School in the 2020-2021 Academic Year & Coronavirus (Part 1)

Parents Forum
11362

Well…my school will be surveying parents asking if they are planning to return. Additionally…the 30+ page plan (that changes daily) is coming out “soon.”

The biggest issue I have is that classroom teachers will be required to teach classes of up to 17 students sitting 6 feet apart…with no masks on the students…for 7 hours. Masks are not required in the classroom (unless the final plan changes). The students are required to sit all day. They are expected to put on a mask if they leave to use the bathroom.

I work in a state where masks are mandatory when inside buildings and also when outside and unable to distance. Essential workers are exposed to people who have to wear masks. Why are schools exempt?

Teachers want to teach…but they expect to be protected.

11363

GW: testing and 24 hour results. Professors attending flex training. They have stated that anyone that wants to take their classes online can. If you look at the schedule now it seems that less than 1/2 the classes are in person .

Testing and tracing

Lynn Goldman, the Michael and Lori Milken Dean of the Milken Institute School of Public Health, also provided an update on the university’s plans for testing and tracing.

Currently, the university expects to test all on-campus students, faculty and staff, first as they initially return to campus and again after three to five days, Dr. Goldman said. The free tests, which reliably detect active infection of the virus, will be conducted and processed by GW, and results will be available within 24 hours. Subsequent tests detecting infection would also be conducted periodically throughout the semester on varying timelines specific to different groups of community members. Other tests, which detect antibodies to the virus and indicate whether a person has previously been exposed to it, would also be offered.

In addition to testing, a Campus COVID Support Team will follow up with those who test positive to support rapid response and containment of cases and provide referrals for services and resources. There also will be a mechanism for daily symptom monitoring and guidance for social distancing, masking, isolating and quarantining, all of which are critical in limiting virus transmission, Dr. Goldman said.

There is significant “fluidity” in all of the planning based on the evolving pandemic, Dr. Goldman cautioned.

“We are confronting something we have never seen before,” she said in reference to COVID-19, adding that scientists are constantly adapting as they learn more about the virus and its transmission.

Academic planning

With regard to academic planning, Provost M. Brian Blake said faculty and leadership continue to work to determine which classes will be held in-person, online or in a hybrid mode, understanding that offerings can change at any time this summer and fall as the pandemic changes.

Course listings are being updated daily as schools and colleges provide information. Students can log onto Banner or view the fall class schedule to see the latest information available regarding their courses. Nearly all in-person courses will allow for a combination of in-person and online attendance.

Additionally, classrooms also are being prepared to accommodate in-person teaching with reduced room capacities, Dr. Blake said. This includes non-traditional spaces on campus that can accommodate a larger number of students and will have the needed technology to enable the simultaneous teaching of remote delivery as well as face-to-face.

Dr. Blake also noted that the university continues to communicate with faculty and graduate students with teaching and research responsibilities to emphasize the importance of health and safety and provide the accommodations and support necessary.

Noting a recent survey, Dr. Blake said that the majority of undergraduate students surveyed said they want to attend classes in person this fall and live on campus. In another survey, faculty emphasized the importance of having a vaccine widely available, social distancing, testing, cleaning and sanitizing as among the factors that would help them feel more comfortable returning to campus.

Finally, Dr. Blake also said that hundreds of faculty members have signed up for FLEX camp sessions, which help instructors transition existing coursework to online and blended formats for flexibility. Many additional faculty have attended shorter workshops and webinars to prepare for the fall.

11364

Are you advocating that kids at risk be removed from their homes and placed in residential schools? If so I think you need to Google “Canada + Residential Schools”.

11365

Why aren’t all essential workers, including teachers, equipped with PPE already?

HVAC should be fixed/retrofitted everywhere (restaurants, etc) already or urgently.

Beside beside these two basic points, k-12 opening safely, going back to remote learning, being in person a couple days a week, etc… is not easy at all. It’s a huge complex task with no easy answer and only downsides.

Teachers shouldn’t be asked to put their life on the line. It’s not their job. It’s the school’s and the district’s job to protect their lives, as well as janitors’, lunch ladies’, aides’, principals’, etc.

Based on the Korean study of 65,000 kids in lockdown, kids 5-10yo transmit the virus at a 50% rate // adults and kids 11-19 infect others more than adults, with 20-24yo roughly on par with younger kids.
It means they carry the virus home, contaminate teachers and each other, and thus create clusters. It also means some suffer from a mild version of the disease but may have trouble breathing months later. Some (very few) suffer from Kawasaki syndrome.

