Manhattan Beach Public Schools To Resume In-Person TK-2 In Feb.

Liz Spear
·2 min read

MANHATTAN BEACH, CA — EDITOR'S NOTE: This is a message from Mike Matthews, superintendent of the Manhattan Beach Unified School District.

Hello everyone,

There have been a number of encouraging recent developments for fans of defeating COVID:

  • Like you, I now know several people, some medical personnel, and some adults aged 65 or older, who have received their first (and in some cases second) dose of the vaccine. Several employees from MBUSD who meet the criteria above have also received their first doses.

  • MBUSD is working with Beach Cities Health District and with the City of Manhattan Beach. Both of these partners may be able to help us provide vaccines to all of our employees. We are polling staff, holding vaccine Q&A sessions, and continuing to develop plans to make sure that we are ready to move quickly when vaccines become available.

  • At this point, only 6% of our employees have said they do not plan to get the vaccine. That is great news.

  • Today Governor Newsom announced that he is lifting the most recent stay at home order. In listening to a LACDPH briefing this afternoon, Governor Newsom’s announcement will start having some impact on restaurants and businesses in our community as early as Friday. Although the direct implications for our schools is still unclear, I should be hearing more from LACDPH in the next few days.

  • Finally, LACDPH announced last week that they have no intention of extending the recommendation to temporarily close TK-2 classrooms beyond the end of January. Therefore, we plan to return to our hybrid learning model next week, expanding to two days per week of on-campus instruction for students on February 1, and then expanding again on February 8, with our TK-2 students attending school on campus four days a week. Please see that schedule here.


I am encouraged by all of these developments. While there are no promises of going back to normal any time soon, I do hope we continue bringing LA County COVID numbers down from the massive spike we have experienced since November. Such a decline would allow us to bring back more students to in-person classes — eventually including more students at our secondary level. Thank you for your efforts in following all County and state guidelines, but please stay vigilant so that we can continue to move in the right direction.

Thank you,

Mike Matthews
MBUSD Superintendent

This article originally appeared on the Manhattan Beach Patch