In a statement released Thursday evening, West Virginia’s Superintendent of Education Clayton Burch and the state school board said the Hope Scholarship diverts funding from public schools and that makes it unconstitutional.
In a statement released Thursday evening, West Virginia’s Superintendent of Education Clayton Burch and the state school board said the Hope Scholarship diverts funding from public schools and that makes it unconstitutional.
Burch and other state leaders are named in a lawsuit, Beaver Vs. Moore, requesting the court halt the unconstitutional diversion of public funds from public schools authorized by the West Virginia Legislature in the Hope Scholarship Program’
A West Virginia Department of Education statement released Thursday evening said “The Hope Scholarship Program incentivizes students to exit the public school system and drains needed public funds from the state’s public schools. As a result, it violates the West Virginia Constitution as it prevents the West Virginia Board of Education from providing a thorough and efficient education for all children.”
The Hope Scholarship website notes that the program is “The state’s education savings account program that gives parents an opportunity to build an individual learning experience that works best for their child. The scholarship allows K-12 students to receive financial assistance that can be used for tuition, fees and other expenses.”
The Hope Scholarship amount will vary annually depending on the amount of state aid funding per pupil provided to county boards of education for public school students. The scholarship amount for the 2022-23 year will be $4,298.60.
Families will spend their Hope Scholarship funds directly through the Education Market Assistant (EMA) platform with participating education service providers and vendors for qualified educational expenses, including but not limited to the items listed below.
Tuition and fees for private school, non-public online programs, or alternative education programs
Services provided by a public school (extracurricular, individual courses)
Tutoring services
Fees for standardized or advanced placement exams
Fees for preparation courses
Educational services and therapies
Supplemental materials (supplies, textbooks)
Transportation fees
Any other qualified expense as approved by the Hope Scholarship Board
The lawsuit also challenges the scholarship adminstration led by state Treasurer Riley Moore, referring to the Hope Scholarship as ‘the voucher law.’ It said, “The voucher law unlawfully creates a separate board which oversees and supervises the public’s funds that are to be used for educational purposes.
The WVDE statement adds that the West Virginia Board of Education intends to take every action it can to protect public education and the children it serves.
Beginning with the 2022-2023 school year, a new West Virginia school program requires teachers and school staff to receive training and education in self-harm behaviors and eating disorders.
Beginning with the 2022-2023 school year, a new West Virginia school program requires teachers and school staff to receive training and education in self-harm behaviors and eating disorders.
Meghan’s Law, as it’s known, stems from a near-death health episode with Jefferson County Del. Wayne Clark’s teenage daughter, Meghan, after she was told she was too fat for a school cheer team. Randy Yohe spoke with Clark about implementation of the program, and how his family is doing.
Note: This interview has been lightly edited for clarity.
Yohe: Training for state school personnel and education for middle and high school students on self harm behavior and eating disorders begins this September first. Where do things stand on putting plans into action?
Clark: These trainings will occur during the teacher’s early school development program, before the kids come in, and they’ll have their first training in place. So that they can kind of learn some of the triggers on what to look for that kind of stuff, along with the service personnel and anyone else that comes in contact with the kids.
Yohe: You mentioned coaches, as well, was anything different or specific in that regard?
Clark: Well, the hard part with the coaches is changing their culture of how and how they speak to kids in regards to making comments, like “you’re too fat,” or “you need to lose weight” that can’t lead to some sort of misunderstanding by the kid. So, we want to make sure that the coaches are using correct wording as an example. If you have an offensive lineman on a football team, and that lineman is 280 pounds, but hasn’t spent the day in the gym, maybe the coach instead of saying, “you’re just a fatty,” the coach should say “hey, let’s work on you cleaning up your frame by getting you in the gym, getting you to lifting weights,” that kind of stuff.
Yohe:Another important element is faculty and staff awareness of a problem in class or anywhere in school, if there’s a situation that needs immediate attention, right?
Clark:Correct. So if a teacher sees a kid one of the one of the triggers is, self harm. So what the kid might do in the evening before is they might cut themselves. That’s an immediate pain relief, that helps them address the stress or anxiety situation that they’re dealing with. And then, during school, obviously, they can’t cut themselves, but what they’ll do is they’ll take a rubber band, and they’ll put a rubber band over top of the cut. So a teacher might see a kid popping the rubber band on their wrist, or wherever the cut is, like the teacher might see the kid using the back of the eraser, and erasing on their hand or their arm, giving that burning sensation. So identifying that, and then how to handle that, how to not necessarily scold the kid, but walk up to the kid and politely ask them what kind of situations are they going through? What anxiety are they feeling? Or, are they nervous about the assignment, what can the teacher do to help to alleviate this anxiety? Or, did something happen in the hallway? So, rather than yell at the kid, identify, that this kid here is doing some sort of self harm, because of some sort of a situation. Now, how do I address that?
You have teachers that are doing cafeteria duty, and cafeteria aides as they’re walking around, and they’re watching kids just sit there and not eat on purpose. Or maybe they’re eating and then spitting it out in napkins, and they have trays full of napkins, that’s full of food. They’re trying to hide it that way. So we want to make sure that the kids are identified at an early stage so that they don’t get too far gone.
