DAVENPORT, Iowa — After a year filled with changing policies, flexible learning styles, and a whole lot of unknowns, the largest school district in the Quad Cities is finally on summer break.
The Davenport Community School District released students and staff for the mid-year break on Wednesday, June 16. Leading up to the last day was a journey unlike any other.
What began as a fully remote year transformed into a hybrid learning model on Monday, December 14. Then just two months later, on February 15, the district had to pivot again, when Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds required public schools to offer full-time, in-person learning.
Now, the break might be a little bit shorter than some are accustomed to. The district will resume classes on Monday, August 23 - just nine and a half weeks from the final day of classes in the 2020-2021 school year.
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But for some students, all the focus now is on a break from a long and stressful several months.
Trinity Flower just finished the sixth grade when we caught up with her at pitching practice in Davenport's Marquette Park. She told us about the challenges of online learning and how she often felt confused about the way classes were taught remotely.
"The work just made no sense," she said. "It's hard because I'm still new to typing stuff and then the questions they ask online might be worded weird and not make sense to me."
She said while she was excited to go back in-person this past spring, she still takes caution and wears a mask most days. Trinity loves to hang out with her friends and enjoys subjects like math.
But she admits she did end the year with lower grades than what she's used to.
"It was quarantine... quarantine for sure. Covid really got to everything and everybody," she said. "My grades slipped a little bit and it's scary to me."
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A few blocks away, Kieran Lecount was celebrating his completion of first grade with a family ice cream run. He says the year was tiring and he was also excited to get back to in-person learning - especially for lunch time and recess.
"[Online learning] was kinda like watching boring videos and stuff," he noted. "But now I'm done with school for a couple of months!"
It's a sentiment that high school Spanish teacher Stephanie Hansen knows well. She says online learning took a lot of extra hours for both her and her students, who sometimes struggled with finding class times to adequately learn the language remotely.
"I love my job so I can't say that I'm like relieved, but it's kind of crazy where we started to where we are now," she said. "It kind of is a relief for them to have this ending."
Hansen says while next fall still promises future unknowns, she just hopes it will be a little closer to 'normal.'
"Usually kids are ready for the end of the year but they were so ready," she laughed. "They had a countdown on the board and I'm like you go ahead and change that. You've earned it."