blaseg.
He went on to say "Also just be creative, look for different ways you can communicate with your children again maybe this is an opportunity to rebuild those bonds,"
Blaseg says school boards will have, most likely by next Tuesday, more of a direction from the Ministry of Education in terms of what the future will look like and whether school will resume this spring or be cancelled until September.