Yohe: We know self-harm behaviors and eating disorders affect thousands state wide, millions nationwide. You explained to me that this is not an instant fix by any means, and it can be a durational, even lifelong challenge for any family. How is your family and Meghan doing?
Clark: So we’re handling things. Well we have situations here and there. Obviously, we have another huge stress situation going on in the household with my wife and her multiple sclerosis diagnosis that was recent, in January. So it’s very important that we’re paying attention to the little things to make sure that we don’t have a trigger on Meghan or even her twin sister, because it’s not uncommon for it to make its way through the household. So, at this point, we’re doing okay, but it’s an everyday, I don’t want to say struggle, but it’s in our minds every single day, because we never know when something could come up.
The West Virginia House of Delegates is considering a bill that would prohibit public K-12 schools and county boards of education from mandating masks for its students and employees.
The House Education Committee passed HB 4071 after about an hour of discussion Wednesday afternoon.
The bill would create the Parent and Student Health Rights Act, which would prohibit West Virginia public schools, the West Virginia Schools for the Deaf and the Blind, and any appointed or elected county school officials from requiring masks.
The bill would also prohibit any COVID-19 testing or quarantine requirements, unless a student or employee is actively showing symptoms of the coronavirus. Parents or guardians would have the sole authority on whether a child should be masked.
“I’ve heard overwhelmingly from my district. I’ve heard overwhelmingly from all of the interested parties discussed here today, and I think it’s time to empower parents, empower individuals, to start making these decisions,” said Del. Jordan Maynor, R-Raleigh, who is the bill’s lead sponsor.
Across the aisle, Del. John Doyle, D-Jefferson, felt differently.
“There are certain things where the parents are right. There are other things, other issues, where the greatest amount of knowledge is in the hands of a school system,” Doyle said. “And there are yet others where the decision is best made by public health officials.”
House Education Minority Chair Del. Sean Hornbuckle, D-Cabell, offered an amendment to the bill that would have allowed a masking mandate in times of a declared state of emergency, but it failed.
HB 4071 now goes to the House Judiciary Committee for further consideration.
The West Virginia Board of Education voted on Tuesday to mandate elementary and middle school students return to five days a week of in-person instruction by March 3.
The board also voted for high-schoolers to return to the classroom in counties that are not marked red on the Department of Health and Human Resource County Alert map.
“We understand all the concerns related to going back to school,” said Miller Hall, state board president. “We know teachers and school staff are working hard and are concerned about safety measures, but so are we. Anybody who thinks we are not concerned about the safety of our young people, they are wrong.”
Thirty-eight counties currently offer four or five days a week of in-person instruction, according to the Department of Education website. If they want to continue with the four-day model that allows a day for local virtual instruction, counties will have to apply for a waiver.
Hall emphasized that this decision follows state and national data showing little to no classroom transmission.
“This is not he said, she said, or hearsay,” said Hall. “This is data.”
State coronavirus czar Clay Marsh spoke to the board this week and said that with proper masking and distancing, elementary and middle school classrooms are safe for teachers and students.
“I think it is reassuring that with the appropriate mitigation strategies, we just don’t see the spread in the classroom,” he said.
A state team of epidemiologists has learned from last year’s data that any transmission happening between teachers and students is in an environment where masks are not or cannot be worn, he said.
“We’re seeing spread on sports teams,” Marsh said. “We’re seeing spread in meetings between adults and lunches where people aren’t really as careful with masking.”
Special education classes where students are unable to wear a mask and music class where students are singing or playing instruments in an enclosed area also led to transmission, Marsh said.
There is also evidence of individuals becoming infected at home by a family member or in the community and bringing that illness into the school, Marsh added.
He also clarified that while six feet is recommended, recent medical studies from Asia show three feet can be sufficient with proper mask-wearing.
Across the state, cases of COVID-19 are at the lowest point since the fall and the percentage of vaccinated West Virginians continues to lead the nation.
Almost 75% of teachers over the age of 50 have been vaccinated in Wyoming County, and the county board there voted Monday to return to the classroom five days a week.
“We’ve had so few cases of Covid in our schools,” Superintendent Deirdre Cline said Friday to the Wyoming County Report. “Our county has been green all week. We feel like our schools are doing a phenomenal job with the safety guidelines – wearing masks, social distancing, hand-washing. Our people and parents want the children back full-time. It’s time to move.”
Vaccines have been made available to teachers and service personnel over the age of 50. Marsh said the state is currently prioritizing the senior population but as more vaccines become available, educators under 50 and the rest of the essential workforce will be eligible for vaccinations.
“The key part of this is that we are not vaccinating teachers and service personnel because it’s not safe to be back in the classroom,” Marsh said. “We are doing this or recommending this as an additional safeguard for them to be in the classroom.”
In Preston County, students returned to four days a week of in-person instruction yesterday, with online classes on Fridays. In comments to the Dominion Post, Superintendent Steve Wotring laid out simple reasoning.
Last week, Gov. Jim Justice ordered all public schools in West Virginia open for the 2020-2021 school year beginning Sept. 8. Schools must provide 180 instructional days and must have a five-day school week.
