The Thames Valley District School Board is preparing to hand out electronic devices to some of the families of its 79,000 students in an attempt to adapt to the unprecedented COVID-19 public health crisis that has shuttered all of the province's public schools indefinitely.

On Monday, education officials began making phone calls and sending emails to area homes, in order to gauge from parents how wide a technology gap exists between between the families of its students.

There is still no timeline for when the province's public schools will reopen after they were ordered closed 18 days ago in an attempt to stop the spread of COVID-19, which, as of Monday included 1,706 cases and 23 deaths.

The closures come at a crucial time for some students, especially those looking to graduate and go on to post-secondary education, because so far the province has given no contingency plan for how students would make up for lost time.

'Students who are about to graduate will not be disadvantaged'

Thames Valley District School Board director of education Mark Fisher said he doesn't know if students will be able to return to class this year. (David Donnelly/CBC)

Sheila Powell, the Thames Valley board's superintendent of student achievement and the person in charge of making the on-the-fly-shift to virtual classrooms, said post-secondary institutions are willing to be flexible, given the situation.

"The ministry has said that students who are about to graduate will not be disadvantaged because of the COVID-19 outbreak," she said. "We have to look at courses differently, recognizing that the school closures may be longer than we would hope."

The school board said Monday the Ontario Ministry of Education is expected to spell out exactly how it plans to have teachers engage their pupils through remote learning later this week.

The change could be the biggest challenge of many teachers' careers, who will have to hold the attention of their class without being physically present in the room.

Powell said that while students will be doing their learning online, the strength of their Internet connection won't be a factor in how students are graded.

'We'll get very creative'

"We have phones, we have opportunities for students, if they need, to mail-in assignments," she said. "We'll get very creative and our staff response today in our staff meetings was very positive about how we're going to support each other in learning together in how to reach our students."

The school board said Monday that families who do not own a computer or tablet are asked to fill out an online form or leave a message on their neighbourhood school voicemail.

Powell wouldn't answer questions about how many devices the school board has to give out, saying that officials have a "very detailed inventory" and that distribution would be limited to one device per family. Parents have until April 2 at noon to tell school officials if they need one.

The board said health authorities must still review and green light the plan before the devices can be sent out. It also said it would publish details of how the devices would be distributed and eventually returned to schools at a later date.