Texas schools will remain closed through the end of the 2019-2020 school year after Governor Greg Abbot’s press conference Friday afternoon in response to the coronavirus pandemic. Texas currently has 14,624 confirmed cases of COVID-19 while Collin County reports 505 confirmed cases, 304 of which are recovered. 

Superintendent Michael Goddard released a video message shortly following Abbott’s announcement regarding what the rest of the year will look like as the district continues to utilize online learning. 

“We’ve got lots of things going on,” Goddard said. “We’ve got virtual campouts, we’ve got all kinds of different things here in the future that you’ll hear more of in the next few weeks as we know that school won’t be returning in a physical sense over this school year.” 

Administrators are also working out ways to honor the class of 2020.

“I do want to let you know that we have opportunities that we are working through right now to have graduation, [we have] ideas of doing it in a different way virtually,” Goddard said. “You’ll see some of those pieces for honoring our seniors and even having senior announcement day for their colleges, universities or next steps.” 

According to senior class president Lily McCutcheon, the district’s closing is an obligation for safety. 

“I believe that the cancellation of school is a necessity because of the liabilities schools would have to face if they held school,” McCutcheon said. “For both the students and the teachers I think the cancelation is crucial for all of our safety and to stop the spread of the virus.” 

Moving forward, Abbott already cancelled STAAR testing for the year, and students taking AP exams will complete them all online in a FRQ based format. For final exam grades, third and fourth quarter grades will be averaged with the third quarter grades weighing two-thirds of the final and the fourth quarter grades weighing one-third.