Governor Ducey Issues an Executive Order Mandating All Public Schools to Resume In Person Instruction When Spring Break Ends

Citing the revised Center for Disease Control Guidelines for reopening schools, comments from CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky and Center for Infectious Disease Director and Biden/Harris health advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci, the number of schools already reopen, and instructors being included in the 1b vaccination group, Arizona Governor Doug Ducey issued an Executive Order mandating that all public schools open for in-person instruction on March 15 or after spring break.

Please click here to read the Governor’s Executive Order.

The order tells the Arizona Department of Health Services to modify their dashboard to conform with the CDC version.

Now, the categories for disease transmission in Arizona Counties will be designated low, moderate, substantial, and high.

It should be noted that no Arizona County is currently rated low in COVID 19 Disease Transmission and only three (Graham, Santa Cruz, and Yuma) are labeled moderate. The rest of Arizona’s counties are either substantial or high.

The Executive Order does provide instructional delivery flexibility for middle and high schools in areas with substantial and high Coronavirus transmission.

It also allows parents and guardians to be able to keep their children in virtual instruction.

Reaction from the Arizona Department of Education.

The team at the Arizona Department of Education, led by Superintendent of Public Instruction Kathy Hoffman issued a measured statement following the release of Mr. Ducey’s Executive Order. It read:

“The Arizona Department of Education (ADE) is supportive of schools using layered mitigation strategies to safely initiate or expand in-person learning, as Superintendent Hoffman said in a press conference last week. However, the timing of this announcement will make it challenging for some schools that had already made plans to return to in-person instruction on a different schedule due to their local community circumstances. As a state, we should be collaborating to provide as much preparation and planning time as possible ahead of significant changes to school operations. To achieve stability for our school communities, it’s necessary to provide them with adequate time to inform and ready their staff, students and families.

With this new Executive Order (EO 2021-04), our goal will be to provide schools with the support needed to implement the requirements ahead of the March 15th reporting date. ADE would like to clarify that Tribal Sovereignty is still in effect regarding this new order – if a sovereign Tribal Nation has issued a stay-at-home order mandating students stay in distance learning, the new executive order does not impact them.

Since the onset of the pandemic, Arizona schools have prioritized their school communities’ safety and well-being. That is no different under EO-2021-04. The Department stands ready to support all schools as they foster safe teaching and learning environments.”

Statement from the Arizona Education Association (A.E.A.)

The Arizona Education Association, representing the state’s teachers issued a statement praising educators for their hard work and efforts to safely reopen schools while being more critical of Mr. Ducey’s decision. It read:

“For the past 11 months, educators have gone above and beyond to provide our students with learning opportunities as our communities were living through a pandemic. From the day the governor told schools to shift to distance learning the Arizona Education Association has been very clear in calling for the resources needed to support a safe return to in-person instruction.

Throughout the summer and fall we continued to call on Governor Ducey to implement a statewide COVID-19 school safety plan. He refused to meet with educators and left it to school districts to develop their own plans. Now, after educators, school administrators, and parents have done the hard work to move toward reopening schools (and remain open), the governor issues an executive order to take credit for others’ year-long planning and efforts without offering any resources.

The safety of our students and educators is our number one priority, but guaranteeing safety in a pandemic requires additional funding. Making safe in-person instruction a reality requires state mandates and resources that compel and allow school districts and institutions of higher education to put in place the mitigating measures necessary to protect against COVID-19. When the proper mitigation precautions are taken — masking, social distancing, proper ventilation, contact tracing, hand washing — the data and the science suggests a return to in-person learning may be possible. The science also says that community spread is key to keeping our schools safe, yet Governor Ducey has chosen to focus on reopening schools without any kind of measures to mitigate community spread such as a statewide mask mandate.

Additionally, we must take the time thank the educators who have taken on the challenging work of educating through a global pandemic. We must thank the parents who have worked with educators to take on the difficult work keeping our students’ learning on track and making plans to return to in-person instruction. These collaborative efforts of educators, parents, students, and public health experts – coming together to reopen school buildings safely and equitably, following the guidance from public health authorities by implementing distancing, retrofitting ventilation systems, and providing the PPE and supplies needed – are the reason our students and educators can return to the classroom safely.

We have learned an incredible amount about the inequities in our education system through this time of crisis and about the devastating impact of years of neglect and underfunding our schools by state leaders. We have learned that our most vulnerable students, those living in poverty and our students of color, have been impacted the most. We must remember these lessons as we return to in-person instruction. We have a better understanding about the resources our students need and deserve. We need elected leaders with the will to provide those resources so our students can be successful now and after the pandemic.”

Moving Forward

It seems apparent from reading the statements from the Arizona Department of Education and the A.E.A. that Governor Ducey did not do a lot of consulting or planning with these organizations to safely reopen schools.

Instead, he used the revised CDC guidelines and cherry picked comments from Biden/Harris officials as cover to issue his Executive Order today without fully thinking of all contingencies.

He probably could have issued a similar (and better) Executive Order that reopened in-person instruction in roughly the same time period if he and his team had fully formulated a strategy with the other educator stakeholders that took into account:

• The quality of mitigation measures in place at all schools.
• Whether the ventilation system at each public school was up to the job of ensuring all stakeholder’s safety on school grounds.
• The number of educators and staff at each school that has been given the Coronavirus Vaccine.

Readers who review Governor Ducey’s Executive Order will note that he does not mention any of those contingencies.

Honestly, he probably would not know the answers if he was asked.

With schools set to reopen in 12 days and new COVID 19 variants coming into the state, Mr. Ducey had better take the time to find out because he will be responsible for how well this reopening goes.