The Flu

[Orange]

12 minutes ago, All Hail said:

It also helps that these local leaders have arguably the most wealthy, educated and intelligent constituents in the country who are capable of acting on informed and reasoned policy decisions.  These same leaders would be far less effective in southern states where constituents choose from the leading conspiracy of the day over science and logic. Or as the graphic shows above, the more poorly educated parts of California. 

I think we're going to get circular here.  If the South had any kind of competent leadership that cared about the poorer people of their states, they would have adequately funded schools, expanded medicaid and affordable healthcare, unions, easy access to the ballot box, less violence, and therefore a more informed/safe/healthy/trusting citizenry.

[glduck]

Can’t believe blind hope in lieu of a plan didn’t work.

[Nakedmolerat]

On 6/29/2020 at 8:10 AM, All Hail said:

It also helps that these local leaders have arguably the most wealthy, educated and intelligent constituents in the country who are capable of acting on informed and reasoned policy decisions.  These same leaders would be far less effective in southern states where constituents choose from the leading conspiracy of the day over science and logic. Or as the graphic shows above, the more poorly educated parts of California. 

I see your point about the CA local leaders. I think that they would be able to understand the plights of their constituents of the southern rural areas, but when they spoke in an ordinary voice, they would sound pompous and faggy to them. 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZxCfb4Z_Ks

[glduck]

Damn teens!

[glduck]

 

[Orange]

13 hours ago, glduck said:

 

How many hundreds of deaths will this be directly responsible for?

[Scscsc89]

Apparently we didn’t learn from business reopening.

 

 

[Orange]

They have to figure out this school thing.  It is, by far, the single most important factor that will undermine our economy and our well being as a country.  If kids are remote learning all through 20-21, we're fucked.  SERIOUSLY fucked.

[Scscsc89]

The problem is that people assume there is a good (safe) solution to the school thing — besides remote learning.

There’s not.  
It’s all risk management & in-person will involve a lot of risk, of both health & $$$.

[Orange]

There has to be a balance, or millions of parents won't be able to go back to work.  And we all know this particular president and senate do not give one single fuck if parents are destitute and unable to work.

[Scscsc89]

Here’s still what you’re looking at — you send your kid to school. 5 weeks in, a classmate tests positive.

Overnight, they pull the teacher and the entire class home for remote learning for (a minimum of) two weeks.   They recommend you also pull all your other kids home too.  Maybe it only happens once, maybe it happens again & they just call the whole thing off.

There goes your plan to “get back to work”.

The balance you are looking for is hoping this doesn’t happen to you.

[Scscsc89]

The above just addresses the impact on parents — doesn’t even get into the health risks for kids & staff — or how districts plan/pay for it all.

[Orange]

11 minutes ago, Scscsc89 said:

Here’s still what you’re looking at — you send your kid to school. 5 weeks in, a classmate tests positive.

Overnight, they pull the teacher and the entire class home for remote learning for (a minimum of) two weeks.   They recommend you also pull all your other kids home too.  Maybe it only happens once, maybe it happens again & they just call the whole thing off.

There goes your plan to “get back to work”.

The balance you are looking for is hoping this doesn’t happen to you.

There is a great deal of science suggesting that child-to-adult transmission is virtually unheard of due mostly to their lack of symptoms.

 

That said, your post reeks of mockery.  Do you doubt that parents being stuck at home with kids who have nowhere to go is terrible for our society?  I'm saying this as someone that understands the gravity of this virus.

Moreover, if we shut down schools, and parents CAN'T work (or have to curtail hours significantly), how do you propose parents pay their bills?   Just wish for money?  

 

[Scscsc89]

I understand the gravity all around — it’s serious as hell and there is no good answer.  That was my point.

Many parents are viewing back-to-school the same way the NCAA is viewing fall football & Texas viewed businesses reopening on May 1.  Like there is an obvious  solution, it’s just that the bureaucrats are too stupid to figure it out.

Those parents who are screaming at their school boards about how this is ruining their kids’ lives while completely ignoring the risks that teachers will be taking — fuck them.  I have no sympathy.

[Orange]

4 minutes ago, Scscsc89 said:

I understand the gravity all around — it’s serious as hell and there is no good answer.  That was my point.

