Center Grove reverses course, goes hybrid

Center Grove schools will move to a hybrid schedule at its high school and two middle schools after a rash of new cases forced administrators to change course, following a move the county’s other five public school districts made late last week.

Students at Center Grove High School, Middle School Central and Middle School North did not go to school today, will learn virtually Wednesday and will attend school on alternating days starting Thursday, with no return to full-time in-person learning at least through the end of Thanksgiving break, Nov. 29.

For one day, Center Grove schools bucked the trend of Johnson County school districts reverting to hybrid learning as COVID-19 cases surge across the county and state. The other five county school districts—Clark-Pleasant, Edinburgh, Franklin, Greenwood and Indian Creek schools—followed the recommendations of the Indiana State Department of Health and the Johnson County Health Department in limiting high school and middle school students to two days a week of classroom learning.

Superintendent Rich Arkanoff on Thursday justified the district’s decision to stay the course with in-person learning.

“Our numbers aren’t leading us to make that decision at this point. We’re monitoring (personal protective equipment) and we seem to be doing fine, same with our cleaning supplies and staff. We’ll continue to monitor those things,” Arkanoff said.

“We will stand by in-person instruction as the best model of instruction. There’s been an increase in mental health issues across the schools, and the best thing we can do is to keep those students in front of us.”

Those numbers, however, took a turn this weekend, when the district learned of seven positive cases. An additional six cases were added to the tally Monday, and contact tracing efforts determined 413 students and employees would have to quarantine, similar to the 418 who had to quarantine the last week of August.

Students assigned to Group A will go to school in person on Mondays and Thursdays, while students in Group B will go to school on Tuesdays and Fridays. As is the case with other schools across the county, all elementary school students who opted to learn in person this semester will continue to learn in person every day, according to Center Grove Community Schools.

Students’ group assignments have been listed in the Skyward platform, and students have been placed in the same groups they were in when Center Grove schools followed a hybrid schedule in September, according to its website.