Lisbon High School does not have a certified science teacher for the second semester.
Lisbon secondary principal Aaron Becker said the district has had an advertisement out for a science teacher since the middle of February, when science teacher Shannon Walker submitted a letter of resignation due to health reasons. Walker had a case of COVID-19 in late 2020/early 2021 which had left her hospitalized for multiple weeks.
The school is currently utilizing a long-term substitute teacher and has switched its science curriculum to APEX Online learning, used for credit recovery at the Lisbon Secondary School to allow students to receive credits in science classes.
Classes impacted at Lisbon include chemistry, physics and earth science. Jordan Meyer is helping by teaching the anatomy class at the high school because there is not an anatomy equivalent course in APEX, while Nick Boots will take Meyer’s middle school coding class for the rest of the second semester.
“It’s not ideal, but it’s the option we have,” Becker said. “I know it’s hard having kids move from learning in person to learning on computers, and we’re doing what we can to make this transition less hard.”
Becker said he thought it would be more beneficial for these students to have some science content, even if it wasn’t taught in a traditional classroom setting, than to have an additional study hall.
Current middle school science teachers have volunteered to help as they can, but Becker said he doesn’t want to pursue that for a long-term solution, as that could contribute to burnout for those staff members.
“They still need to maintain lesson plans for their middle school classes, plus whatever courses they’re helping with at the high school,” Becker said.
Heath Holub, Meyer and Dylan Hastings have been working with the long-term substitute Jake Wolf, however, to help him get used to teaching in a classroom setting and learning how to help students navigate APEX.
Becker said the district has started advertising for the science teacher position for the 2022-23 school year as well, where he has some interviews lined up currently following spring break.
“It doesn’t take care of the problem for this school year, but it is definitely a priority for the district,” Becker said. “Our issue is anyone we interview for 2022-23 school year is a college student looking to graduate in May, so they wouldn’t be able to jump into teaching the remainder of this school year.”
Lisbon school board member Abbe Stensland said she was concerned many of the students from Lisbon might not be ready to take science level classes at this point, as they’ve had disruptions in their science education for the past two years. When Walker was out with COVID in the 2020-21 school year, students had a long-term substitute teaching the curriculum.
“I’m concerned that they are missing basic fundamental pieces to some science content,” Stensland said, “things that they won’t be able to get from the APEX learning program that are important to fields like chemistry if they were to pursue this post high school.”
Becker said he has drawn on other teachers to help find areas where students are not getting enough attention to core details and work with them to make sure they are getting some key concepts for those courses.
Lisbon school board member Robyn Richey asked if it would be possible for students to contact teachers in other districts to have answers to concepts they just weren’t getting. Becker said that would require other districts to be willing to take on that additional burden. The district has reached out to Cornell College and surrounding colleges on the issue, and will be discussing the issue with other Tri-Rivers Conference Schools.
Lisbon school president Jen Caspers’ concern was the change to how students learn in the science curriculum was different then they had previously expected, and might raise concerns for their eligibility for extra-curriculars as they adapted to the online learning model.
Becker said he will also be checking in with colleges if offering science classes pass/fail would still work on transcripts so students don’t have to be as concerned about a GPA from transitioning to an online only class.