According to Coleman, the proposals are aimed at helping schools represent all of their students, and to form an action plan for reopening schools in the fall.
"The task force includes representatives of Kentucky's educational cooperatives, educational partner organizations such as the Kentucky Association of School Superintendents, Kentucky School Board Association, Kentucky Parent Teacher Association, Kentucky Education Association and Kentucky High School Athletic Association, as well as Kentucky Educational Television, the Southern Regional Education Board and other relevant partners," Coleman said. "This task force focuses on providing timely information, research and instructional resources to our school districts as they dealt with an unprecedented length of school closure and are now trying to figure out ways to reopen amid the crisis."
On March 16, the Kentucky Department of Education formed an Education Continuation Task Force, which involves K-12 education stakeholders. The task force was created to develop plans for continuing education during the pandemic.
Coleman said she recently invited a bipartisan group of legislators to join in their effort. The legislators that accepted her invitation were Senators Reggie Thomas and Max Wise, and Representatives Tina Bojanowski and Regina Huff.
The taks force is currently working to develop guidance to help school districts across Kentucky plan for fall. In a recent meeting, the task force discussed the "five best practices" heard from public health officials: wearing masks, practicing social distancing, hand sanitizing/surface sanitizing, temperature checks, and contact tracing.
Coleman says the practices aren't new, but what is new is figuring out how these best practices look in a school system.
She said, "How does this look in a school system? How does this look when there are hundreds and maybe even thousands of students in a building at one time? That is certainly not going to be an easy feat."
Coleman goes on to say that it will be imperative that the students and children throughout our communities have positive role models and positive examples to actually practice what they're preaching.
"We should never ask of our students what we're not willing to give." Coleman continued, "And so it's really important for not just our teachers and our education leaders, but our community leaders and state leaders to follow these guidelines as well."
One of the goals of the task force is to create a culture of support around the best practices from the medical community. Coleman says the important aspect is taking the safety expectations for the students at the state level, and helping to implement them at the local level. They are working to empower local community leaders to take the safety expectations and "make the best of the situation."
"It's going to be a difficult lift and I'm not going to sugar coat that because we have children who are involved. So that becomes even more important, obviously, to every one of us. As teachers we refer to them as our kids," she said.
Coleman says that although it will be a challenge, she believes it can be done. There will be continued updates as the project moves forward.
As for the pandemic numbers, Beshear said Sunday's report had 85 new cases, with four in McCracken, two in Graves, and one in Calloway County. One death was reported on Sunday, a 91-year-old woman from Henry County, who became the 500th person to die of the virus in Kentucky.
As of Monday there were 120 new cases of COVID-19 across the Commonwealth, bringing the total number of cases to 12,647. Out of those new cases, three were in Marshall, two in Calloway and two in McCracken County. There were five new deaths associated with the virus, bringing the total number of deaths to 505. There have been 3,416 reported recoveries, and 325,065 people have been tested.
Beshear said, "Our testing capacity continues to increase, we just have to make sure to encourage people to get tested."
He also reminded voters that Monday is the last day to request an absentee ballot for the June 23 election.
Beshear said, "We have had significant numbers of folks get online. Voting is the bedrock of our democracy."
Online requests for ballots can be made at GoVoteKY.com through 11:59 pm on Monday.
In-person voting is also taking place at county clerk's offices through June 22, and in-person voting on primary election day will typically happen at one location instead of numerous precincts. Check with your county clerk for details.
You can see Beshear's full update below.
