School In A COVID-19 World: Relearning What Day Will Be Like For Students, Teachers

CHICAGO (CBS) – Now that Illinois is continuing to loosen COVID-19 restrictions, a big question remains: When will schools re-open and what will be different for students?

CBS 2's Chris Tye has details on what a re-engineered classroom will look like for schoolkids in a COVID world.

To start with, desks will be six feet apart, new policies will be in place for water fountains and hygiene breaks will be built into the school day. These are some of the new protocols now required by the state of Illinois.

Catholic schools will open up, but others are not yet ready to commit, waiting to see how summer school rules shake out. "We are still developing our full re-opening plan," said Dr. Jim Rigg, superintendent of catholic schools for the Chicago archdiocese. "We can pull this off. This is something we can do safely and successfully."

No matter when students go back to the classroom, job one will be re-learning what a day at school looks like.

Summer school requires six feet spacing in all directions between desks. There are proposals to separate kids in gym class with partitions and even banning high-fives. There will be deep cleaning of all facilities as well.

Adding in training for staff and the costs begin to add up – an estimated $1.8 million for districts with 3,700 students, according to the national School Superintendents Association. Nationwide, that's $116 billion. Chicago's Catholic schools are still budgeting the costs, and are using federal COVID-19 relief money to cover initial expenses.

But they have several issues still to resolve, including how kids will enter and exit classrooms to keep social distance.

Chicago public schools are establishing a so-called "re-entry" task force to examine how this would play out. Other ideas include alternate day learning schedules to reduce headcount.

The biggest change may come when Illinois moves to phase four. Currently classrooms and hallways are limited to 10 people per space. When phase four kicks in: you can put 50 people in a space, which may nudge more districts toward a formal re-opening plan.