UMATILLA COUNTY — Just as local school districts started to distribute work packets for students, the Oregon Department of Education is making another sweeping change to the education system in light of the ongoing COVID-19 school closures.

Acknowledging that students may not return to school facilities before the end of the school year, Colt Gill, the department’s director, announced Monday night that the state was adopting a “Distance Learning for All” model and was expecting all schools in Oregon to submit a distance learning plan by April 13.

The directive comes two weeks after Gov. Kate Brown signed an executive order requiring districts to only provide “learning supports and supplemental services” until April 28, which is still the presumptive date students are supposed to return to school.

Matt Yoshioka, the Pendleton School District’s director of curriculum, instruction and assessment, said the prospect of closing schools for the rest of the year was in the back of district officials’ minds, but the new plan still came as a surprise.

Yoshioka noted that Brown had not yet issued a new executive order extending the school closures and the state had previously assured local districts that they didn’t want to move to distance learning during the shutdown because of the potential for inequity.

InterMountain Education Service District Superintendent Mark Mulvihill has said so often recently that schools are in a constantly changing environment that he thinks it’s starting to become cliche.

“If there’s anything we’ve learned from this pandemic, it’s that plans change overnight,” he said.

Distance Learning for All calls for teachers and other educational staff to reconnect with their students on a regular basis, whether that’s online or by other means, and monitor student progress from a distance.

Mulvihill said districts in the region had already gotten creative in how they were providing supplemental material, and he was confident K-8 schools would be able to make the transition to distance learning.

He still had questions about how it would work with high schools, where students can earn credits toward high school graduation and college.

Districts are still waiting on guidance from the department of education on how to graduate seniors who have fallen behind on credits due to the closures, despite the department saying it intended to release new rules last week.

While encouraging more interactions between staff and students, the state’s distance learning plan also stresses that districts need to maintain equity between students with internet access and those without.

Yoshioka said the district can rent out plenty of laptops, but one of the problems Pendleton will need to solve with its plan is how to serve students without internet access.

Mulvhill said districts will need to be creative to bridge that gap, with internet-deprived students likely to receive more printed packets and phone calls with staff.

While districts have spent recent years adopting new policies to limit private, unsupervised, one-on-one contact between students and teachers to protect each party from unethical situations and abuse, Distance Learning for All asks districts to revise their policies if electronic and telephonic communication are prohibited.

Yoshioka, who used to give out his home phone number to parents during his teaching days, says staff will still be expected to act professionally when communicating with students.

Mulvihill said the uncertainty with education extends beyond distance learning.

Districts are expected to turn in their applications for Student Success Act funding around the same time they submit their distance learning plans.

Mulvihill said districts won’t know their long-term outlook until the Oregon Legislature meets next year to set an educational budget.