Many parents are viewing back-to-school the same way the NCAA is viewing fall football & Texas viewed businesses reopening on May 1.  Like there is an obvious  solution, it’s just that the bureaucrats are too stupid to figure it out.

Those parents who are screaming at their school boards about how this is ruining their kids’ lives while completely ignoring the risks that teachers will be taking — fuck them.  I have no sympathy.

I'm not screaming at school boards, I'm screaming at our dipshit federal government.  From the very beginning, this entire thing could've been over in 6 weeks if (a) all PPE had been handled by private business via executive order and (b) people were paid $5k per month to stay the fuck home.  Just put the entire economy, interest rates, mortgages, rent, EVERYTHING on hold.  

I could've tolerated home-schooling my kid if I could take off 4 days per week to do it.  Instead, we fuck parents with a gigantic, herpe'd dick and tell them to like it.  It's fucking disgusting and aggravating, and a war crime, frankly.

[mysfit]

I say fuck the machine.

The machine, being our current economy where 95% are exploited for the benefit of the 5%.

So break it, break it completely. And replace it with something which benefits the people actually doing work. A living wage. Healthcare not tied to a job. College. Stability. 

People are so worried about the economy and its false metrics. Fuck it. We put people first. What happens if the 95% go on strike for a couple of days?

We need to stop playing by the rules which exploit us. We've been programmed to support s system which screws us over.

Change the damn program. 

 

[glduck]

Years and years of packing as many students into classrooms as possible has essentially destroyed any chance of socially distancing students at school. If states mandate students go back, I don’t see any way they don’t employ a hybrid in-class/distance learning system. A classroom ideally designed for 15 but has been operating at 40 since 1992 just isn’t going to fly. They’ll need to do a morning/afternoon, A day/B day, or one week on/one week off schedule if they’re going to reopen safely.

[duckfandan]

I teach 8th grade Social Studies, and while I took a small break (from planning during an unpaid time in the summer summer) focusing on how I can poison the minds of kids and make them hate our country, I've heard and thought some about reopening schools.

*end the sarcasm if you didn't pick it up and now actual thoughts*

GL touched on it, but it is IMPOSSIBLE to open schools back as normal last year, unless the virus is under near complete control.  

First, class sizes are 34 in middle school and even larger in high school. The average space between students in my classroom is likely 1-1.5 feet.  Having kids be within a foot of each other, for an hour at a time, and then move through six different classrooms, with six different combo of students is just asking for the virus to explode.  And sure, we can say kids are not at much risk, but many adults who work in schools are.  I can't believe the lack of concern about school staff I've heard in many places now that we're discussing schools.

Second, middle schoolers often are not developmentally able to sit and follow all the precautions we would need for them to do in order for it to be safe.

Third, funding.  Right, that thing that is continually neglected in education in this country.  Due to the pandemic affect on the economy we are actually looking at LESS teachers than we had this last year, which means LARGER class sizes if we want to go back and do school as normal.  This isn't even considering the funding that is needed to buy more sanitizing supples, hire more staff that is sanitizing trained certified (fun fact I learned today: teachers technically can't sanitize because we are not certified).  We need a very large investment from the federal government to be able to open safely.

So that brings us to only two possible solutions: a hybrid model, and a fully online model (but with some exceptions for underserved populations I bet is what would happen here).  A hybrid model will still need more funding.  By halving classrooms you can barely get spacing down to 'safe' areas if kids are stationary.  Our district has discussed having kids stay one classroom their whole day and teachers rotate to the pods so the kids are only in contact with the same 15 kids every day and that pod can be held home if there's an infections and teachers can be tested (maybe?) if they teach in the infected pod.  The most likely scenario is kids are only in school two days a week, and working from home two or three days.

I think we end up with hybrid, but I still don't see how that is truly safe and it will spread the disease significantly more.  Which is all to say, there is no good option with schools.

[Scscsc89]

 

[glduck]

Unbelievably, athletic practices began this week at high schools in my school district. They’ve placed restrictions — parents have to sign a waiver, school admins are taking every athlete’s temperature before they’re allowed on site, no locker room use, parents aren’t allowed to stay, everyone has to bring their own water — but I can’t imagine anything sillier. In what world is high school football happening in 7 weeks?
 

I “get” the argument in favor of college football — $$$$ — but high school football?