Most of the big local school districts around here announced how they were going back, F2F, all very clean and physically distancing. That was after the 4th of July. In the last 2 weeks, almost all the districts have ‘revised’ their plans, most announcing they’d start online for the first 2 weeks, then review how things were going. Now, less than 1 week later, all are revising the revisions, and will be online for the first quarter. One district that was going F2F 5 days a week is now going 2 in/2 out, and Fridays will be a mix. That was announced on Saturday and parents flood the charter, private, and catholic schools on Sunday and all were full by Monday.
The catholic schools are offering an inschool option and their own online program. The online program includes a tutor for every 5 students, available from 3-5 every day. The online students pay the same tuition as their ‘base’ school and students can opt to return to in person classes at the beginning of every quarter. Only 2 of the hs are run by the archdioceses, and I’m not sure what they are doing, or the private catholic high schools.
So really, public schools are online, private schools are trying to return to F2F.
“Bill Gates. Who is certainly science and health oriented just came out with a position that schools should open for the fall. Especially k to 9.”
He also said, as long as you can protect the teachers. But open has many interpretations, it could mean hybrid, or f2f with everyone having masks. Social distancing is going to be a little hard at that age. Yes, schools should open especially when you think about the free lunches that many get. I don’t think he’s saying back to what it was in fall of 2019.
Parents are forming groups for their k-8 kids to study together, following the school’s program online. Rich parents, I should say. The poor families just can’t afford for the parents to stay home and help the kids with online classes and can’t afford to pay someone else to do it.
I work with some kids in the foster system and they will just fall farther behind (and they are already behind their peers because they pretty much didn’t go to school for the last 2 years).
With a little less than a month to go before Fall semester re-openings (Wesleyan at full enrollment; Yale at 60%) it looks like Yale and Wesleyan have begun a little bit of a testing arms race:
On the way to work I heard a Harvard epidemiologist on public radio commenting on back to school planning. In his opinion, the hybrid model, from an epidemiological standpoint, is the absolute worst course of action. On the days that younger students are not in class many will need to go to a daycare of some sort so their parents can work. That means many more points of contact for these children.
My 10 year old will probably end up home alone with a Chromebook and a promise that he doesn’t spend all day watching youtube (this is unlikely). Our public charter did an awful job this spring so I am either enrolling him in a different school or putting him in Connections Academy. At least they have online schooling down.
I believe that any college than can test all students and faculty twice a week, and have social distancing restrictions, will be able to contain the spread of the virus on their campus.
Our district is doing a 2 days on, 3 days remote plan. Parents can opt for all remote, as well. I happened to have my D24 in for her well check yesterday and asked her pediatrician his opinion. He was unequivocal in his response: If we have the ability to keep her home, we should. This was before I even mentioned to him that my H is currently being treated for cancer.
So, I’m not wrestling with the decision any longer. Remote learning, it is. It isn’t going to be a wonderful experience, especially as she is starting a new school (HS), but she’ll manage. Hopefully a vaccine will come sooner than later.
@DeeCee36 I’m surprised that a pediatrician wouldn’t ask more questions before answering that question. There are social/emotional reasons for going back into school and it’s possible that learning in school will still be a better academic experience for many kids whose districts don’t do remote classes well. Add on that parents might need to work and, for a doctor to just say stay home without digging deeper, seems like a premature answer. It’s a complicated decision.
There is no good plan right now. Just sayin’. Maybe if your student was already home schooled or in a good online high school program like Stanford, they are in the best boat. High school kids whose lives revolve around their in-person high school have nothing but bad options. All remote? Not healthy for most and practically no real high school experience left. High school teachers not trained in best practices for remote learning. Hybrid? Social distanced with masks, teachers not given enough time to figure out how to teach part in school and part remote, still have the possibility of getting sick, little to no sports and activities. All in school? Well, we know that’s not going to last. I think we all need to have pretty low expectations and each do what we can to support our families and help others if we can.
@homerdog His answer was purely from a physical health standpoint and with extensive knowledge of our district (he lives in town and is actually the district doctor). I am not presuming his prescriptive advice is applicable to anyone else. We were discussing my child and what he thinks would be best for her.
Purdue ran an article today that the there was a disconnect between the school reporting numbers to the state and what the state was telling the local health department. The local health department is now partnering directly with Purdue and the Purdue testing facilities processing tests to make sure no one is getting missed. The local health department and Purdue seem very serious about contact tracing.
I guess I assumed that the local health departments would also be getting their numbers directly from the school all along. Wonder how it’s set up in other areas/states?
ND called off alumni football ticket lottery for this year, but we purchased ND-Duke tix through Duke yesterday (game is at ND this year). Fully expect these tix might not actually be available but I imagine we’ll be refunded if that’s the case. Feeling selfish since our Dukie can’t leave Durham to join us in South Bend but since we haven’t cancelled our hotel room yet, I can dream that this might happen. I give it a <10% chance at the moment.
I hope at some point someone complies a list of stats for various schools such as public vs privates and also those who are allowing kids back vs. those who are limiting who comes back.
