This post has been updated to reflect new developments:
Tuesday, 2:07 p.m.
According to Michigan Public Radio Network's Rick Pluta, the state may in fact be willing to work with the district to put kids back in school soon. The Buena Vista School Board will meet tonight. If the board can approve a "deficit reduction plan" that is then approved by the state, school aid payments would begin to flow again and the school could re-open. If that doesn't work, plan B is the federally-funded skills camp model.
Tuesday 11:00 a.m.
By far the least important, but most commented on, aspect of this story is how Buena Vista is pronounced. I'm getting this out of the way. It's pronounced Be-you-nuh Vis-tah. I know this bothers many people and is not the correct way to say buena vista if you were speaking Spanish, or just not mangling Spanish. But that's the way the school district is pronounced. I promise.
So what's happening there and why aren't kids in school yet? The State Board of Education is meeting today to potentially approve a deal for the Buena Vista school district. Using federal money, not state (the state made it clear they were not going to help), kids who haven't transferred into another district already can probably go to voluntary "skills camp" until the end of school. Like summer school, only not in the summertime.
Let's see who tries to take credit for opening the school doors again.
It's been nine days since the Buena Vista schools fired all its teachers and told their students to go home and not bother coming back. There were five more weeks of school and no ceremonies to celebrate their successes or let them say goodbye to teachers and friends.
The state did step in to help Pontiac schools last week. Maybe it's a "too big to fail" thing?
Updates as the situation progresses.