Williams: KCS considering extra duty contract for teachers during pandemic

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Kanawha County Schools officials are looking into the possibility of giving teachers an extra financial contract for teaching both in-person and students virtually.

Superintendent Tom Williams said during a board meeting on Tuesday night that he has spoken with Treasurer Melanie Meadows on an “extra duty contract,” similar to what coaches receive. No amount was mentioned.

“We can’t give a bonus with ESSERF money, it’s specifically doesn’t allow that. However, we could give them an extra duty contract so to speak. That is something we are exploring with our treasurer,” Williams said.

Williams said last school year when there was blended learning, teachers could work exclusively with e-learning or exclusively with in-person learning. Now, Williams said teachers cannot be freed to do one or the other because classrooms are nearly full and it’s 5-day a week learning.

Williams said there are those few hundred kids that do miss in-person learning due to COVID-19 and need that online portion to catch up.

“We had 326 cases last week and that was about one and a half percent of our total student population,” Williams said of current COVID-19 numbers in the school system.

Williams and board members said those numbers are expected with a school system so large and community spread. Officials applauded the results of the current mask mandate in the county.

Williams also wanted to let constituents know that every COVID case in schools is different and to never compare the two.

“You may do something this way and someone may say ‘Well you did this at South Charleston but didn’t do this at St. Albans so you don’t care about the St. Albans and only care about the South Charleston kids,” Well, every single case is different,” he said.