COVID-19 New Canaan

District: School Buses Are On Roads To Improve Routes

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The school buses traveling local roads and even making stops as though children would board them are testing routes in order to make drive-times more efficient, district officials say. New Canaan Public Schools rarely gets an opportunity to drive-test routing improvements, according to Superintendent of Schools Dr. Bryan Luizzi. “The bus drivers are still working for us—they are still employed by DATTCO as part of the contract—and so we thought, let’s get the buses driven and see if we can make the routes more efficient,” Luizzi told NewCanaanite.com. 

“We have an opportunity to have them drive the runs and have them look at the new runs for the [proposed new] school start times, as well,” he added. With COVID-19 drive-thru testing launched Friday outside Saxe Middle School, the school buses have suspended the test-runs for now and they’ll be “sporadic” in the future, Luizzi said. Public schools have been closed since March 12 and the district the following day launched a remote “e-learning” program to keep students learning and connected to their educators.

COVID-19 New Canaan

Superintendent: School Buildings Now Closed Through April 20; Changes Coming to E-Learning Program

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New Canaan Public Schools will resume no sooner than April 20, district officials said late Wednesday. 

Originally planned for two weeks, the e-learning program launched last Friday as the COVID-19 emergency took hold—a system that parents, while grateful for educators’ efforts, have found cumbersome in some ways—will be modified “to ensure that it will be sustainable for our students, staff, and families, and that it will be responsive to whatever lies ahead,” Superintendent of Schools Dr. Bryan Luizzi said in an email to parents. 

“These adjustments at each level permit us to adapt to the few challenges that have arisen while capitalizing on some wonderful opportunities that have appeared,” the email said. It wasn’t immediately clear what the changes would involve, though they’ll take hold Monday, Luizzi said. Principals are to contact public schools parents about them. The news comes as state officials waive a requirement that districts hold 180 school days amid growing concerns about the spread of the virus. Connecticut cases are increasing a rapid rate—up from 68 Tuesday to 96 Wednesday, according to the state Department of Public Health,  with more than 70% of cases in Fairfield County.

Dr. Bryan Luizzi

New Canaan Public Schools To Close Thursday After First Confirmed COVID-19 Case in Town

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In a move designed to limit the spread of COVID-19 following the first confirmed case in town, New Canaan Public Schools will close Thursday, district officials said, and starting Friday students will continue learning remotely for two weeks. Faculty and staff “have been working tirelessly over the past weeks to prepare for this scenario,” Superintendent of Schools Dr. Bryan Luizzi said Wednesday afternoon in an email to parents. “We have prepared for this scenario by coming together as a district to develop plans that provide our students with a continuing educational experience during the closure,” he said. “These plans will be shared by your building principals in subsequent communications.”

Thursday will count as a snow day, district officials said. Symptoms of COVID-19 include fever, cough and shortness of breath, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Board of Selectmen

Public-Private Partnership: District Pursues $1 Million Refurbishment of Planetarium at NCHS

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District officials say hundreds of thousands of dollars are to be raised privately to offset a taxpayer contribution toward an upgrade of the planetarium at New Canaan High School and that the revamped facility would be used by students as well as the wider community. 

The ca.-1970 planetarium and its original projector have been “aged out for a while,” Superintendent of Schools Dr. Bryan Luizzi told the Board of Selectmen at a Jan. 23 budget hearing, held in Town Hall. 

“We use it for our programs, but the opportunities that are there at the planetarium are enormous. The new technology now allows you to change the projector out and put a new projector in that use the dome as the screen in an immersive environment. And if you have been to the Natural History Museum or others and have seen a planetarium show, you have seen that this is an immersive experience that is focused on not only astronomy but multi-disciplinary, across anything, any age, any discipline, any subject.”

To upgrade the projector, sound system, dome and seats in the planetarium would cost about $1 million, Luizzi said. The selectmen at a subsequent meeting voted 3-0 in favor of a capital spending plan that includes $550,000 in taxpayer funding for the planetarium.

News

Board of Ed Backs $92.8 Million Spending Plan; Final Recommended School Start Time Schedule Still To Come

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The Board of Education on Tuesday night voted 6-1 to recommend an approximately $92.8 million spending plan for next fiscal year. The budget brought forward by Superintendent of Schools Dr. Bryan Luizzi and endorsed by the school board during its regular meeting represents a 1.47% increase over current spending—within Board of Finance guidelines. 

It includes about $950,000 needed for new transportation costs that would come with a revised school start times schedule, though it is unclear which of two equally expensive start time scenarios the Board of Ed ultimately will recommend. 

The first scenario, studied and discussed extensively for months, would see the three elementary schools start together at 7:45 a.m., followed by the seventh and eighth grades at Saxe Middle School and all of New Canaan High School at 8:30 a.m. with the fifth and sixth grades at Saxe starting together at 9:15 a.m.

Major advantages of that schedule include starting school late enough that adolescents get sufficient sleep, district officials have said, citing established medical data and recommendations from the American Academy of Pediatrics. It also would see all three elementary schools get onto the same start and end time schedule and avoid having those young kids in school late into the afternoon, when anecdotal evidence says they tire out, officials have said. Yet based on strong feedback from the community, including families with kids in elementary school, Board of Ed Chair Katrina Parkhill said the elected body may consider another scenario that “flips” the first and last “tiers.” In other words, the fifth and sixth grades would start at 7:45 a.m. while the elementary schools would all start at 9:15 a.m., she said. “This scenario may more appropriately balance schedules, in response to family and community needs,” Parkhill said during the meeting, held in the Wagner Room at NCHS.