Are you sending your kids to school next month?

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

The district only has about 7% of the kids doing 100% online. There are no subs to fill in.

I think this is probably the more important part. What is the district supposed to do if they can't (edited: corrected word) shift them to online? Are they supposed to tell the teachers that are doing online "sorry these other teachers need it now you have to go to in-person"

I think there may be some districts/places out there that more what people envision of the "districts just don't care"...I think it's much more likely that the demand for whatever is being weighed with the realistic of those reopening plans and the desires of the area. It can easily go the other way. What if teachers didn't really think they could teach well online and really want to do in-person but there isn't enough demand for that in their area?

I know what a lot of news stories are focused on is the teachers who want remote learning but there are definitely ones who want in-person. We've talked with my aunt who retired last year after over 40 years in teaching and for her she would be nervous (she's a nervous nelly) about in-person but would not have stayed in teaching if all of her teaching was virtual and that's with iPads already part of the lesson curriculum. She did not feel like her passion for teaching would have been matched by a computer screen only. She's but one teacher but she's not the only one who feels that way just as teachers who want remote are definitely not the only ones who want that.

 

[LSUmiss]

My previous school had 4 teachers quit this week because they cannot do in-person teaching due to being high risk. Two are Type 1 diabetes, one is undergoing chemo, and the fourth finished chemo last year. The district will not let them be "online" teachers so they were forced to retire or quit. All 4 are amazing educators.

A neighboring district had 300 teachers take a leave due to them being high risk or living with a family member who is high risk.

Our district has had several resign or go on sabbatical.

 

[roomthreeseventeen]

1,193 Quarantined for Covid. Is This a Successful School Reopening?

 

[mom2rtk]

1,193 Quarantined for Covid. Is This a Successful School Reopening?

No sane person thought that would go well. I'm far more interested in results from schools that are putting serious mitigation policies in place .

 

[JaxDad]

1,193 Quarantined for Covid. Is This a Successful School Reopening?

It's either clever or a funny coincidence that the featured photo for the article was of "Hasty" Elementary School...

 

[RamblingMad]

What I’m seeing locally by me is that the rich areas are home schooling, and the poor areas are sending their kids back to school. Reminds me of the Hunger Games. I guess this is the first annual COVID games.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

What I’m seeing locally by me is that the rich areas are home schooling, and the poor areas are sending their kids back to school. Reminds me of the Hunger Games. I guess this is the first annual COVID games.

Interesting how different areas are. I live in the wealthiest county and majority want in-person last I heard.

The district my house is assigned to purchased 1,500 wifi hotspots to give to families with issues in connectivity-that in part is tied to wealth/tax dollars.

There's disparities within the area, I've spoken about it before, but here it's not rich remote poor in school. Many of the parents in my area are concerned with the quality of education their children are getting and trying to weigh that with the home life abilities, access to reasonable accommodations needed, and the virus.

 

[katie01]

What I’m seeing locally by me is that the rich areas are home schooling, and the poor areas are sending their kids back to school. Reminds me of the Hunger Games. I guess this is the first annual COVID games.

I have been making the Hunger Games reference to my husband also, especially when viewing the “numbers” of deaths and illlness, it’s so gruesome reducing human life to statistics on a screen.

To add to your post a bit, I see the scenario you are talking about, but also the reverse. Because in our area, it’s the public schools going online, while the wealthier families are sending their kids to the private schools that are staying open. We are not “rich” in that sense, but my DDs were in Catholic schools (heavily funded by the diocese so the tuition is not anywhere near as high as a typical private school). Their schools are planning for 100% face to face learning with the same schedule as usual. I opted to homeschool them, as there was no option through their Catholic schools to do remote learning. I could have enrolled them in the public school district for remote learning that way, but wanted to choose our own curriculum. Anyway, even though my kids won’t be attending their schools this year, I find myself very anxious for what is going to happen. The Catholic schools are small enough to possibly pull off in person learning without a covid outbreak (they are requiring masks), but there are also quite a few elderly teachers and staff members (one in his 80s!).

It also gives me an uneasy feeling because the Catholic school kids are typically a year ahead educationally than their public school counterparts (at least this is what I have been told by parents who send their kids to the Catholic schools but teach in the public schools), and now I wonder if this gap will widen even further if the private school kids are having a full in-person year while the kids in public school will not have the same level of learning as they would face to face.

We do live in an affluent area, so some of the public school parents are electing to now send their kids to private schools for the face to face experience, and others may hire tutors and so forth, but I’m sure there are still other families who aren’t able to do so, and may have trouble working now if they can’t send school-age children to schools.

