VA. Religious, yes. Local schools are masking albeit reluctantly. It is required by the state. City schools it is very hard to get an exemption. County schools not as difficult. Quarantining is done if an exposures are found, but they use such a loose definition of exposure that very few are found.
As a public school advocate in many/most situations, I have to say public schools may have a one-up right now with more strict COVID protocols (masking and such). Doesnât make for perfect by any means, but because most public schools serve many children in a community, this could be making an impact in overall child covid cases.
Iâm glad her daughter is wearing a good mask. Hopefully it is N95 or the equivalent because she is in a dangerous place for someone who may be at risk. I canât imagine how scary it must be. I would never send my child to a school without a mask mandate and good COVID protocols.
Front page of todayâs paper was about a program that pays school kids to get tested. First test is $25 and then $10 per test. Not sure how many tests they take a month but figure at least 1x per week. Steamboat Springs has signed up every school and the picture was of first graders sitting in class (same school my niece and nephews attended). Little Rockefellers in the making, getting paid $40/mo to go to school, which they have to do anyway.
Free lunch, paid for testingâŠschoolâs looking pretty good this year.
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One state in a European country, two of my three kids go to school there (and my H teaches):
All children and teachers in school are currently masked. No distancing. Masks off for lunch and during swim class only.
All children in school are now tested daily, vaccinated or not. Vaccinated teachers may opt out, since they can distance.
Testing is PCR âlollipopâ pool testing. Children suck on two Q tips type âlollipopsâ for 30 seconds each. One sample is pooled with the rest of the class, processed during the day in a lab. If the pool is positive, the second samples are tested individually overnight. The parents of the positive child (or children) will be notified in time before school in the morning so the kid can stay home and be isolated. All kids who tested negative go to school normally, where they of course immediately take another daily pool test.
The idea is that PCR testing can identify positive kid before the viral load is so high that they might be infectious even though everyone is masked.
One kid goes to school across the state line. Masking and distancing rules are similar, but they test students every other day with rapid tests (so positive student can be sent home immediately) and vaccinated students can opt out.
Interestingly, while case numbers soared in each state after the end of that stateâs summer vacation (lots of irresponsible travelers who couldnât be bothered to adhere to the testing and quarantining rules on reentry) they are falling just as rapidly now.
Epidemiologist say itâs because while the grown ups can break the rules and just not test or quarantine, the kids canât, and this way, transmission can be stopped as soon as a school aged child is in the mix and the grown ups around them can be identified, tested and quarantined or isolated as well. Itâs just getting very hard to slip through the net.
I am cautiously optimistic for our school year. Really, my kids would g nuts with another year of online schooling.
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Wish the us were doing something similar. Lollipop testing and pooled testing sound so well thought out!
I looked it up, and VA has a mask mandate for all k-12 schools. How does this religious school get away with no masks? Why hasnât anyone reported them to the health department? Or has the school granted everyone a religious mask exemption? (Are religious mask exemptions allowed in VA?)
@tigerle - who pays for that daily testing? (and lollipop testing is really good term!)
i canât imagine how my school district of 53K and 83% low income would be able to do that. but i like that idea . . .
State governments pay. There is very little local control in this.
There are no religions (known of) that are against testing. In TN, the churches are pushing the government to mask and stay safe. One of the Donadâs supporters in TX came out and said his church wonât grant exemptions and that if you wonât mask, you shouldnât take tylenol, etc. Itâs all about politics. Why else would a chiropractor in Florida (not a medical doctor) give mask exemptions?
Then you look at my district in TN which made news the other week where they said no more masks. Why does one care if another wearâs a mask? Itâs my body, not theirs - and they say they should have a choice. So why make a choice for me? Same in Palm Beach yesterday. Unfortunately, the situation is toxic and we have turned against one another which is a shame because obviously no one asked for this. We have to get through it together.
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Texas megachurch preacher and Trump devotee says there is no âcredible religious argumentâ against COVID-19 vaccines
Joshua Zitser
Sun, September 19, 2021, 9:13 AM·3 min read
Pastor Robert Jeffress participates in the Celebrate Freedom Rally with then-President Donald Trump on July 1, 2017. Olivier Douliery-Pool via Getty Images
- A preacher at a Texas megachurch is refusing to offer his congregation religious exemptions to COVID-19 vaccine mandates.
