Are you sending your kids to school next month?

Out of curiosity, how far would kids have to walk to get to their school in NYC?

Varies wildly, but they allowed kids to pick up from ANY school, not just the one they go to. Nobody is more than a few blocks from a school.
 
My DS is in college, and his school plans to have students back with hybrid classes - if a class was scheduled Tues/Thur, for instance, half will go Tues and the other half Thurs, so they can better spread out. Students will watch a recorded lecture for the other session. He is happy to be going back.

If I had little kids, though, I would most likely homeschool. (And yes, I’m fairly qualified. I have a degree in mathematics and years of substitute teaching experience.) I would be hesitant to accept the increased risk of being in school for a reduced benefit - because I think so much of the social factor will be lost, and other stresses added.

But I do understand that for some families, being in school is the greater risk, and for some, not having school is the greater risk. That’s why I think each district should have surveyed both parents and teachers and divided up, if at all possible - the teachers who want to teach online with the families who can/want to keep their kids home, and the teachers who want to be back in the classroom with the families who want/need that. I think it would automatically cut down on in-person class sizes, and really help a lot.
 
My DS is in college, and his school plans to have students back with hybrid classes - if a class was scheduled Tues/Thur, for instance, half will go Tues and the other half Thurs, so they can better spread out. Students will watch a recorded lecture for the other session. He is happy to be going back.

If I had little kids, though, I would most likely homeschool. (And yes, I’m fairly qualified. I have a degree in mathematics and years of substitute teaching experience.) I would be hesitant to accept the increased risk of being in school for a reduced benefit - because I think so much of the social factor will be lost, and other stresses added.

But I do understand that for some families, being in school is the greater risk, and for some, not having school is the greater risk. That’s why I think each district should have surveyed both parents and teachers and divided up, if at all possible - the teachers who want to teach online with the families who can/want to keep their kids home, and the teachers who want to be back in the classroom with the families who want/need that. I think it would automatically cut down on in-person class sizes, and really help a lot.

Going with all three options (100% distant, hybrid, and 100% in person) at the same time is going to be very tough for schools to accommodate.
Not that many school districts around me are providing all 3 options, but of the few that are planning to do so, I have yet to hear how they will do it with regards to staffing.
Each grade level or subject department will have their own share of families disagreeing on how they want to go back to school. So, how would they divide up the teachers between online and in-person teaching? You would need more teachers, or teachers will have to learn to teach different grades/subjects.
 

On a related-ish note I am irrationally annoyed after having gotten my daughters final report card. When our schools shut down in March (and had no distance learning on the horizon at that point) I just decided to get our own curriculum and start homeschooling. When they did offer the the distance learning I contacted her homeroom teacher that we were doing our own thing who said she would pass the message along to the principal and I didn't need to do anything else.

Fast forward to today and the report card shows a carryover of her grades from the last semester (despite us not participating in their distance learning at all) which was fine- she's an A/B girl- and at least she kept that for this crazy year. Her PE/Health teacher though decided to give her an F though with a note "Little to no participation during shutdown". Ummm, yeah. We homeschooled! What irritates me the most though is that a teacher would slap an F grade on a student who gets good grades without ever having contacted a parent once. I mean I get she probably didn't get the memo that we withdrew but, assuming you thought you had a student that never turned in one assignment or even logged into the online portal, wouldn't you think to check with the parent to see if there was some sort of issue or barrier?

This totally confirmed my plan to homeschool! Thank you for listening to my rant.:mad:
 
I understand you have strong feelings, but denying many children access to in person school is dangerous. I respect the choice you make for your children. I don’t need you to respect mine. As I have said before in this thread and others, my child needs to be in school. My child suffered greatly this spring both intellectually and emotionally. My child has teachers and medical professionals who agree he needs to be in school. My child is not alone.

Having options for families to choose between schooling from home or in school is the best way to go forward in the Fall.
 
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I understand you have strong feelings, but denying many children access to in person school is dangerous. I respect the choice you make for your children. I don’t need you to respect mine. As I have said before in this thread and others, my child needs to be in school. My child suffered greatly this spring both intellectually and emotionally. My child has teachers and medical professionals who agree he needs to be in school. My child is not alone.
One solution for special situations would be to incentivize teachers who are teaching in person classes.
Extra pay, maybe extra time off as well.
 
