Lakeland school parents say they want their kids to return to the classroom full time - and the district says it has a new proposal for them.

Superintendent Brendon Lyons is presenting a plan to the school board Thursday night to allow all students to come to school four days a week starting April 6 -with the option to still be fully remote.

Under his drafted plan, Wednesdays would continue to be a flex day, where all students would learn remotely.

Parents say the plan would allow students to be 3 feet apart with plexiglass partitions and air purifiers in the classrooms.

Lyons says for this to be possible, the school district wants to meet two metrics. The first is using the seven-day rolling average for Westchester County, where the COVID-19 positivity rate must remain below 5%. The second is the district's target to have at least 70% of its faculty and staff fully vaccinated.

Parents and members of the school board say they're concerned about that second metric because employees aren't legally obligated to report if they've been vaccinated.

 The superintendent says the biggest hurdle they'll have to face is bringing back students in grades 6 through 12 since they go into multiple classrooms and walk through the halls more frequently.


To gauge how many students would come to school four days a week, they're sending out a survey March 1 asking people to commit to in- person or remote learning for the rest of the year.

Hundreds of parents have been calling on the district to bring back students full time.

Like many schools in the region, students have only been going into their school buildings there two days a week.

Parents said it's a step in the right direction, but they have concerns.