As COVID-19’s new surge rages on, Cranston Public Schools on Monday announced that all of the district’s buildings are moving to full distance learning from Dec. 10 through at least Jan. 4.

“We are seeing a surge in cases in our community and across the state that is unprecedented, and we are unable to staff our buildings safely any longer,” a letter to the school community reads. “We are seeing more students and staff who are positive and more families who are affected by this pandemic. With the inability to consistently and predictably manage our staffing due to positive cases, quarantining, testing time requirements, and just general absenteeism, it is not fair to parents and staff to not know from one day to the next if we can open our schools.”

The move to distance learning includes all students in pre-K through grade 12 at all Cranston schools. Schools were already set to close for two weeks starting Dec. 23 for holiday break.

As part of the state’s two-week “pause,” Cranston Public Schools had recently moved its high schools to virtual learning – with exceptions for key subgroups – while the youngest students remained in classrooms and others operated on a hybrid schedule.

This is far from the first disruption to the school reopening process since September. In mid-November, all district buildings temporarily closed as a result of staffing issues.

And just hours before this week’s district-wide decision, the district had announced that three buildings – Western Hills Middle School, Stone Hill Elementary School and Woodridge Elementary School – would be closed through Dec. 11. That was the latest in a growing list of short-term closures during the last three months.

During Monday night’s virtual work session of the School Committee, Superintendent Jeannine Nota-Masse said temporary school and classroom closures have become an increasingly serious issue in recent weeks as Rhode Island’s COVID case counts have soared.

“With the increase in cases recently, and it is hitting our staff as well as students now, we’re seeing increased folks being out because they are sick, or because they’re on quarantine or they’re awaiting testing,” she said. “When that happens, it becomes extremely unpredictable to know who is coming in on a day-to-day basis in our schools.”

She added: “Each week, we have two or three schools that are not able to have in-person learning, Unfortunately, it’s becoming more and more frequent. More and more classrooms are getting impacted by COVID. We’ve have some classrooms that have been shut down a couple of times now over the past couple of weeks.”

A shortage of substitutes, Nota-Masse said, remains a “real problem.” The recent surge has also increasingly led families to keep students home, she said, noting that in-person attendance at the middle and high school levels has particularly seen a “huge drop-off.”

The superintendent additionally noted that in more recent days, the district has increasingly experienced instances in which staff members and students arrive at school feeling fine but become symptomatic over the course of the day.

“We have difficulties safely, consistently and predictably staffing schools … It’s not fair to families that we have to close down classrooms and schools kind of quickly because of staff being absent, and it’s not good for students’ education that they’re in and their out,” she said.

She added: “Our job is to educate students. We want every student to be in school every day. That is our desire, that is our focus, and that is our job. Unfortunately, we’ve come to a point where the pandemic is taking control over how we are able to execute that on a daily basis …I totally agree with parents who are not happy with this. It’s not ideal. It’s inconvenient. But at least we know for the next few weeks where we are and where students will be on a daily basis.”

Nota-Masse noted that the Thanksgiving holiday appears to have fueled some of the latest COVID spread in the school community. While the hope is for the district to reopen its buildings for in-person instruction in the new year, she the situation remains far too fluid to make definitive plans at this point.

“I hope we are able to be back up and running in person after the holidays. I don’t know what that’s going to look like … I don’t know what to predict. I don’t think anybody does,” she said.

Members of the School Committee on Monday expressed support for Nota-Masse’s decision and praised the district’s educators and staff for working through the challenges of in-person learning.

“The faculty and staff in our schools are second to none. We asked them to do the impossible, and they were able to do it,” Ward 5 representative David Alden-Sears said.

“I think this is the best move for this time,” said Dan Wall, the committee’s chairman and Ward 6 representative.

“I know it’s a really tough decision, but I think that it’s the best one for the community,” added Ward 1 representative Sara Tindall-Woodman.

Mayor Allan Fung on Tuesday said he, too, backs Nota-Masse’s decision to move to distance learning.

“Superintendent Nota-Masse has been keeping us informed,” he said. “I support her decision to make sure that the students and the staff have a safe environment.”

In response to a question Monday about access to technology and internet connectivity for the district’s families, Nota-Masse her focus at this point is “less with access to the internet than it is with [student] disengagement [during distance learning], and that’s something I worry about.” That concern is higher at the middle and high school levels, she said.

Donna-Marie Frappier, the district’s technology director, said at this point the district has received very few inquiries related to technology and connectivity. She said Cox Communications has been assisting families in need of access.

Frappier also noted that through a move to Google Enterprise, educators will have an automated log of when students log in for classes and how long they stay connected.