Pennsylvania students expected to return to school in fall, official says

Gov. Tom Wolf's education secretary told lawmakers on Monday that he expects students to go back to school in the fall, and the Department of Education will provide guidance in the coming weeks to prepare teachers and staff to return to school buildings.

Schools have been closed since March under Wolf's orders to try to stop the spread of the coronavirus, keeping more than 1.7 million public school children home and exposing big differences in the ability of wealthier and poorer districts to educate children online.

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Education Secretary Pedro Rivera, testifying in a Senate committee hearing, acknowledged that schools will need additional aid to respond to various challenges posed by school closures and the need to contain the virus.

He downplayed the notion that students might not return to school buildings in the fall. The department intends to reopen schools, but keeping students and staff safe might mean changes that involve following state Health Department recommendations, he said.

Rivera said he did not expect to require a particular approach for each school to reopen. Rather, the department will allow school districts to choose from various options to meet social distancing guidelines, Rivera said.

Those could include smaller class sizes.

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In one instance, a senator raised the question about whether districts will receive more state aid to pay for more buses to accommodate social distancing. 

While the department will not mandate testing in the fall after it canceled standardized tests this spring, its reopening plan will need to account for remedial education that students may need because of lost classroom time during the closures, Rivera said.

Every school district and charter school complied with the requirement to submit a plan showing how they would educate students during the school closures, Rivera said.

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