Graduation for Carbon High will take place on May 21, but it will be very different from the past. Details on how it will be done will be forthcoming.
Carbon School District Press Release
May is usually the month when schools finish up standard testing and have a lot of fun activities for students at all levels.
When the school dismissal was announced on March 13 by Governor Gary Herbert, it was initially announced the dismissal would be for two weeks. Eventually, that order turned into school dismissal extending through the rest of the school year.
“As of May 1, we will have completed seven weeks of intensive coursework delivered in the most difficult manner ever,” said Carbon School District Superintendent Lance Hatch. “We have concerns about fatigue and mental health for both staff and students. Usually, May is reserved for reviewing material, intensive testing schedules to fulfill state mandates and fun student activities. There are actually only about three weeks of school left in May and because of school dismissal, we can’t do what we would normally do in May.”
Students left school on March 13 expecting to come back on the following Monday. Because they didn’t come back, students left behind their personal items in desks and lockers. In May, students are going to be able to come back to their schools again, at a designated time to keep social distancing in place, to pick up things they left behind. At that time, they will also turn in their Chromebooks and pick up yearbooks as well. Each building will have its own plan for accomplishing this.
Carbon High School plans to host a drive through graduation ceremony on May 21, and the details on that will be forthcoming.
May will bring some new learning activities for students, concentrating on a certain subject each day until school is dismissed for the year. That instruction will not be the same as what has been done in the last few weeks.
“This is different than any other May ever,” said Hatch. “We still want students connected to what they are learning, but we also realize that we need to deal with the stress and anxiety that is there for everyone. Every student will get one major, meaningful learning activity each day along with regular reading, math facts or other necessary tasks. This starts on May 4 and that activity will be posted online. It’s going to be fun and exciting, as well as a change from what has been done in the last few weeks.”
May will also become a time when educators in the district will start to assess what school will look like next fall when students return to buildings.
“There is no way we have helped students master all the learning outcomes that should have been mastered in the fourth quarter of school this year. We know there are going to be gaps, and they will worsen over the summer, so we are asking teachers to figure out how they will assess the students, how they will figure out what those gaps are and how those gaps are going to be filled,” Hatch concluded.