I also just watched a news story about children with disabilities, and how much they are suffering and regressing in skills right now, not being able to go to school and receive a myriad of therapies. These therapies take hours per day, and the parents already have their hands full at home trying to work and provide the basic care for their kids who need assistance with bathing, feeding, walking, and talking. It’s all just such a mess, I wonder what the long-term affects will be for this generation. As much as I fear the effects of keeping everyone home right now, I also see that people may be experiencing long term heart or lung damage with covid, so it seems pretty dismal no matter what choice is being made

 

[RamblingMad]

I have been making the Hunger Games reference to my husband also, especially when viewing the “numbers” of deaths and illlness, it’s so gruesome reducing human life to statistics on a screen.

To add to your post a bit, I see the scenario you are talking about, but also the reverse. Because in our area, it’s the public schools going online, while the wealthier families are sending their kids to the private schools that are staying open. We are not “rich” in that sense, but my DDs were in Catholic schools (heavily funded by the diocese so the tuition is not anywhere near as high as a typical private school). Their schools are planning for 100% face to face learning with the same schedule as usual. I opted to homeschool them, as there was no option through their Catholic schools to do remote learning. I could have enrolled them in the public school district for remote learning that way, but wanted to choose our own curriculum. Anyway, even though my kids won’t be attending their schools this year, I find myself very anxious for what is going to happen. The Catholic schools are small enough to possibly pull off in person learning without a covid outbreak (they are requiring masks), but there are also quite a few elderly teachers and staff members (one in his 80s!).

It also gives me an uneasy feeling because the Catholic school kids are typically a year ahead educationally than their public school counterparts (at least this is what I have been told by parents who send their kids to the Catholic schools but teach in the public schools), and now I wonder if this gap will widen even further if the private school kids are having a full in-person year while the kids in public school will not have the same level of learning as they would face to face.

We do live in an affluent area, so some of the public school parents are electing to now send their kids to private schools for the face to face experience, and others may hire tutors and so forth, but I’m sure there are still other families who aren’t able to do so, and may have trouble working now if they can’t send school-age children to schools.

I also just watched a news story about children with disabilities, and how much they are suffering and regressing in skills right now, not being able to go to school and receive a myriad of therapies. These therapies take hours per day, and the parents already have their hands full at home trying to work and provide the basic care for their kids who need assistance with bathing, feeding, walking, and talking. It’s all just such a mess, I wonder what the long-term affects will be for this generation. As much as I fear the effects of keeping everyone home right now, I also see that people may be experiencing long term heart or lung damage with covid, so it seems pretty dismal no matter what choice is being made

It’s a mess. I expect this mess to continue into the start of the next school year as well. That’s almost three years of potentially home schooling. No idea of the long term effects. The end game is ultimately what your kids are going to do for a living when they eventually leave. Will this impact their life choices? I have no clue.

 

[HeatherC]

After reading and hearing about all these schools that have opened and closed, have new cases, are quarantining, etc.. I am beginning to think no schools (or a very small percentage) will be able to have a full year of kids in person. This thing is running amok and we haven’t even seen most schools start yet. Add that to heading in the fall and winter season and I hate to say it, but I do think everyone (or most) is going to wind up remote. Such a sad year all around.

 

[mom2rtk]

After reading and hearing about all these schools that have opened and closed, have new cases, are quarantining, etc.. I am beginning to think no schools (or a very small percentage) will be able to have a full year of kids in person. This thing is running amok and we haven’t even seen most schools start yet. Add that to heading in the fall and winter season and I hate to say it, but I do think everyone (or most) is going to wind up remote. Such a sad year all around.

It all could very well turn out to be a disaster. But I wouldn't base judgment on a few schools that opened with no mitigation efforts.

And if we're mitigating against Covid, we're also mitigating against colds and flu.

 

[mjkacmom]

I have been making the Hunger Games reference to my husband also, especially when viewing the “numbers” of deaths and illlness, it’s so gruesome reducing human life to statistics on a screen.

To add to your post a bit, I see the scenario you are talking about, but also the reverse. Because in our area, it’s the public schools going online, while the wealthier families are sending their kids to the private schools that are staying open. We are not “rich” in that sense, but my DDs were in Catholic schools (heavily funded by the diocese so the tuition is not anywhere near as high as a typical private school). Their schools are planning for 100% face to face learning with the same schedule as usual. I opted to homeschool them, as there was no option through their Catholic schools to do remote learning. I could have enrolled them in the public school district for remote learning that way, but wanted to choose our own curriculum. Anyway, even though my kids won’t be attending their schools this year, I find myself very anxious for what is going to happen. The Catholic schools are small enough to possibly pull off in person learning without a covid outbreak (they are requiring masks), but there are also quite a few elderly teachers and staff members (one in his 80s!).

