HARTFORD, Conn — With the vaccine making headway and COVID-19 numbers on the decline, will we ever get to a point where schools are completely reopened?
Last week, the CDC released new guidance on how to safely reopen classrooms and here in Connecticut, the state says roughly 52-percent of schools are doing in-person learning.
When you factor in hybrid, even more students are in-person.
Governor Ned Lamont said 95-percent of Connecticut schools have been conducting in-person learning, something teachers' unions have been strongly against, but some parents said there is a way for kids to learn in the classrooms while staying safe.
Dana Lowes-Hobson is a mother with two elementary school kids in Granby. Their school district has only been remote on snow days and has had in-person learning since September and she is happy that it has stayed that way, but when it came to remote learning, it has not been easy.
"My younger one .. she just sometimes she'll just get up and just run away from the iPad so i think for younger children, remote learning is not ideal because they don't understand why they should be doing it," said Hobson of Granby.
Education Commissioner Miguel Cardona and Governor Lamont have publicly pushed for schools to be open when COVID numbers make sense.
"I'd like to think as you can see, we've kept our schools safely open really since the beginning of this fall and we've had it with a very low infection rate. More and more parents and their kids will be comfortable being in school," said Gov. Lamont.
Andover's Superintendent Valerie Bruneau echoed his statement and said her district has remained fully open with no issues and pointed to specific mitigation strategies.
"We called on parents to say hey we need help with being able to make sure that the children on the bus can properly have social distancing so 60-percent of the parents said we will drop off and pick up our kids so the other kids can ride the bus safely at a 25 or 26-percent capacity.
For Newington who is currently on a hybrid model, Superintendent Maureen Brummett plans on making changes come March 1st by returning those who are struggling at home back to the classrooms.
"Looking at students who are not doing well with our cohort model - our hybrid model. Currently we have many that are either at risk or have special education need but we're also going to start looking at students who are going to have poor grades," said Brummett.
The Connecticut Association of School Superintendents shared a chart with FOX61 that listed the five percent of districts that were remote the first week of February.
It included big districts like New London, Norwich and Waterbury.
This list changed often as districts shifted models. For example, a spokesperson with Waterbury Public Schools said they were supposed to begin hybrid learning on February 1st, but it had to be pushed back because of the snowstorm.
Governor Lamont mentioned in his Tuesday news briefing, he will roll out the 200-million dollars for schools so learning can get back on track and teachers and make up for lost times.