The Eudora school district will move to fully in-person classes shortly after starting the school year.

During a special meeting on Thursday, the Eudora school board approved a recommendation from Superintendent Steve Splichal to have fully in-person classes for the first full week of school. But the board said the decision would be “subject to review and ongoing recommendation.”

The board also approved Splichal’s recommendation to allow activities to continue with standard public health precautions.

Previously, the board had not chosen how to begin the school year but was considering a hybrid option. The hybrid plan would have split the student population in half, with each half attending school in person on different days to reduce the number of people in school buildings at once.

Under Splichal’s plan, half of the school district’s students will still start their school year on Thursday, Sept. 3, and the other half will start on Friday, Sept. 4. But then the following week, after Labor Day, all students will be fully in-person for classes Sept. 8-11.

Splichal said his recommendation would have the school board revisit the issue during its Sept. 10 meeting, which allows the board to consider extending fully in-person classes or move to the hybrid option.

The district’s plan is in line with the recently released guidance from the Education Unified Command, which outlined recommendations on how Douglas County schools could conduct classes and activities during the pandemic.

As the Journal-World has reported, the guidance includes four color-coded tiers — green, yellow, orange and red — with green providing the safest conditions for students to return to in-person classrooms and allowing activities and athletics to continue as long as standard health precautions are taken, such as wearing masks and social distancing.

As of Friday, Lawrence-Douglas County Public Health’s guidance was in the green phase. The health department’s up-to-date recommendation can be found on its education guidance website, ldchealth.org/457/Smart-and-Safe-School-Reopening.

Elsewhere, it is unclear if the Baldwin City school district has changed its plan for reopening school in light of the recently announced guidance. Superintendent Paul Dorathy did not immediately respond to the Journal-World’s request for comment.

Previously, Dorathy told the Journal-World Baldwin City was planning to begin with pre-K through sixth grade classes to be on-site daily in “self-contained cohorts,” and grades 7 through 12 using a hybrid option, attending every other day to decrease the number of students in the buildings.

Perry-Lecompton, which began school on Wednesday, chose to start the school year with its hybrid option, which will continue until Aug. 28. The district will reconsider how to continue the school year during its Tuesday school board meeting, taking Douglas and Jefferson counties’ local COVID-19 data into account, the district said in a news release.