— Public schools across North Carolina won't reopen this school year because of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, state officials said Friday.

"School classrooms may be closed, but the learning is not over," Gov. Roy Cooper said at a news conference.

Cooper ordered schools closed on March 14 as the viral outbreak began to explode. They were to remain closed through May 15, but he said Friday that conditions haven't stabilized enough to allow in-person classes to resume.

"This decision is not made lightly. This decision was made with the high hopes that we could go in and finish the school year like any regular school year, but this virus tells us that cannot be," he said. "I know parents want us to keep the health and safety of their children as our No. 1 priority."

Students have in recent weeks been taking classes online or at home with delivered instructional materials.

"Our children and their parents have had some of the most abrupt disruptions to their lives and routines," Cooper said, noting teachers have been separated from their students and classmates from each other.

AT&T is providing 100 Wi-Fi hotspots in school buses, and the Duke Energy Foundation is providing another 80 hotspots so that students without internet access can keep up with their lessons, he said.

Parents, students face challenges

Keith Sutton, chairman of the Wake County Public School System, said the decision not to reopen schools was widely expected, so local school officials have been preparing for weeks to continue with online learning.

"The two major challenges for us have been, one, connecting with students and connectivity. We are still getting out laptops and hotspots, but we're finding those students and families and connecting them with devices," Sutton said. "The biggest challenge going forward will be engagement and making sure that ... [students] are actually getting online and engaging and connecting with teachers and engaging in learning."

As for parents, he acknowledged that having students learning at home instead of in a classroom "is not a perfect scenario." But he encouraged them to keep moving forward and not get frustrated by the situation.

"You don’t want your kids to fall behind. I know I don’t, anyway," said Serena Hinton-Smith, who has two children in Wake County high schools.

But she said she doesn't want either of them to get ill, so she has no problem with schools remaining closed. She is disappointed, though, that her daughter's senior year ends this way.

"She is not taking it too good," Hinton-Smith said.

North Carolina PTA President Harold Dixon said everyone needs to support each other in the new paradigm.

"I know it’s challenging for parents to become teachers at home. I’ve talked to many parents who are frustrated because it’s not like it was when they were in school," Dixon said. "It’s hard for everyone, even the teachers who are struggling with online classes and keeping up with work and monitoring students."

"We encourage students and parents to remain engaged, but not at the expense of emotional or mental health," Wake County school Superintendent Cathy Moore said. "We know this is hard."

"The best place for students to learn is in our school buildings, in the classroom of a nurturing, caring teacher," State Board of Education Chairman Eric Davis said, thanking teachers for going above and beyond in recent weeks to try to connect with their students.

The board and the state Department of Public Instruction are developing an intensive learning program to help students who might be falling behind because they aren't getting in-person instruction.

"We will finish this year as strong as we can," Superintendent of Public Instruction Mark Johnson said, noting that school officials will be less reactive to the crisis and more proactive moving forward.

Funds earmarked for schools, meals

Davis said teachers and school employees will continue to be paid through the scheduled end of the school year, and he encouraged local administrators to find ways for support staff to assist during the crisis.

"We need their talents to continue our emergency efforts," he said.

Teachers support the decision to keep schools closed, said North Carolina Association of Educators President Mark Jewell.

"Our educators continue to be on the front lines of this pandemic, providing new remote learning opportunities and essential nutritional and emotional support, and we appreciate local school districts adhering to the more stringent personal protecting protocols and social distancing guidelines," Jewell said in a statement.

North Carolina Teacher of the Year Mariah Morris said the decision will protect students, but it also will put some at a disadvantage moving forward.

"We are going to have gaps next year, and we’re going to have students who might not finish at the same place and who might not have had access to learning for the five months prior to August," said Morris, a second-grade teacher at West Pine Elementary School in Moore County. "We have to understand that we are all in this together and that we are going to be able to face these challenges.”

Doug Price, a sixth-grade teacher at Voyager Academy Middle School in Durham, who is the state's Charter School Teacher of the Year, said equity goes beyond having a laptop and internet access to do schoolwork remotely. For many students, it's having a decent breakfast and lunch.

Dixon agreed, saying he wants to ensure that needy students can continue getting meals when out of school.

"We all know that school time is the only time that some of our students have the opportunity to have a meal," he said. "We're asking our PTAs, houses of worship, community organizations to support the school districts in helping them with feeding the children."

Cooper has included $78 million for school nutrition and $243 million for K-12 education as part of a budget proposal in which he is directing $1.4 billion in federal CARES Act funding to address public health and safety needs, fund ongoing state government operations and provide assistance to businesses and local governments.

The State Board of Education on Thursday adopted a grading system for the spring semester and asked state lawmakers for $381 million in federal funding to address needs as schools resume later this year, such as a summer "jump start" course to help disadvantaged students catch up and remote teaching and learning needs, including Chromebooks for the estimated 300,000 students who have no digital devices.

Cooper said decisions about when and how to open schools in the fall – and year-round schools in July – will depend on data about public health trends at the time.

"Even the next school year won't be business as usual," he said, suggesting class schedules may need to be staggered and some remote learning may need to continue to maintain the "social distancing" needed to limit the spread of the coronavirus.