Are you sending your kids to school next month?

[MickeyWaffles]

Our district is planning 3 options (virtual, hybrid and face to face), but first week of August we will hear if having any in person option is even possible. Things are sadly trending up here.

Unfortunately, some of the most vocal people in our district who are demanding face to face instruction are also galavanting around without masks, having parties, ignoring the virus and not taking any kind of precautionary measures - and will coincidentally be the very reason our schools can’t open up.

I believe the choice will be made for me in the coming weeks.

 

[JM23457]

I believe this is the relevant part of your statement “has to go to work”. A grocery store clerk can’t do their job remotely, but a teacher can. Why should the teachers have to put themselves in a situation where they can‘t be safe when it isn’t necessary?

It is necessary because a large percentage of students don't learn effectively online.

 

[Happyinwonerland]

I’m pretty sure the American Pediatrics reconsidered that opinion for certain areas.

The Florida chapter of the AAP sent a letter to the governor outlining why his plan to have all schools open 5 days per week is a really bad idea.

 

[sk!mom]

This past virtual learning was not successful in my town and surrounding towns.We can't wait til there is a vaccine to continue living. We need to adjust and follow guidelines. People follow guidelines for wearing masks in public spaces and will confront someone who doesn't follow the guidelines. The CDC and American Pediatrics guideline both state it's safe for children to return to school.

Last spring was mostly unsuccessful in my area, as well. Those who choose virtual “should” have a better experience this fall. That is provided the parents and students who choose it plan to support it and fully engage. That did not happen in the spring. In my state, virtual will be an enrollment in the state online school which has been in existence and successful for years.

My frustration in all of this is that teachers always get most of the negativity yet (at least in my case) we get to make little to none of the decisions regarding delivery and instruction. I don’t want to make safety decisions. Those should be made by science.

As far as going back and why a delay might be best in my area, cases have skyrocketed and hospitals are becoming overwhelmed. My state learned nothing from those who went before us so masks were only mandatory starting 3 weeks ago. The hope is that with this order we would see cases begin to decline.

As far as school goes, our governor has made masks mandatory for 10 and up. That means that teachers and other school personnel working with students in PK-3 will be doing so with no protection other than the adults in masks. My districts “plan,” after 5 months to prepare, is masks for 4th and above and social distancing “where possible.” Not much of a plan.

 

[motherof5]

I’m pretty sure the American Pediatrics reconsidered that opinion for certain areas.

We should treat each individual town/city as individualized.

 

[motherof5]

My guess is staffing. Schools can’t afford to hire the number of teachers that would require. And while great in theory, a teacher trying to teach an in person class at the same time as a remote class will only end up with everybody frustrated, in my opinion.

Also, the AAP reversed their stance on return to school and said only when it’s safe. I know it’s not safe for my area.

If it's not safe in your area I agree, but many areas are safe, like small towns but we are being lumped together with the big cities surrounding us.

 

[motherof5]

Last spring was mostly unsuccessful in my area, as well. Those who choose virtual “should” have a better experience this fall. That is provided the parents and students who choose it plan to support it and fully engage. That did not happen in the spring. In my state, virtual will be an enrollment in the state online school which has been in existence and successful for years.

My frustration in all of this is that teachers always get most of the negativity yet (at least in my case) we get to make little to none of the decisions regarding delivery and instruction. I don’t want to make safety decisions. Those should be made by science.

As far as going back and why a delay might be best in my area, cases have skyrocketed and hospitals are becoming overwhelmed. My state learned nothing from those who went before us so masks were only mandatory starting 3 weeks ago. The hope is that with this order we would see cases begin to decline.

As far as school goes, our governor has made masks mandatory for 10 and up. That means that teachers and other school personnel working with students in PK-3 will be doing so with no protection other than the adults in masks. My districts “plan,” after 5 months to prepare, is masks for 4th and above and social distancing “where possible.” Not much of a plan.

Doesn't sound like any of this is well planned out. Each place should be assessed individually and a plan on how to best meet the needs of the students. Some places that have little to no cases are remaining shut down out of fear and that is not acceptable. I agree parents and teachers need to work together, but remember there are parents that don't have internet, don't speak english and don't have a education themselves so can not help their children learn.

 

[motherof5]

All of this has been said many, many, many times on these boards. There isn’t an easy solution. It’s going to be a long, tough road to recovery.

This virus has been in our lives for just 6 months. That’s it. It might feel longer, but it hasn’t been. We simply do not understand it well enough to determine the best courses of action.

Agreed but it takes alot of studying and time to fully understand a virus and know treatment. It isn't in anyone's best interest to remain closed as a society for another year while this is being figured out.

 

[sk!mom]

I agree parents and teachers need to work together, but remember there are parents that don't have internet, don't speak english and don't have a education themselves so can not help their children learn.

I am well aware of that and not blaming anyone for the failures. Everything was unprecedented and planned on the fly. In my district the plan was rearranged and tweaked throughout the
9 weeks of spring as we continually tried to make it more successful. Hopefully we all learned from it.

For those that it absolutely didn’t work for due to the reasons you listed, they should choose the in person route unless a health issue indicates otherwise. For those who felt it didn’t work because it was poorly implemented, they Might want to look into the virtual school this fall to see how it will be different and then decide which will work better for their student/family.

Tough decisions for most parents.

 

[dvcgirl67]

Agreed but it takes alot of studying and time to fully understand a virus and know treatment. It isn't in anyone's best interest to remain closed as a society for another year while this is being figured out.

