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13 hours ago, duckfandan said:

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.

I don't disagree with any of this.  I think a priority needs to be placed for elementary kids, however.  Keep remote learning for MS and HS kids, and do a hybrid for elementary kids could be a compromise, yeah?  Fewer staff would be required, and even a few days a week where elementary school kids get some in-person instruction (and their parents are given a much-needed break) would be a massive release valve for stress/financial distress among parents.  Teachers should be given the same level of PPE as nurses/doctors.  Of course our country is fucking broken, so funding that may be a non-starter. 

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1 hour ago, Orange said:

I don't disagree with any of this.  I think a priority needs to be placed for elementary kids, however.  Keep remote learning for MS and HS kids, and do a hybrid for elementary kids could be a compromise, yeah?  Fewer staff would be required, and even a few days a week where elementary school kids get some in-person instruction (and their parents are given a much-needed break) would be a massive release valve for stress/financial distress among parents.  Teachers should be given the same level of PPE as nurses/doctors.  Of course our country is fucking broken, so funding that may be a non-starter. 

In Oregon the big 5 districts (Portland, Beaverton, Hillsboro, Salem, Eugene) are having building and district level meetings with the goal to have one unified plan for the majority of the populated areas of the state.  I did hear yesterday from one of our committees that they are looking at what you mentioned and treating primary and secondary differently, which makes a lot of sense.  Elementary kids are already in isolated rooms and can be taught by one teacher.  Much easier to control the environment there than in secondary.  And like you mention, secondary students are better equipped to do distance learning.  I'd bring in SpEd and ELL teachers at secondary, however to run at least some in class instruction and support in secondary.  I think this is the best compromise situation.  

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The problem they are discussing in our elementary district with the hybrid model is that it needs TWICE the staff because the classes are HALF the size — unless you have the same teacher leading both cohorts which is a virus vulnerability.


 

 (Not to mention needing extra back up staff in case/when a teacher or someone in their family gets sick)

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1 minute ago, Scscsc89 said:

The problem they are discussing in our elementary district with the hybrid model is that it needs TWICE the staff because the classes are HALF the size — unless you have the same teacher leading both cohorts which is a virus vulnerability.


 

 (Not to mention needing extra back up staff in case/when a teacher or someone in their family gets sick)

Yea...for it to work, some secondary staff would need to be involuntarily and temporarily reassigned to primary and use a high school for more elementary classrooms.

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We have a friend who has been a kindergarten teacher In our district for over 20 years.  She is in her 50s and has auto-immunity health issues.  She asked if she could do ONLY remote teaching.

they’ve told her no.  
 

They are also signaling that remote-only will NOT be an option for elementary students.  If you are uncomfortable sending your kid to physical school, you need to go private or homeschool.

both seem lawsuits waiting to happen.

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23 minutes ago, Scscsc89 said:

We have a friend who has been a kindergarten teacher In our district for over 20 years.  She is in her 50s and has auto-immunity health issues.  She asked if she could do ONLY remote teaching.

they’ve told her no.  
 

They are also signaling that remote-only will NOT be an option for elementary students.  If you are uncomfortable sending your kid to physical school, you need to go private or homeschool.

both seem lawsuits waiting to happen.

Wow...that's not a good plan.  There's talks of here, in Oregon, even allowing temporary retirements for teachers in those kind of situations.  Also, at least the local districts are planning on giving an online option if parents would rather have that.  Our district already has an online school, so the infrastructure is already there to build upon.  A paint survey a month ago showed about 20% wanted to send their kids to the online option.

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21 hours ago, Scscsc89 said:

We have a friend who has been a kindergarten teacher In our district for over 20 years.  She is in her 50s and has auto-immunity health issues.  She asked if she could do ONLY remote teaching.

they’ve told her no.  
 

They are also signaling that remote-only will NOT be an option for elementary students.  If you are uncomfortable sending your kid to physical school, you need to go private or homeschool.

both seem lawsuits waiting to happen.

I mean, teaching kindergarten remotely is, in fact, impossible.  I don't think this woman should be forced to retire or teach in person, but we also can't teach 5-year-olds via Zoom.  It just isn't teaching.

Something has to give here.

 

P.S. I'm amazed @KUGRDON liked your comment given his frequent and open disdain for teachers.

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4 minutes ago, Scscsc89 said:

Something doesn’t have to give just cause you want/need it to.