Of course, this could all change depending on how the coronavirus pandemic evolves. But county school boards are starting to prepare for that date and discuss how a return to school in a pandemic would look.
Earlier this week in the Eastern Panhandle, both Jefferson and Berkeley County Schools met for special board meetings to begin outlining fall 2020.
The main message from both was what we know now will likely change before the Sept. 8 start date, and no matter when school begins, it will not be business as usual.
“It is anything but that. It will not look like the school that you left,” said Jefferson County Superintendent of Schools Bondy Shay Gibson speaking over Zoom to board members and the public.
“We will have reduced class sizes,” she said. “We will not be having lunches in the cafeteria. We will be holding class in the library. We will be holding class to a limited extent in the gymnasium. We will be utilizing spaces that currently are congregate spaces as classroom spaces in order to socially distance students.”
These are all situations that could occur if school returns to in-person learning, which the governor is hopeful will be achieved by all 55 counties.
Gibson said students age nine or older, and all faculty and staff, will be required to wear face masks throughout the school day. Frequent sanitization and hand washing will be a constant; random visitations to schools will not be allowed, and staff in Jefferson County schools will be provided with a variety of personal protective equipment.
“We will provide gloves, we will provide Tyvek suits, we will provide shoe booties, we will provide the equipment that ensure that our staff are safe, which means that students are safe,” Gibson explained.
Across the border in Berkeley County, much of the same message was sent to board members and the community, but not quite as many details as Jefferson. Berkeley County Superintendent of Schools Patrick Murphy noted in a live Zoom meeting that the county is preparing for the fall but they’re just starting to lay the groundwork.
“I know we want absolute decisions. I know we want answers. I wish I could give you all those answers,” Murphy said. “But I’m fearful that if I give you a specific answer today, tomorrow it will not carry any merit and the environment will have changed.”
Credit Liz McCormick / West Virginia Public Broadcasting
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West Virginia Public Broadcasting
Berkeley County Superintendent of Schools Patrick Murphy presents a PowerPoint to county board members and the public detailing the district’s reopening plans for the fall.
Murphy said the goal of Monday’s meeting in Berkeley County was to begin a dialogue with the public about reopening plans. He said he will be providing updates regularly.
“We need to plan. We need to think,” Murphy said. “We need to look at all of the different possibilities and progressions.”
One area discussed during Berkeley County’s meeting was fall sports and how that will look different. Don Dellinger, deputy superintendent of Berkeley County Schools, outlined some of those anticipated changes.
“There are still strict guidelines with sanitizing the equipment, social distancing … so, those are all in place,” Dellinger said. “Screenings and the daily check-ins are all still in place.”
He explained that athletes will be kept to small groups and fall practices have been slated for Aug. 17.
Murphy, the superintendent, noted that everything from sports to class instruction will have to adapt – and how schools respond to needs could change at a moment’s notice as the pandemic changes.
“I think we have to recognize it’s going to look different, and while we have a traditional model of education in our mind … what education will look like is going to be different,” he said. “And we’re going to have to adapt to that as we are adapting to many things in our life.”
Both Berkeley and Jefferson County schools also made it clear in online meetings that virtual school will be an option for any family who feels concerned about sending their child to school in person. And both counties are looking at internet access options for families in areas where broadband might not be as reliable.
“We’ve been working with the West Virginia Department of Education on a deal with Sprint that we are hopeful will come to fruition,” Gibson said. “[This] would allow a full-service unlimited data plan, in-full for the entire school year for any family that is within their coverage area, provided we can purchase the appropriate hotspots for them. That is a technical problem that we are working through, but we are actively pursuing every possible means for getting WiFi access inside the home to families.”
Both counties also noted that virtual school in the fall will look different from what happened in the spring. Virtual school in fall 2020 will, according to Gibson, have regular class meetings, accountabilities in place, testing and tutoring.
It was also acknowledged by both counties that between now and Sept. 8, or even after school begins, school for fall 2020 could end up being entirely virtual depending on the pandemic.
Also, to help limit the spread of the virus, in-person class sizes will be small, and students will likely remain in a pod, or cohort, where teachers can more easily control who those students are interacting with.
The subject of how students will be social-distanced on school buses, however, did not come up in either meeting.
All 55 of West Virginia’s counties will have the flexibility to decide how fall 2020 will look within CDC guidelines and requirements set by the governor, according to the state Board of Education.
West Virginia’s 2020 school year, from kindergarten through college, is wrapping up unlike any other. In recent years, Mountain State communities have been devastated by man-made crises and natural disasters, but nothing has affected the state’s education system like a world-wide pandemic.
The coronavirus forced an extended Spring Break in March that quickly became a season of virtual classrooms and distance learning. Teachers have converted lessons into online assignments. Parents juggle their work with home-based tutoring. And schools deliver millions of meals to low-income students.
As this truncated school year comes to an end, we hear from West Virginia families trying to make it work and teachers who say they’re learning valuable lessons they will use in the future. But we’re all learning something unfortunate; during a pandemic, all students aren’t equal.
This episode of Us & Them is presented with support from the Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation and the West Virginia Humanities Council.
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