Fowler: Hoover schools working to recover from COVID-19, rebuild trust

Matthew Hudgins, a seventh grader at Berry Middle School, had a rough time after missing four weeks of school due to COVID-19 near the beginning of this school year.

He was able to come back to school after his fever finally went away, but he still suffered from lingering fatigue, his mother, Valerie Hudgins, said in a video produced by the school system. Matthew would come home from school and sleep for hours, his mother said.

But the teachers and staff at Berry were amazing, she said.

While Matthew was out sick, the school nurse called every other day to check on him for four weeks, Hudgins said. Kayla Latuso, who was hired by the school district as an interventionist to help students catch up from learning losses due to COVID-19, helped Matthew get back on track academically.

The proactive approach the school took was impressive, reaching out to parents when they noticed he was struggling, Hudgins said.

“At a school this size, they noticed him, and they called me, which blows my mind,” she said. “They actually pulled him out of classes twice a day and let him take a nap to regain his strength so he can make it through the day. That has been extremely helpful for him.”

That’s a prime example of the care the Hoover school system has for its students, Superintendent Dee Fowler told the Hoover Area Chamber of Commerce at a luncheon at the Hyatt Regency Birmingham — The Wynfrey Hotel today.

The Hoover school district hired 41 interventionists to help students recover from COVID-19 learning losses, Fowler said.

Just as businesses’ bottom lines were affected by COVID-19, the school district’s bottom line was, too. The school district’s bottom line is student achievement scores, which went down due to the loss of face-to-face instructional time, Fowler said.

The good thing is the COVID-19 pandemic showed the importance of face-to-face instruction, but the bad thing is that test scores indicated students didn’t make the progress they needed to make, he said.

“We can’t fix that. That’s happened,” Fowler said. “Now it is our job to focus on the future and to develop the expectations to move forward.”

He knows the Hoover community has high expectations, and he and his leadership team are working to find ways to meet those, he said.

There are some challenges, such as shortages of teachers, bus drivers and aides and shortages of certain kinds of food for the cafeterias, but “brighter days are ahead,” Fowler said.

Also, studies indicate that while 90% of students say they plan to go to college, only 80% actually do, and only 65% of that 80% actually graduate from college within six years, Fowler said. That means more than half of the high school graduates do not graduate from college, he said.

For that reason, Hoover schools must make sure students are prepared for both college and a career, Fowler said.

He said the Riverchase Career Connection Center has been a positive step in that direction, providing students a chance to earn credentials in five career areas: skilled trades such as construction, culinary and hospitality, health science, fire science and cyber innovation (database design and computer program and software development).

Last year, 11 graduates of the Skilled Trades Academy earned jobs with contractors, and graduates from other academies also obtained jobs and additional educational opportunities. One graduate of the Culinary and Hospitality Academy was accepted to the Culinary Institute of America in New York.

“It’s working. We’ve got to grow it,” Fowler said of the career-oriented school.

The superintendent also talked about the importance of working together. He’s only been in Hoover since this summer, but he senses that some of the trust in the community has been eroded over time, he said.

“We need to redevelop and re-establish trust,” he said. “We have to rebuild bridges — bridges between the city and schools and bridges between homes and schools.”

The school board recently heard from parents who spoke from a pure heart and conscience about their desire for masks in schools, as well as from parents who spoke from a pure heart and conscience about their desire for masks to be optional, Fowler said. Others were somewhere in the middle.

“There’s room at the table here for everyone,” Fowler said.