Oh, I see, you think this is just about my selfish desire not to be miserable.

Fuck everyone with elementary-age children who prevent parents from working, because Orange is annoying.  That about right?

There is ZERO economic relief for parents, there is ZERO sympathy from employers who insist on the same rate of productivity from parents working from home (if indeed they're lucky enough to hold a job while working from home).

Let me be clear: I'm lucky as fuck.  I can work from home, and so can my wife.  I haven't lost a dime. But I'm squarely in the minority, and if you don't think children being denied in-person education throughout the 20-21 school year is a big deal, you're a fucking idiot.  And yes, it's a bigger deal than a handful of teachers and staff getting sick.  We HAVE to have some hybrid model in schools this year, or we will pay for it with a ravaged economy, poor mental health, and a serious dearth of educated children.

I swear to fuck, America has completely forgotten about parents with children in school.  There is ZERO awareness of it.

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11 minutes ago, Scscsc89 said:

Something doesn’t have to give just cause you want/need it to.

There doesn’t have to be a right answer to this problem.

Oh I missed this gem.

What a genius statement.  "We don't need to solve problems."  Sounds roughly like the White House's response to this whole thing.

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10 minutes ago, Scscsc89 said:


I don’t think it takes a genius to realize these two statements are not remotely the same thing:

“There doesn’t have to be a right answer to this problem.“

“We don't need to solve problems.”

Then what the fuck are you saying?  You don't seem to be interested in being understood.  

What I'm gathering from your remarks is that you insist we don't open schools in any form or fashion, purely because trump supports opening them.

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I can’t be any clearer than this.   If you can’t understand, I can’t help.
 

On 7/8/2020 at 12:21 PM, Scscsc89 said:

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 & $$$.


The virus doesn’t give a shit that JoeBob “needs” to get back to work & JoeyJr “needs” an education and to socialize with other kids.

There doesn’t have to be a good solution just because “JoeBob” needs/wants one.

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55 minutes ago, Scscsc89 said:

 

I can’t be any clearer than this.   If you can’t understand, I can’t help.
 


The virus doesn’t give a shit that JoeBob “needs” to get back to work & JoeyJr “needs” an education and to socialize with other kids.

There doesn’t have to be a good solution just because “JoeBob” needs/wants one.

I really can't fathom how you're this pigheaded.

There can be good solutions, such as staggered classrooms, masks, lunch in classrooms, remote learning only for grades 6-12, etc.  Eliminating school entirely for some 30 million grade-school age kids should not be considered an option.  This is the kind of shit that enables the "COVID is a hoax" people, because too many consider the virus the singular threat to humanity that surpasses all others in this crisis.  

Yes.  Something has to give.   This isn't football, this is a permanent degradation of developing brains and social habits.

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On 7/10/2020 at 10:40 AM, Orange said:

I really can't fathom how you're this pigheaded.

There can be good solutions, such as staggered classrooms, masks, lunch in classrooms, remote learning only for grades 6-12, etc.  Eliminating school entirely for some 30 million grade-school age kids should not be considered an option.  This is the kind of shit that enables the "COVID is a hoax" people, because too many consider the virus the singular threat to humanity that surpasses all others in this crisis.  

Yes.  Something has to give.

 

I don't understand how "everything besides remote learning will involve some risk of spreading the virus" is pig-headed.  It's just science.

Every county is faced with a different situation & every family has a different definition of "acceptable risk".  I wasn't even advocating that remote learning was the best choice for my or anyone's kid, just that it involves the least risk.

My problem with saying that there are "good" solutions is that some districts will employ them, do everything right, and still get slammed.

 

 

On 7/10/2020 at 10:40 AM, Orange said:

  This isn't football, this is a permanent degradation of developing brains and social habits.

Again, the WHY you are getting crowds of people together during a pandemic doesn't matter to the virus.    Perhaps it changes your personal openness to risk but the risk is the same.

 

 

It's great news that child-to-child and child-to-adult transmission appears to be low.   Not much solace for teachers tho.  

https://www.abc10.com/article/news/health/coronavirus/california-teachers-union-pushes-back-on-reopening-schools/103-7b2f6362-7deb-411a-8a03-bb325bacb1aa

 

I think @MrBug708 is a teacher, isn't he?   Would love to hear his thoughts

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