We Will Be Back...And Here's How

Screening: All employees will be required to complete a daily screening for COVID-19 symptoms. Parents will be required to complete a daily screening for their child(ren) each day prior to arrival. We will also be spot checking temperatures over the course of the day. Stay tuned for the survey platform. 

Hygiene: We will nearly double the number of hand sanitizer stations inside and outside of the classrooms. Handwashing will be a much more significant part of the daily activity. We are also investigating all the ways to limit shared school supplies and spaces. 

Facility: We are in the process of potentially placing a year round, multipurpose tent set up over the turf field to facilitate social distancing for PE, Pursuit, hook up and other needs. We will cut off or remove traditional water fountains and replace them with bottle filling stations. 

Cleaning: We will be cleaning high touch surfaces throughout the day, including playground equipment after each use. We will be doing a deep cleaning each evening and, in the older grades, will require desk sanitization upon entering and prior to departing each class. 

Sickness: We will follow CDC guidelines (under Preparing for When Someone Gets Sick) should students or other members of the Harding Academy community fall ill and the CDC guidelines (under Discontinuation of Isolation) for when those members may return. More detailed protocols specific to Harding are being developed and will be an addendum to the Harding Academy Parent Handbook. 

Social Distancing: The Nashville Plan guidelines say schools should use one of the following measures to mitigate the risk of spread: masks, desk partitions, or social distancing. It is not reasonable and possibly counterproductive to expect very young children to wear masks all day, and our programs in those grades do not align with the use of desks, so we will deploy social distancing practices in those grades. Our PreK and Kindergarten classes will be further divided into small groups of no more than twelve students and one teacher. For the 2020-21 school year, PreK will be based in the Art Rooms of the Schwartz Center and Kindergarten will occupy the entirety of the Kindergarten building and PreK Annex on the east side of campus. 

Masks: Masks will be required for all students when in common areas or travelling in hallways. We will ask that each student have at least two cloth face masks.  They will not be required in classrooms. Teachers will wear masks or face shields in the classroom if within six feet of students and students may be required to wear them during more collaborative work. 

Partitions: We are in the process of sourcing and customizing clear plexiglass, three-sided desk partitions for every desk in the school. The number one benefit of partitions is that it allows us to keep our class sizes at the typical numbers they have been over the years, meaning the social distancing impact to staffing and schedule is significantly reduced. This, of course, means a much more recognizable Harding experience. It also means our students do not need to wear masks all day long. We are hopeful for a time when we don’t need partitions, but considering the pandemic context, it is our best option. 

Flow: We are currently developing student and faculty movement patterns with one way directions where possible along with signage that clearly outlines expectations for movement and social distancing. 

Curriculum: The class size and social distancing steps above were arrived at with a goal of working to preserve as much of the core academic and extracurricular program as possible. Our faculty continue to work to develop lesson plans and units that are dynamic and can toggle between in person and remote learning should the city move back into Phase Two and we are mandated to go to remote learning. We are working on tweaks to our schedule to accommodate cleaning procedures, as well reducing the mixing of homerooms/travel groups as best we can. 

Program: According to the Nashville Plan, in Phase Three groups may not be larger than fifty people and activities with greater respiratory expirations have stricter social distancing guidelines. This has implications for our programs in areas like athletics, physical education, band, chorus, theatre, assembly and some specials. Our academic team is working hard to reimagine and innovate in order to continue to develop the whole child across these experiences.

Technology: Our technology infrastructure proved to be a real strength this past spring when we were forced to pivot to remote learning. We are building on that strength in a number of ways. One particularly helpful step we are taking is to add Meeting OWL Pro cameras to every instructional room in the school. This means that if a student or group of students are out because they are sick or because their families have decided to stay out, they can still attend classes through our secure Google Meet platform in real time in the classroom as the teacher is conducting class. These cameras automatically pick up on the speaker, so there is as real an experience as possible in terms of class conversation and collaboration. These cameras can also help move our remote learning program forward in terms of the possibility of more “synchronous” or face-to-face, real time interaction between students and teachers. Stay tuned for more details around this feature and accompanying policies that will follow.

Lunch: Lunch will be in classrooms (homerooms or advisories depending on division). FLIK will offer premade boxed lunches that can be delivered to classrooms, or students may bring their own lunch. You will hear more about this process over the summer. 

Hook Up: Morning hook up will look much like before with the potential for smaller bands of cars in each batch but a quicker roll out process. Parents and/or students will need to display a “good-to-go” badge from our survey partner and have a mask on in order to exit the car and then will follow the proper pathway into the school building. Afternoon hook up will be more prescribed in our process and our students will be spread out around campus as we will not be able to socially distance all students in the depot. Stay tuned for more details. 

Parent Visits and Events: The Nashville Plan guidelines are clear that in Phase Three parents will not be allowed in the school buildings except under extenuating circumstances. We are developing protocols for late drop off or early pick up and other similar scenarios. Most immediately this impacts a number of parent volunteer opportunities (i.e. lower school lunch volunteers), as well as various parent events we typically hold in the fall like Orientation and Back to School Night. Stay tuned for more information from the school and HPA regarding these plans. 

Essential School Business: Schools do have to have some vendors on campus to conduct our essential business, and these vendors will be expected to abide by the existing social distancing and preventive measures in play at the time of their arrival. Additionally, an essential part of our business is Admissions and we are developing a variety of scenarios within the restrictions of this day and age for admissions visits, testing, etc. 

Buses: We will be able to continue to offer bussing in the morning, but riders will have to wear masks at all times on the bus. We are working out the wellness survey procedures we would use, as well as our cleaning procedures, but we will be able to offer that service. More to come. 

Pursuit: We will also offer Pursuit this year up until 6:00 PM. We will be focusing on keeping students in the same grade level together and in smaller groups and will be spread out over campus more. Most immediately we will be using the new turf tent to act as a home base for Pursuit, allowing more space to spread out.