KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Every morning, Sarah Brewster gathers her three school-aged children around the kitchen table at her Kansas City, Missouri, home and writes their schedules on a white board.
Each of the children is in a different grade level at St. Elizabeth Catholic School in the Waldo neighborhood, but they all are learning from home as governments enforce stay-at-home orders across the area to prevent the spread of COVID-19. On Thursday, Governor Mike Parson announced he is keeping schools shut until the end of the semester.
While the world around them seems to keep changing, the Brewsters' day always begins by playing a YouTube video the school's principal uploads every morning and afternoon with announcements and more.
“I think it’s just good to see him," Brewster said, "and he does the prayers, Pledge of Allegiance and they do all those things with him. So I think it’s good to see his face and feel like it's normal.”
Normal is the keyword at St. Elizabeth, a kindergarten through eighth-grade school. First-year Principal Mike Riley said he wants the students and teachers to find a routine and interact with one another so distance learning still feels like going to school.
"It's ongoing, it's a learning process," Riley said. "We're all in it together. The families have been very supportive, reaching out to teachers. And teachers have been over-communicating. It's really finding that balance of communication."
He saw Parson's announcement coming, but now that the closure of school is here, Riley said he has new hoops to jump through – what to do about eighth-grade graduation and when the official last day of school will be. In the meantime, he's trying to send as much encouragement to teachers as possible.
And Brewster said teachers have answered the call. They encourage students to video chat from outside when the weather is nice and assign papers, tests, experiments as if students were still in the classroom.
