After careful consideration, the Board of School Directors approved Abington School District’s revised plan for hybrid instruction. The Montgomery County Office of Public Health recommends a switch in learning models to a virtual schedule under a linked in-school transmission or functional closure, a level that Abington School District has not needed to observe. Since September 8th, Abington School District has had a total of 92 COVID-19 cases (57 student cases and 35 staff cases), and every school in the district has had at most 1 case in a rolling 14-day period. Between the elementary schools, Junior High, and Senior High, the hybrid instructional model is only utilized by an overall average of 51% of students. With many students struggling in a virtual setting, the school district encourages providing students with an advanced version of the hybrid schedule to improve their learning standards while also observing safety precautions. To accomplish these goals, the district formulated an improved hybrid schedule to safely enhance learning.

Following spring break, the Abington School District will implement its updated hybrid plan to improve learning for its students and progress to a more standard instructional model. Starting on Tuesday, April 6th, Cohort A and Cohort B students will be merged to allow both groups to attend in-person learning for 4 out of 5 of the school days each week. Students in these cohorts will receive in-person instruction on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays, but similar to the current hybrid schedule, Wednesdays will remain as asynchronous instruction for the cleaning of the buildings and professional development.

In order to provide an optimized learning environment for students who will attend in-person instruction for twice as many days as in the previous plan, social distancing in classrooms will be at least 3 feet. While the previous schedule provided safer precautions with a required distance of 6 feet, schools will attempt to adhere to the original provision while also accommodating all of their students in a hybrid classroom. Despite the change in student seating, a minimum of 6 feet of distance between students and teachers will continue to be observed. Students will also continue to maintain at least a 6-foot distance between themselves during mask breaks, including when eating or drinking.

Virtual students will follow the same schedule as they have been following in the original hybrid plan, but room assignments may be altered for some in-person students in the Senior High to maximize social distancing. Current hybrid students will remain hybrid (and virtual students will remain virtual) unless they have notified their school counselor beforehand about switching cohorts.