Note that Korea has a rapid test/results/trace system.

Israel blames its second wave to schools re opening without mitigation and social distancing. (2 weeks of classes of up to 10 kids age 4-10 didn’t result in the same outcome and authorities thought it meant the virus wouldnt return or touch kids).
Germany and France had countless clusters appearing in schools even with class sizes shrunk to 6, 8, or 10 and twice a day cleanings.
Scandinavia had “outdoors school” – a tradition that has its own curriculum, kids go into the woods or fields, etc, irrespective of pandemics; in addition, all parks, libraries, pools, and public squares were reserved for school age children from 8:30-4:30 each day so rhst kids could occupy all the space needed while learning.
In some systems, they plan on having A/B days with a corps of counselors and coaches taking over when kids aren’t in school (perhaps PE, art, music… would all take place on B days …)
Teachers with asthma, high BMI, heart issues, cancer/aids recovery , or 65+ are typically exempt from f2f teaching or have something planned (except in Israel, where that became a problem, too -because if teachers are sick with covid, they can’t teach and teachers’ hospitalization, illness or death is a trauma for their class.)

So, there’s a way to do it. It requires the virus circulation to be low (R=1 max), a lot of money, and adults sacrificing public spaces and daily habits/pleasures.
In addition it means a lot of planning, with plan A, B, C depending on R, hospitalizations, and hospital saturation.

Nothing’s safe for kids even if most may not die; with schools re opening, even in areas that aren’t hot spots, many will be sick, a few kids will die – not that many, but do I want to take the risk it’ll be my kid? Do I want to take the risk of my kid killing their teacher? Or being at the root of a cluster? Those aren’t rhetorical questions. In the abstract, if 3 kids in the State die from covid, that’s not much. But if one of them is mine, I dont care about statistics considering it’s very few.
There is no good solution: risk killing your teacher and your grandma with the added bonus of a minimal risk of severe or debilitating fallout from the disease, OR social isolation, plus risking subpar teaching, abuse, no access to food and clothes.

Plus, the US is so big that the best solutions will necessarily be local and will have to change at a pace that is likely unique to this local situation.

One can imagine that cities and districts would use the summer

  • contacting Google, Microsoft, etc, so they donate thousands of tablets or laptop to schools
  • negotiating an at-cost public broadband service (in areas where it cannot be taken for granted)
  • ordering PPE for all school staff
  • designing staggered schedules that accommodate 50% fewer kids per bus, organizing staggered recess, seeing if logistically school can go 8am-2pm+12-noon-6pm or A/B or ??? (Or if the boiler/AC will break down or ??)
  • plan for various R situations, (0, 1-1.5, 2+…) and have a plan for each
  • hiring camp counselors and coaches to help with social distancing and keeping class size small, help with virtual school and remote learning as well as provide activities
    -securing tests and testing facilities so that any suspicion is tested immediately and has a rapid result
  • securing the money for all that (requesting Congress appropriation for that purpose?)
  • writing up a list of criteria to determine which kids must have priority for f2f learning

K-12 is even harder to solve than colleges because nothing will be good and were talking about children.

11366

Oh, I didn’t realize Caltech was on a three quarter schedule. That makes sense then, I was surprised they were seemingly letting MIT have a leg up. That explains it:)

11367

There’s usually a reason why parents send their kids to a private school. Odds are it’s after sending their kid to their public school or doing research. Even if you send your kid to a private school you still have friends and neighbors in the school district. You still pay local school taxes. Your kids still play with other kids in the school district.

11368

My SIL and BIL are both special education teachers in a lower to middle class public high school on Long Island (NY) and they want to go back to school, in-person in the fall and the main reason is that once their classes went remote last spring they had a dozen of their students that they never heard from again. Never attended one online class or even checked in with the teacher once.

IMO, we need to attempt to get kids back to in-person classes this academic year (even if it’s a hybrid approach) and adjust the plan accordingly. We may be in this for the long haul and need to try to educate our youth within a “new” normal.

Take Japan for example. Kids back in class, with many safety precautions including both student and teachers wearing masks, only half the students attend class on any given day and daily monitoring of everyone.

I give them a lot of credit for trying and they have contingency plans in case there are unreasonable spikes in cases.