- He told the Associated Press that there is no âcredible religious argumentâ for turning down a shot.
- Religious exemption letters are becoming more widely used as a âloopholeâ to avoid vaccine mandates, the AP said.
- See more stories on Insiderâs business page.
As Republican lawmakers rage against President Joe Bidenâs sweeping vaccine mandates, the Associated Press reported that religious exemptions are becoming more widely used as a âloopholeâ to avoid getting a COVID-19 vaccine.
But a Trump-loving preacher at a Texas megachurch has decreed that there is âno credible religious argumentâ for turning down a shot, the Associated Press said.
The Rev. Robert Jeffress, a pastor at the 12,000-member First Baptist Church in Dallas, told the news agency that he and his staff are neither âofferingâ exemption letters nor âencouragingâ members of their congregation to seek out religious exemptions from coronavirus vaccine mandates.
âChristians who are troubled by the use of a fetal cell line for the testing of the vaccines would also have to abstain from the use of Tylenol, Pepto Bismol, Ibuprofen, and other products that used the same cell line if they are sincere in their objection,â said Jeffress in an email.
I really donât know what the rules are for private schools. Iâm glad my kids are out!
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Private schools pretty much do what they want. Here in the northeast, most of the Catholic ones try to emulate the public systems as much as possible in terms of teacher licensure, # of days of school, health rules, etc. Independent schools can do what they want, pretty much.
WAY back when I taught at a Catholic HS, the thinking was that if they did what the state wanted, they would be left alone.
Iâm pretty sure in CT, the mask mandates until Sept 30 applies to all schoolsâŠ.public, and private.
I looked it up, and Virginia requires masking in all schools. I am curious as to how this private religious school gets away with direct defiance.
Here the private schools are required to follow the rules of the county they are in. Three private school were cited by a county here and went to court today. Two agreed to follow the rules (masks indoors) and the third lost in court and must enforce the mask rule inside AND allow access to the county to supervise.
The catholic schools here have been following the mask rules since the beginning. Last year they were in person, in school all the time, and you never heard a peep out of them. They just wanted to stay in school all day. I think they made some adjustments like the Specials teachers would go to the kids rather than the kids changing rooms, and I think they spread out the lunch periods to allow 6â or so feet between kids. I also think they suspended indoor sports like basketball and volleyball.
It is just amazing to me to see the protests (and the crazy speeches parents are making - the Brian Williams clips are unbelieveable). Here the counties made the call, there were some protests from some at the very beginning of August, but for the most part it isnât even an issue anymore. Denverâs mayor made the rule for all of Denver, including DPS and itâs been fine. Some of the more suburban counties had protests and threats to pull their kids from school. Go ahead, who cares!
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Because the posts had nothing to do with K-12 schools. Letâs everyone please focus. There are other threads to discuss the airport experience.
I think the point was missed - I donât see that personâs post anymore that you took down - but the discussion was how if thereâs a mandate people get away with ignoring it / avoiding it - and there are tons of societal examples highlighting this - and that comes back tot the schools - it can ânot be enforcedâ similar to other parts of society. I was just curios why their post was taken down - i thought it was fine and germane to the discussion - but thatâs me. Thanks for the explanation.
After 2 court injunctions suspending the vaccine mandate, Second Circuit dissolved the temporary injunction placed on the vaccine mandate. This means at NYC DOE, all staff are required to have their first vaccine dose by Friday, October 1 at 5pm or they will be removed from the payroll on Monday, October 4
https://infohub.nyced.org/working-with-the-doe/covid-19-resources/covid-19-vaccination-mandate
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Also, the TN governor has lost in Memphis and Williamson County his mask mandate opt out allowance.
So now kids, in Williamson, canât opt out anymore - except for religious reasons - which can be done without a religious authority signature and the waiver is posted publicly by the school district. Parents sue, itâs a win for the school district, and they still donât want to enforce their own message. Whereâs the leadership?
I havenât seen word on how PAâs court challenge has turned out yet. Our district is supposed to be enforcing it now, but they are not enforcing it on the buses (most kids are bused) and there are plenty of exemptions from those who applied for one so it seems quite worthless to me.