Her PE/Health teacher though decided to give her an F though with a note "Little to no participation during shutdown". Ummm, yeah. We homeschooled! What irritates me the most though is that a teacher would slap an F grade on a student who gets good grades without ever having contacted a parent once. I mean I get she probably didn't get the memo that we withdrew but, assuming you thought you had a student that never turned in one assignment or even logged into the online portal, wouldn't you think to check with the parent to see if there was some sort of issue or barrier?

The total difference between the systems all over the place just boggles my childless educator mind. :)

Meanwhile, in my district, this spring I was running live recorded classes once a week (recorded in case the time slot provided by the district didn't work, connectivity issues, and what-not) and had office hours once a week scheduled and also available by appointment (this happened exactly once). I had four students (out of 140) during the duration of the closure take me up on my office hours (all of whom swore it was great and three of whom insisted they didn't want to tell anybody else how great it was for getting help because they didn't want to lose the one-on-one time, LOL). I had weekly e-mails to families (and a couple of weeks, a second one when developing events occurred that were of great and somewhat immediate interest), and every four weeks reached out specifically to each individual family (with administrators, counselors, and support staff copied) where student contact was slipping noticeably or was absent.

And despite this, no student could receive any grade besides an "A", except for some situations that were so narrowly construed that almost nobody fit the characteristics (you had to be failing pre-closure with three weeks of work in, no contact post-closure, and a few other pieces). And those students would get Incompletes. I had a few Incompletes that I thought were fully appropriate based on circumstances and was not permitted to give any of them.

But once kids figured out this was the system, the number of students who started to disengage rose dramatically. Not that I totally blame them, but that's the system I'm nervous to go back to if we go back remotely, even though I'm feeling like remote might be the way we need to go.

I will say this, though: During the closure, the grades and systems I heard about the most were by far from the PE teachers. When I heard what some of them were wanting, man alive, that was crazy!
 
On a related-ish note I am irrationally annoyed after having gotten my daughters final report card. When our schools shut down in March (and had no distance learning on the horizon at that point) I just decided to get our own curriculum and start homeschooling. When they did offer the the distance learning I contacted her homeroom teacher that we were doing our own thing who said she would pass the message along to the principal and I didn't need to do anything else.

Fast forward to today and the report card shows a carryover of her grades from the last semester (despite us not participating in their distance learning at all) which was fine- she's an A/B girl- and at least she kept that for this crazy year. Her PE/Health teacher though decided to give her an F though with a note "Little to no participation during shutdown". Ummm, yeah. We homeschooled! What irritates me the most though is that a teacher would slap an F grade on a student who gets good grades without ever having contacted a parent once. I mean I get she probably didn't get the memo that we withdrew but, assuming you thought you had a student that never turned in one assignment or even logged into the online portal, wouldn't you think to check with the parent to see if there was some sort of issue or barrier?

This totally confirmed my plan to homeschool! Thank you for listening to my rant.:mad:
Here they were supposed to get what they had when school shut down with the chance to bring up lower grades. My kids participated every single day and my DS did double the math (redoing old assignments per the teacher + current assignments) and the teacher just gave him the original 3rd quarter grade. Here I am telling my kid if you work hard you can turn things around and in the end he had nothing to show for it.

If I were you I’d try to appeal that somehow. She can’t be the only one the teacher did that to.
 
Going with all three options (100% distant, hybrid, and 100% in person) at the same time is going to be very tough for schools to accommodate.
Not that many school districts around me are providing all 3 options, but of the few that are planning to do so, I have yet to hear how they will do it with regards to staffing.
Each grade level or subject department will have their own share of families disagreeing on how they want to go back to school. So, how would they divide up the teachers between online and in-person teaching? You would need more teachers, or teachers will have to learn to teach different grades/subjects.

Oh, I didn’t mean all schools should go with three options! I answered first about my own son’s college - that was the hybrid model I described.

Then I put forth my opinion that the younger schools should have two options (just in person or online) to make both families and teachers comfortable. Yes, there would be some shuffling around. Some teachers would end up switching grades, but I know teachers who feel they are higher risk and would gladly do so in order not to have to choose between in person teaching and leaving all together.
 