Some school districts in the U.S need to follow suit. My S24 public high school was close to opening next month but unfortunately decided to shutdown in person classes at least through Labor Day but likely much much longer.

It’s a real shame…

11369

@fretfulmother Every parent in any community knows what is going on in their public school system even if their kids are in private school. Kids have friends and also people can easily go online. My kids attended public school for years so we know exactly what is going on in the public schools. Hard not to hear the stories.

11370

Our school district went on strike a few years ago. I don’t think it went as planned. Many parents went with other options. Some did homeschooling, some sent their kids to private schools or transferred and others went with cyber school. Lots of sharing of information within the community.

11371

No other school is more generous than Harvard. They are a class onto itself. We have second kid in Stanford. But need based financial aid made by Harvard. There was a difference of $7k between Harvard and second best offer from two of the HYPMS Colleges. And UPenn and Brown were 35K more.

11372

Because we off-shored and outsourced the capabilities. We’re now competing globally for these resources. Then there’s cost. I’m doubtful we’ll ever reach this goal.

That’s a nice thought but where do we come-up with the money, labor, and supplies to do this? Where do schools fall on the priority list? Businesses closed when they were forced to comply with ADA and other mandates.

Maybe but my wife still goes to the OR even though they reuse masks. It’s her job. My dad worked underground for 30 years. Coal mining is risky. It was his job. Either some risk will have to be accepted or we’ll be online until a vaccine is widely available. Lots of possible consequences…some obvious, some unintended.

11373

Denison just posted this piece by its president, Adam Weinberg, talking about the good and the bad in remote learning from an LAC perspective. It was interesting to read his thoughts, particularly as Denison and its professors did a pretty good job in the spring. https://denison.edu/campus/president/speeches/135544

11374

I think the nyc plan hasn’t been approved yet. Plans will be approved in a couple of weeks.

11375

The way i read the guidance for ny state, masks are not required if people are 6ft apart. And the comment someone made about bussing, yes, drivers need to let children on the bus even if they have no mask.

I have a feeling the teacher union will see to it that f2f learning is delayed. How can teachers work in buildings with no air conditioning, windows that dont open and kids not wearing masks.

I just wonder what sums of money will be spent on ppe, bus contracts, cleaning, and security staff for what will become (when cases arise, 7 day wait for test results, sick teachers) online schools. Money that could’ve been more wisely spent on robust online delivery

11376

Healthcare workers (MD’s, nurses, CNA’s, ancillary staff), grocery workers, daycare staff, restaurant staff, personal care/salon staff also shouldn’t be asked to put their lives on the line. It’s not their job either. NOTHING about Covid-19 is fair or as it should be.

11377

At what point does OSHA step in to protect teachers? Or is OSHA asleep during this administration?

11378

"OSHA is a federal agency and does not cover public sector employees such as teachers in public schools, although federal employees and employees of private schools are covered.

11379

A Kawasaki-like disease. It’s not “statistically significant” until it’s your kid.

https://www.aappublications.org/news/2020/05/14/covid19inflammatory051420

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/05/doctors-race-understand-rare-inflammatory-condition-associated-coronavirus-young-people

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-05-18/4-l-a-county-children-diagnosed-with-inflammatory-disease-test-positive-for-coronavirus

https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/06/studies-yield-clearer-picture-rare-covid-linked-syndrome-kids

11380

I feel like I’m stuck in the middle here, between “schools shouldn’t reopen until there is zero risk to students and teachers” and “teachers should teach in person no matter how big the risk is, because they should be willing to sacrifice their lives.”

11381

Teachers should not have to put their lives on the line. Period.

In NY/NJ masks are required EVERYWHERE, and they are required outside if one cannot social distance.

When you enter a doctor’s office, you must wear a mask.
When you enter a store, you must wear a mask…even with social distancing.

Why is it that students are not required to wear masks? Why are teachers expected to be in a classroom of 15 students (the classrooms will NOT be at 25% capacity) who are not wearing masks? Do people really not care about the lives of teachers?

This is not acceptable. Not only will teachers be getting medical notes for accommodations, but there will be lawsuits…and worse…if this horrific plan goes through.

I recognize that it’s hard for young children to wear masks all day. Why not wear one for 30 minutes and then go outside for a mask break?

This is not ok. Teachers lives matter too. They are not asking to work from home. They are asking for protection.