Barren County School District unveils color-coded tier reopening plan

GLASGOW, Ky.- The Barren County School District in Glasgow is a school district where the staff is hard at work to formulate a reopening procedure.

Superintendent Bo Matthews is looking forward to getting the plan into motion.

“We miss our students; we miss our staff. We had a very abrupt end to the face-to-face school year last year,” Matthews said.

For that reason, the district has put together a color-coded tier system depending on the situation- green if there are no cases, yellow if cases emerge in the district and red for the worst-case scenario of a large amount of cases. Each tier will determine how the district operates. Even during a green tier, the district is still working within CDC guidelines.

“Green means we’re good to go. We’ll certainly be wearing masks; we’ll be washing our hands, sanitizing surfaces in the school buildings, maintaining social distancing every opportunity that we can,” Matthews said.

The tier system came about as the district immediately began brainstorming ideas for how to safely reopen.

“We immediately formed a task force and populated it with stakeholders including staff members, teachers, community and board members, school administrators, district directors,” Matthews said.

The process resulted from the combined work of the district staff, an effort that Matthews said will benefit the entire Trojan community. While this school year will be unique, Matthews said he’s just ready to see everyone again.

“We’ve got safety as our top priority. That’s always something that’s a part of our school district. In regard to the pandemic and the variables that seem to change daily, anything that we put out in draft is subject to change,” Matthews said.