Almost all of the approximately 2,900 students living in the Madras, Warm Springs and Metolius areas will likely return to classrooms this September.

Jefferson County School District leaders unveiled a tentative plan Monday night to return to in-person learning this fall for the first time since March, despite the COVID-19 pandemic not appearing to slow down. There will be an option for distance learning for those with health concerns, according to a school district document.

Although the district will follow state guidelines if it reopens this fall, such as most staff wearing face coverings and desks placed 6 feet apart, most of the specific details of Jefferson County School District’s fall plan haven’t been determined yet, said Superintendent Ken Parshall.

Every Oregon school district’s reopening plan must be approved by its school board, the local public health agency, and the Oregon Department of Education, according to state guidelines.

Complete in-person learning stands in contrast to the plans of Bend-La Pine Schools and Redmond School District, which both plan to have in-person/online hybrid schedules for older students.

Parshall said his district’s smaller class sizes — an average of 23 children per classroom, compared to 26 for Bend-La Pine and Redmond, according to state data — will make in-person learning possible.

“Our classrooms are big enough and our class sizes are small enough, we think we can pull it off,” he said Tuesday. “But it’s going to require some strategic (class) scheduling.”

The school district has also sent about half of its teachers and all administrators to professional development so they can improve online learning this school year, Parshall said. And thanks to multiple grants, the district also purchased 1,500 new laptops and other computer devices and 400-500 internet hot spots for families, he said.

The decision to resume in-person learning has already split opinions of parents in the district.

Star Todd, who lives in the rural outskirts of Madras, is the mother of an incoming seventh grader and ninth grader at Jefferson County Middle School and Madras High School. She and many other Madras-area parents want kids to return to classrooms for myriad reasons, she said.

“We weren’t set up to do home learning,” Todd said. “Those of us who haven’t homeschooled, we don’t have a routine for that … we weren’t prepared.”

This spring, parents of younger kids scrambled to find child care, and more extroverted students — like her daughter in middle school — were having a rough time, Todd said. Despite the risk of COVID-19, she believes students’ emotional and educational needs should be heavily considered, she said.

“We’ll take precautions in mind, but I think there’s a desire for a lot of people to get back to somewhat normalcy, have a routine,” Todd said.

Rosetta Herkshan, a mother of four students at the Warm Springs K-8 Academy and Madras High School who lives on the Warm Springs reservation, said letting students back in classrooms could speed up the spread of COVID-19.

“Kids are really social, and it’s going to be unrealistic to expect them to keep their distance and keep hygiene up,” she said. “Kids share colds, flu, head lice.”

Herkshan was also concerned for the health of the many residents of Warm Springs who have preexisting conditions such as diabetes, as well as older people — many of whom live with their grandchildren, she said.

“They’re putting their elders at risk,” she said.

Her husband, Gunner Herkshan, stated his opinion on in-person learning bluntly.

“My kids aren’t going back to school,” he said.

Jane Stwyer had a more mixed response. The Warm Springs resident, whose daughter will start fourth grade at the K-8 Academy this fall, said her daughter is more motivated to learn and happier when she’s in the classroom.

But the threat of COVID-19 still makes her nervous.

“I’m trying to be brave and have her go back to school, but at the same time, I’m slowly backing away, as there’s more people being affected by the illness,” Stwyer said.

Stwyer hasn’t decided whether or not to have her daughter learn inside the K-8 building, or to have her daughter learn remotely, she said. But no matter what, her daughter will have a say in how she’s taught this fall.

“I would talk with her first, and let her know what’s going on, and how hard it would be to be in-school with that sickness out there,” Stwyer said. “I’ll let her know her choices.”

Courtney Snead, a member of the Jefferson County School Board, said she supports the school district’s plan for reopening school. The Madras resident — whose daughter will start kindergarten at Madras Elementary School this fall — said distance learning was tricky for the district’s many students who lack internet access.

About 40% of school district families don’t have an adequate internet connection, proper electronic devices to access the internet, or both, according to a district survey.

Snead said she was optimistic that the school district and the Jefferson County community would do their part to keep everyone safe, through social-distancing, wearing masks and other precautions.

“I’m choosing not to worry about it, to trust that we’re going to do everything we can,” she said. “We do the best we can and hope for the best.”

Of the 534 parents who responded to a recent Jefferson County School District survey, only about 2% said they didn’t plan to send their kids back to school in the fall. However, 42% of parents said their students’ return to schools would depend on the school district’s plan.

About 38% of school district parents said they would only send their children to classrooms if various COVID-19 protocol, like social distancing and face coverings, were either enforced or encouraged. About 54% of parents said they would send their children to school based on any COVID-19 safeguards, and nearly 9% said their kids would return because the family didn’t have a choice in the matter — the parents work and couldn’t afford child care.

However, 56% of parents who responded to this survey, who were willing to identify their race, identified as non-Hispanic white. White students make up only 29% of Jefferson County School District’s population — a smaller percentage than Hispanic and Native American students.

Superintendent Ken Parshall said the survey was sent out in both English and Spanish.