Georgia closing schools for remainder of school year

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp on Wednesday announced that the state's K-12 public schools will remain closed for the remainder of the school year and that he will sign a shelter-in-place order on Thursday.

The Republican governor last week issued an order closing schools through April 24. But he said Wednesday that he will sign an executive order that will close the schools for the remainder of the school year.

"I want to stress that online learning will continue," the governor added when making the announcement.

"Tomorrow I will sign a statewide shelter in place order, which will go into effect on Friday and run through April 13, 2020," the governor also said.

California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom indicated Wednesday that schools will likely not reopen during this school year, though distance learning will continue.

"With this new modeling, with the dynamic nature of the models that we've been using for now many, many weeks it seems I think self-evident that we should not prepare to bring our children back into the school setting," he said.

California's State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond on Tuesday issued a statement that similarly expressed that the state's schools should focus on distance learning as it appears likely the schools will not reopen.

“Due to the current safety concerns and needs for ongoing social distancing, it currently appears that our students will not be able to return to school campuses before the end of the school year," his statement said. "This is in no way to suggest that school is over for the year, but rather we should put all efforts into strengthening our delivery of education through distance learning."