Photo from Grande Prairie Public School Division (Facebook)

By Curtis Galbraith

Schools

GPPSD superintendent proud of students, staff adjustments to online learning

Dec 9, 2020 | 12:10 PM

Grande Prairie Public School Division superintendent Sandy McDonald says he is proud of how students and staff have adjusted to learning from home.

“I could not be more proud of our staff and our schools for how they prepared for this transition and of our students for the way they jumped into the work at home. The transition has been very smooth.”

Grades 7 to 12 students in Alberta are into their second week of online rather than in classroom learning.

McDonald says staff started preparing at the beginning of the year for the possibility of classes going back online.

He adds every teacher has created an online classroom.

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“They’ve trained the students and we’ve set up schedules where students are expected to be participating at specific times in their classes. The teachers are all at work and they’re interacting with the students.”

McDonald says attendance for the first three days was higher than the average was for the first two-and-a-half months.

He adds students who need to can borrow a device to do their work.

“We lent out, across our division, close to 700 laptops for students to use at home. While lots of families and lots of students do have access to technology at home, they don’t always have access to the right technology.”

McDonald says the division has “created the expectation that learning continues” and effort and attendance still matter, even if students are not in the classroom.

McDonald adds at least 3000 students in the division are currently taking their classes online.