Students and staff at Red Bank Regional are scheduled begin 2022 in remote mode Tuesday. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)

By JOHN T. WARD

Red Bank borough schools will be open Tuesday, but the regional high school in Little Silver will go remote as shifting approaches to a surging COVID-19 virus arrived with the new year.

• Red Bank Regional High School will switch to virtual instruction starting Tuesday, Superintendent Lou Moore wrote in an update on the district website Monday afternoon.

“Unfortunately, the anticipated rate of staff absences impedes our ability to provide for adequate class coverage and supervision of students,” Moore wrote.

RBR was closed Monday so it could update COVID-19 response procedures,  though it had originally been scheduled to reopen after the Christmas-to-New Year’s break.

Moore said the school still plans to return to in-person classes Monday, January 10. In the interim, “sports will continue this week,” and meal distributions, for which all students are eligible, will be conducted Tuesday and Thursday from 2:30 to 3:30 p.m. at the school, Moore said.

The district comprises Red Bank, Little Silver and Shrewsbury.

• Red Bank borough’s primary and middle school students will return to the classroom Tuesday, Superintendent Jared Rumage said in announcement. The schools were closed Monday, extending an 11-day holiday by a day.

Rumage had previously said the district might switch to minimum school days, remote instruction or the use of additional emergency closure days in the face of surging COVID-19 cases. But the schools “will be open as per our normal operating schedule” Tuesday, he wrote on Twitter.

All before- and after-school activities are cancelled through Friday, he said, and Acelero students will follow a remote schedule.

• Little Silver’s two-school district began half-days of remote instruction Monday, an approach that is expected to continue through Friday, with a return to full days of in-classroom instruction anticipated Monday.

In his announcement of the plan Sunday, Acting Superintendent Eric Platt cited COVID-19’s “impact on staffing, along with the current number of student positives.”

• After a winter break that ran through Monday, the Red Bank Charter School is scheduled to reopen Tuesday.

• Fair Haven and Shrewsbury continue in-person instruction Tuesday.

• Red Bank Catholic High School and Saint James Elementary School are scheduled to be open Tuesday after a snow day Monday taken in anticipation of a storm that did not affect the area.

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