AURORA | The Aurora Public Schools board approved a plan Tuesday for returning students to classrooms depending partly on the rate of virus infections in the area and how many students quit attending online classes.

The school district is currently in online-only learning through the first quarter, after which the board will have to decide whether to continue with that format or bring some students back into classrooms. At the meeting, which was held in person and streamed online, Superintendent Rico Munn presented a metric he created for helping determine safety levels.

The metric, which he created with the input of the teacher’s union and Tri-County Health director Dr. John Douglas, takes into account a variety of factors, including case numbers in the surrounding area, the amount of personal protective equipment the school district has on hand and the number of district staff who have tested positive for the virus. 

Cherry Creek schools has returned students to classrooms already using a similar host of metrics also created by Tr-County Health Department officials.

Student engagement is also one of the variables, and Munn said that the decision how to hold classes should center around students. A metric that would raise a red flag for him is if average daily attendance in online learning drops below 75%.

“If we ever hit that, that would be a fire alarm going off,” Munn said.

The system is on a 30-point scale, If the district is at 14 points or below it should be in online-only learning, and at 25 points or above, school would be able to host students and teachers at schools. In between that are various levels of in-person learning would be allowed. The data would be recalculated every two weeks.

Munn said that by the metric’s standards, on Aug. 20 the district was at 17 points, which would allow for small groups of students to come back. He added that the metric would not require him to do anything, but if the board voted in agreement it would give him the authority to make decisions based on the data it provided. 

“It won’t be zero to 100,” Munn said.

The board ultimately voted unanimously to approve the metric, which the district will likely begin using in October.

After Munn’s presentation the board heard presentations on enrollment numbers and a budget update.

Planning coordinator Joshua Hensley said that the district’s enrollment is down from what it had projected, and currently has about 1,000 fewer students than it was expecting.

“We are trending below where we would expect to be,” he said.

Attendance is down about 5.7% from August of 2018 and 2019, and staff members are currently in the process of reaching out to families who are enrolled but have not shown up for virtual classes, he said.

Hensley said that he could not definitely say if COVID-19 or online learning was a major factor in students leaving the district, but that “clearly the pandemic is the biggest difference between this school year and the last.” 

Of students who have left the district, only 250 have filed a notice on intent to homeschool, he said.

Brett Johnson provided a budget update, telling the board that the district has a projected $25 million decrease in revenue based on cuts to the state budget. The district believes that it should be able to make up the deficit using the $26.8 million in CARES money that it was allocated.

This year’s budget is also prioritizing reserve funding for future shortfalls, Johnson said, as the district expects next year’s budget to contain substantial cuts as well. The district has $22 million set aside for the 2021-2022 school year as well as $10 million in recovery fund planning.

The district is waiting for the preliminary budget from the state which will be released later this fall to gauge how significant cuts will be. Creating the next year’s budget usually begins in January, he said, but the process may need to start much earlier this year.