It also gives me an uneasy feeling because the Catholic school kids are typically a year ahead educationally than their public school counterparts (at least this is what I have been told by parents who send their kids to the Catholic schools but teach in the public schools), and now I wonder if this gap will widen even further if the private school kids are having a full in-person year while the kids in public school will not have the same level of learning as they would face to face.

We do live in an affluent area, so some of the public school parents are electing to now send their kids to private schools for the face to face experience, and others may hire tutors and so forth, but I’m sure there are still other families who aren’t able to do so, and may have trouble working now if they can’t send school-age children to schools.

I also just watched a news story about children with disabilities, and how much they are suffering and regressing in skills right now, not being able to go to school and receive a myriad of therapies. These therapies take hours per day, and the parents already have their hands full at home trying to work and provide the basic care for their kids who need assistance with bathing, feeding, walking, and talking. It’s all just such a mess, I wonder what the long-term affects will be for this generation. As much as I fear the effects of keeping everyone home right now, I also see that people may be experiencing long term heart or lung damage with covid, so it seems pretty dismal no matter what choice is being made

We have different types of Catholic schools here. There are some in urban areas that people send their kids to just for safety, they aren’t as good as a lot of public schools, then there are some that lots of parents sent their kids to because they want them to go to catholic school ($10,000 a year), and then there are the Catholic prep schools which provide a great education ($20,000+ a year).

 

[FlightlessDuck]

All of my son's college classes are labeled as "zoom" on his schedule. He's considering just staying home and doing the work online. No sense going to campus if all of his classes are going to be virtual...

 

[HeatherC]

It all could very well turn out to be a disaster. But I wouldn't base judgment on a few schools that opened with no mitigation efforts.

And if we're mitigating against Covid, we're also mitigating against colds and flu.

I am so hoping it isn’t a disaster. It just seems to be happening more and more even in places where they did have what was perceived to be a “good” mitigation plan. Certainly no easy answers either way which makes it so disheartening.

‘As far as flu, we were just talking about this last night. Maybe with more mask wearing going on, flu season won’t be as bad as anticipated! That would be a nice bonus for sure.

 

[1GoldenSun]

Schools in my Florida county were supposed to be all virtual for the first four weeks. Just today the superintendent announced that the state government will drastically cut funding if schools don't go back to F2F, so that's what we have to do.

 

[Disneyland1084]

My kids are going back. There's a mother in my neighborhood who's refusing to let her kids go. Though ALL summer long she takes them to the water park (aside from a little distancing in lines, NOTHING has changed) , her older DD has gone to San Francisco with a family who's child has cancer to get chemotherapy, has gone on multiple trips, etc...Yeah, you can't get Covid-19 from a hospital or a super crowded water park. It's operating at 50% capacity, but that still allows 2,400 in the park and the park isn't that big. In her eyes, school is the only place you can get it.

 

[LSUmiss]

What I’m seeing locally by me is that the rich areas are home schooling, and the poor areas are sending their kids back to school. Reminds me of the Hunger Games. I guess this is the first annual COVID games.

Not here b/c most wealthy ppl send their kids to private schools here & those are going all in-person b/c ppl complained about paying full tuition for virtual.

 

[LSUmiss]

My kids are going back. There's a mother in my neighborhood who's refusing to let her kids go. Though ALL summer long she takes them to the water park (aside from a little distancing in lines, NOTHING has changed) , her older DD has gone to San Francisco with a family who's child has cancer to get chemotherapy, has gone on multiple trips, etc...Yeah, you can't get Covid-19 from a hospital or a super crowded water park. It's operating at 50% capacity, but that still allows 2,400 in the park and the park isn't that big. In her eyes, school is the only place you can get it.

To be fair, school still seems more dangerous imo b/c you’re relying on other ppl to take adequate safety measures with your child while you’re not there.

 

[MATTERHORN]

To be fair, school still seems more dangerous imo b/c you’re relying on other ppl to take adequate safety measures with your child while you’re not there.

Agreed! Although I think the other mom hitting the water parks constantly is crazy too, but it's totally different if the parent is there to control it and can leave at any point if things aren't going well and people aren't listening. Not to mention outdoors versus indoors all day makes a HUGE difference.

 

[okeydokey]

My rural county started today, 90% opted for in person. Mask use not required. I expect it will be shut down by Labor Day.

I know several teachers and worry for them. A friend also has a special needs Middle Schooler who received very little instruction when schools closed in person in March so she felt she had to send him back. She is very anxious.