Curious question, for those that think schools should remain closed in the fall for virus, how do you expect families to survive this? Many on these boards are from quite a privileged socio-economic position to be able to homeschool or stay home with kids who do distance learning.

What do families who are scraping by with two incomes do if there’s no school? Most people are back to work full swing at this point in a lot of places. Even wfh offices are expecting more productive work and are less flexible about people trying to work and provide child care.

I’ve seen a lot of outrage over the fact that Florida schools are required to be open for all students. However, I don’t really know what that alternative is. Closing schools will bankrupt families who need to working parents. Pretty much all benefits related to covid are ending in a few weeks and moratoriums on evictions are expiring, there’s so many people already in a hole from all this.
 
My kids have been in virtual school- connections academy for 3 years. We really like it but we are changing to " homeschool " this year... we moved states last spring and the kids moved to time4learning because Texas considers CA a charter school and we have to attend TX public school before they can attend a charter.
 
DH is unhappy with last semester grading here. They kept standard calculations though much changed with distance learning. eg, DS's gym class was to check in everyday just to hit an attendance button. DS did all the 4th Q assignments and has always maintained A/B in gym, but because he missed hitting the attendance button some days he got a D.

DS is off to uni next month so I figure 4th Q grades of Senior year have little impact on him. He graduated with a great education from this school district. He's well prepared and admission already completed for college. I just want to give them some feedback about our experience while DH wants to push for DS's grades adjusted. 🤷‍♀️ I dunno...
 
Anyway, DS's uni gave us an outline for fall semester expectations about 5-6 wks ago, said they'd confirm by mid July after state orders were finalized. July 9th we recv'd the confirmed Fall Semester Schedule.

Fall semester starts Mon Aug 24, a week earlier than planned and completion of semester by Thanksgiving. A few courses may integrate one additional Saturday session to ensure students receive all the instruction needed. Highlights:
  • Freshmen cohort and select other courses will, to the extent possible, be scheduled in spaces sufficiently large enough for full class social distancing during on-campus classes. (Seems freshmen are getting priority for in person approaches to help get them acclimated to campus life)
  • All other previously scheduled on-campus courses will utilize a hybrid approach, partly online and partly on campus. In most cases this will be achieved by dividing students into 2 smaller groups for separate on-campus sessions. Some course will be set up such that the instructor teaches from the classroom to a portion of in person students while being live streamed to the students working remotely thru the use of newly installed webcam tech.
We're still waiting for dorm assignment. Capacity has been reduced but it looks like freshmen and students that don't have alternatives are getting priority. It's possible demand is less this year, hopefully it all balances out.

I'll take it! We were going to skip if the first semester was mostly or fully online. DS wouldn't thrive well. The 2 opposing risks for us were the damage caused by breaking his education's momentum vs starting his college career on the wrong foot with on line sessions. We are satisfied that the bulk of his instruction and experience will be in person. In person is focused on 6ft apart, masks indoors and hand sanitizer pumps everywhere. We recognize the risks of C19 but believe the state and campus has the capability to manage with conscientious adherence to basic protocols that reduce transmission. Starting with low case rates makes it easier to keep rates low while moving forward.
 
Curious question, for those that think schools should remain closed in the fall for virus, how do you expect families to survive this? Many on these boards are from quite a privileged socio-economic position to be able to homeschool or stay home with kids who do distance learning.

What do families who are scraping by with two incomes do if there’s no school? Most people are back to work full swing at this point in a lot of places. Even wfh offices are expecting more productive work and are less flexible about people trying to work and provide child care.

I’ve seen a lot of outrage over the fact that Florida schools are required to be open for all students. However, I don’t really know what that alternative is. Closing schools will bankrupt families who need to working parents. Pretty much all benefits related to covid are ending in a few weeks and moratoriums on evictions are expiring, there’s so many people already in a hole from all this.
Nm
 
Just got the survey results from my school district.

One question asked if there is no vaccine available will you send your kid to traditional in person school.

55% yes
37% unsure
8% no

My daughter is coming to me now and saying if her friends go back she’ll go back. I explained to her how some of the protocols may be with staying in one classroom all day, no lunch in the cafeteria, etc. We both decided we will see what our districts rules will be and we will decide from there. Assuming our district gives us the option to do full time distance learning. Rumor is that they’re planning on a hybrid schedule.
 

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