Rice is allowing all kids back, but has made one residential college into the isolation dorm. They have a new facility being built that will be ready in a few months. So the kids who were supposed live there were farmed out to the other colleges, which meant housing had to be redone. They also decreased density in colleges with common bathrooms, which is not many. There was lots of angst and stress and a lot of kids decided to live off campus, which is out of the ordinary at Rice. Also, because more classes are online than originally expected, AND the covid situation in Houston isn’t exactly great, quite a few decided to just stay home.
Rice says less than 40% of undergraduate students will live on campus, and approximately 58% of the total on-campus undergraduate beds will be filled. In addition, 21% of undergraduates will not come to campus this fall and will study in a completely remote format, and another 2% are taking a gap year or leave of absence. I guess that means the other 38% are living off campus in Houston. Rice has about 4000 undergrads so that means about 1600 undergrads on campus and around the same amount living off campus.
The District of Columbia recently implemented a mandatory 14-day quarantine for people from 27 states. These evolving health conditions and government requirements now compel us to adjust our plan and offer fall semester undergraduate and graduate courses online with no residential experience.
He highlights the importance of the moment. ND will be one of the first Universities to return to campus and mostly in person classes. He impresses on the students that they have the opportunity to show the world how it can be done.
I realize ND is a smaller school (6700 undergrad) in a low population density area. ASU is exactly the opposite, 70k plus students in a metro area of several million people. They are also taking a number of steps to protect students, faculty and staff.
I am with you - hoping these two schools can be examples of how to safely return to campus and resume school.
The Ontario government finally released their plans for K-12 for the fall. K-8 will be back full-time in-person including recess and lunch and regular sized classrooms, though they will be part of a cohort with the same classmates which is mostly a change for middle school students as they tend to have a rotary schedule.
There are 2 different plans for the high schools depending on what region they are in: regular or adapted. The regular plan is primarily for boards with small schools and they will return to class as normal. For those schools in regions that fall under the adapted plan, which includes DS21’s school, they will be adopting a hybrid model.
DS’s school board had already sent out an email about a week ago outlining what the plan would most likely look like pending approval by the province.
In addition
They haven’t announced what the daily schedule will be or what the distance learning part of the plan will look like but overall I like this plan and I think it could work well for DS21. On the one hand it would enable him to have some social contact (something he has been direly missing since our shut down in mid-March and he is looking forward to hopefully being able to reconnect with some of his friends though it will depend on individual timetabling) and it will provide him with a regular schedule and some structure to help keep him on track. On the other hand it will also require him to be more independent and self-sufficient with his schooling which will be excellent preparation for when he goes to university next year.
I’m not sure if the quadmester plan is a plus or a minus. The majority of our high schools typically run on a semester basis with students taking 3-4 classes per semester with all classes every day (4 for grades 9-11 and 3-4 for grade 12 as they are only required to take 6 courses total but can take up to the regular 8 if they choose. DS will be taking 7). 2 courses at a time means fewer courses to focus at once which makes organization and time management a bit easier and with a maximum of 15 students per class, teachers should be able to focus on them more intently. On the other hand it also means that the pacing of the classes will be much faster with each class being 2.5 hours long which some students may find difficult to keep focused for the entire class. Time will tell how it works out for DS. We have a math tutor arranged for him who we’ve been using for the last few years as he will have 2 advanced math courses this year (enhanced advanced functions and enhanced calculus and vectors) so that should help if he finds the pacing of the courses a difficulty. His brother will also be home since his university classes will all be online so he can help him if needed as well. The other reason I like the hybrid model is for a purely selfish reason. DS21 normally takes the school bus but I plan to drive him instead so the days he doesn’t have to be in school in person I can sleep in. I’m not a morning person and I have been greatly enjoying the fact that since the middle of March I haven’t had to get up early.
For context with regards to our infection levels the last 2 days our official numbers for Ontario have been below 100 cases. Most regions moved to level 3 re-opening 2 weeks ago with the exception of a few (including mine) but all of those regions will be moving to level 3 on Friday with only 1 (Windsor-Essex across the border from Detroit) still being held back. Yesterday my city reported only 1 case and there have been no reported deaths for several weeks.
@homerdog – I tried to reply but didn’t realize that I cannot include the URL to a tweet.
Syracuse University’s campus would be put on “pause” if there are over 100 COVID-19 infections. All residential students would be confined to their rooms, bathrooms and floors. (1/4)
If the campus outbreak escalates from there with transmission at a “significant rate,” SU would shut down on-campus operations completely. This is Level 5 of SU’s decision framework sent to the state. (2/4)
Move-out plan: Students who can travel within 8-10 hours of Syracuse would be asked to leave within 24 hours. If the situation is “more extreme” situation, SU may ask students to evacuate immediately. (3/4)
If the number of potential exposures is over 100 and SU has “moderate” confidence in its ability to contain the situation, the university may stop operations in select programs or areas. One possibility is a shelter-in-place order for an entire residence hall. (4/4)
@CT1417 holy moly. Well let’s hope that doesn’t happen. That’s all a nightmare. They must be banking on keeping numbers under 100 because that scenario is not only going to have parents blaming Syracuse for trying in-person class it will be awful for academics. The stress around some crazy last minute leave won’t be good for class and I can’t imagine it will be a smooth transition to remote class for faculty or for students.