GLADSTONE — Gladstone Area Schools Superintendent Jay Kulbertis gave members of the Gladstone Area Schools Board of Education an update on the district’s re-opening plans Monday. The first day of school for Gladstone students is scheduled for Tuesday, Sept. 1.

During a regular board meeting Monday evening, Kulbertis said the district has been receiving “increasing guidance” from the State of Michigan on what it will need to do ahead of its re-opening.

“We’ve been working with our administrative teams, our supervisors and staff members to take a look at … our six phases,” he said, referring to the phases laid out in the MI Safe Start Plan.

In Phases 1-3, Gladstone Area Schools’ instruction would be fully distanced. Phase 4 would allow for a blend of in-person and distanced instruction, while students could fully go back to classrooms in Phases 5 and 6. As of Monday, the entire Upper Peninsula is in Phase 5.

Planning for the return of students to school buildings has been a complicated process.

“Whether it’s transportation and arrival to school, school breakfast — so, even before the first bell rings, there are a whole number of hurdles to get over,” Kulbertis said.

Because of this, Kulbertis said the district’s re-opening plans will be a “work in progress.”

“We realize there are going to be some ups and downs. It’s going to take a lot of communication with parents, a lot of understanding and really just a lot of collaboration,” he said.

As the start of the 2020-21 school year approaches, Gladstone Area Schools is working to gauge parents’ thoughts on online learning.

“We believe that, regardless of which phase we start the school year in, we have some parents that are going to be reluctant to send their students to school and we want to make a fully-online option available to them,” ­Kulbertis said.

A letter and survey on the subject is set to be sent to parents of Gladstone students this week.

Kulbertis also addressed financial planning on the state level. He said the legislature should meet today to adopt a supplemental budget for Michigan’s 2019-20 fiscal year.

“What we’re expecting to hear is there’ll be a foundation cut, along with some categoricals,” he said.

According to Kulbertis, a federal stimulus package should help offset the impact of these cuts for this year. However, he said it is not easy to guess how Gladstone Area Schools will be financially impacted next year.

“That’s yet to be determined,” he said.

The district is not planning for any reduction in employees.

“We actually firmly believe that we’re going to need all of our people, because there’s going to be a lot to do,” Kulbertis said.

Finally, Kulbertis addressed plans for contact tracing at Gladstone Area Schools. He said Public Health, Delta and Menominee Counties will be in charge of tracing efforts, and the district will provide information to the department.

“There is going to be an expectation that we have a better handle on where students are and who they’ve interacted with even when they’re not in the classroom, so we’re going to make that clear to our bus drivers, our food service staff, our custodians, (and) our instructional aides so that everyone’s working together to make sure we’re minimizing the interaction between elementary classrooms and we’re staggering or alternating traffic patterns at the high school to minimize the interaction,” he said.

While the information Kulbertis shared was current as of Monday, he acknowledged that things could change in the near future.

“We may very well get new guidance by the end of the week — in fact, at this point, we expect it,” he said.

In other business, the board:

– approved an instructional days and hours resolution. The resolution set the calendar for Gladstone’s 2020-21 school year at 180 days and 1,098 hours of instruction, which can be modified by the board.

– approved School of Choice resolutions.

– accepted a letter of intent to retire from Traci Alworden.