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WINTON – Administrators of Hertford County Public Schools (HCPS) have devised a plan to continue educating their students even though classrooms now sit empty.

Additionally, even though instruction is interrupted, nutrition is not.

In an emergency meeting held here Monday among HCPS senior staff members and principals from each of the county’s six public schools, a plan was hammered out that will entail having parents/guardians picking up packets later this week. Those packets will contain two weeks worth of course work that the students can complete at home during this unexpected break in their education.

Packets will be available for pick-up from 3-6 p.m. on Thursday, March 19 and from 9-11 a.m. on Friday, March 20. Parents/guardians are instructed to go to the school (or schools if they have children of different ages/grade levels) where their children are enrolled. NOTE: the packets at each individual school will be located in one specific area of the building and not in the students’ respective classrooms). Parents/guardians will be directed to the location of those packets upon entering the office area of the school.

“We want to continue some form of instruction,” said HCPS Superintendent Dr. William Wright.

As for advancing beyond the “packet delivery” form of education, Dr. Wright said HCPS staff will use this week to work on the best way to make that happen in the event schools are closed longer than two weeks due to the coronavirus threat.

“This situation remains a moving target every day,” Wright said. “We have the capability of delivering instruction online, it’s just a case of working out the logistics to make that happen and we have students that will be fine with that. However, we know that will not work throughout our system. The instructional plan we put together will look different depending on what school or what level the child is at.”

Wright said once those plans are developed, they will be shared with students/parents through robo-calls, email, on the HCPS website and this newspaper.

From a nutritional standpoint, HCPS is offering “grab-and-go” lunch meals from 11 a.m. until 1 p.m. at the high school cafeteria in Ahoskie and the middle school cafeteria in Murfreesboro.

Parents or guardians of all HCPS students (ages pre-K through high school seniors) can pick-up these meals to take home to their youngsters.

This service will continue through Friday of this week and Monday through Friday of next week.

Each lunch meal will be accompanied by a breakfast meal for the following day (example: Tuesday’s lunch will include a separate breakfast meal for Wednesday).

Monday’s meeting also included developing a plan on an effort to keep the schools sanitized while parents are picking up dropping off the packets and collecting meals as well as for the staff working at each school.