Certainly not another year, but another few months is going to be necessary, certainly in states/cities with surging viral outbreaks.

 

[motherof5]

Certainly not another year, but another few months is going to be necessary, certainly in states/cities with surging viral outbreaks.

It will get worse in the winter months so if we aren't returning to school in Sept. What makes you think the Nov-March months will be better when that is flu season?

 

[LSUmiss]

We should treat each individual town/city as individualized.

Kinda except here one district is going virtual & another in the metro area isn’t. The 2 areas are too intertwined for that kind of variation. Also we have a lot of private schools in the area & they want to go back no matter what b/c parents understandably don’t want to pay full tuition for virtual school.

 

[amylevan]

So I spent the last 3 months fully preparing to homeschool: learning my state laws, choosing curriculum, etc. We will not do virtual, I will either send them or withdraw them and homeschool.

My school announced its plan the other night. Families have the choice of fully in-person or virtual. Based on a survey in June, they expect 80% will select in-person. At 80%, busing will be hard to maintain social distancing so they are encouraging parents who are able drive. Masks on busses, in hallways, and “anytime 6’ cannot be maintained”. (Which at 80% I would expect that to be while sitting in class.) Temperature checks each morning. K-8 will not leave their classrooms except for recess (1 class at a time, no playground equipment) or gym. Teachers will rotate, lunch in classrooms. Grab and go lunch purchases only. No field trips, assemblies, visits to the library. Essentially the only interaction will be with the kids in your immediate class.

Frankly, I think it sounds horrid. My kids, however, want to go back. Our school district has asked for commitment by the end of next week so they can have accurate enrollment numbers. DH and I are torn over what to do.

 

[barkley]

the largest district near us announced their tentative plans-gotta say, i don't get the thinking behind it-

k-4th traditional 5 day a week in person instruction

5th-6th 'likely' (guess it's still in discussion) will go m/w/f

7th-12th m/w/f.

no idea how they plan to do the social distancing in k-4th unless they believe a large number of families will opt for distance learning such that class sizes shrink. as for 5th-12th? i can see an alternating schedule with half attending some days/half the others to reduce numbers but what is achieved by sending 100% of attending students on all the same days escapes me.

 

[Southernmiss]

If it's not safe in your area I agree, but many areas are safe, like small towns but we are being lumped together with the big cities surrounding us.

What area are you from? There are over 30 states with a high number of cases right now.

Opening schools in my area is all over the place.

My county has had over 865 new cases since July 1. We are currently at our worst since the pandemic started.

Masks were just mandated in my county last week.

Delaying school here would allow the mask requirement to tamp down the case number.

Our local infectious disease doctor said this morning that delaying school (which starts August 3rd) another 6 to 8 weeks would give our area a chance to come out of this some. I think that's reasonable.

 

[dvcgirl67]

It will get worse in the winter months so if we aren't returning to school in Sept. What makes you think the Nov-March months will be better when that is flu season?

Well, I think we'll have to see how it goes. As it stands right now, we're looking at the possibility that this virus explodes from here. That makes opening school untenable for certain parts of the country for sure.

 

[motherof5]

So I spent the last 3 months fully preparing to homeschool: learning my state laws, choosing curriculum, etc. We will not do virtual, I will either send them or withdraw them and homeschool.

My school announced its plan the other night. Families have the choice of fully in-person or virtual. Based on a survey in June, they expect 80% will select in-person. At 80%, busing will be hard to maintain social distancing so they are encouraging parents who are able drive. Masks on busses, in hallways, and “anytime 6’ cannot be maintained”. (Which at 80% I would expect that to be while sitting in class.) Temperature checks each morning. K-8 will not leave their classrooms except for recess (1 class at a time, no playground equipment) or gym. Teachers will rotate, lunch in classrooms. Grab and go lunch purchases only. No field trips, assemblies, visits to the library. Essentially the only interaction will be with the kids in your immediate class.

Frankly, I think it sounds horrid. My kids, however, want to go back. Our school district has asked for commitment by the end of next week so they can have accurate enrollment numbers. DH and I are torn over what to do.

I agree it doesn't sound the best but at least academically they will learn and see friends if only in classrooms. It's a step in the right direction. Our town is small and they aren't even entertaining fully in person. Neither are the charter schools that originally only had 20 kids to a class and already stated some aren't returning so numbers will be lower. We have also been told we won't know a plan for 2 more weeks. How are parents suppose to plan work, child care etc without knowing what school will be? I'm starting to investigate homeschooling more too, and hopefully a group of parents can do our own private hangouts to get social interaction in. Nothing is ideal right now.

 

[JM23457]

So I spent the last 3 months fully preparing to homeschool: learning my state laws, choosing curriculum, etc. We will not do virtual, I will either send them or withdraw them and homeschool.

My school announced its plan the other night. Families have the choice of fully in-person or virtual. Based on a survey in June, they expect 80% will select in-person. At 80%, busing will be hard to maintain social distancing so they are encouraging parents who are able drive. Masks on busses, in hallways, and “anytime 6’ cannot be maintained”. (Which at 80% I would expect that to be while sitting in class.) Temperature checks each morning. K-8 will not leave their classrooms except for recess (1 class at a time, no playground equipment) or gym. Teachers will rotate, lunch in classrooms. Grab and go lunch purchases only. No field trips, assemblies, visits to the library. Essentially the only interaction will be with the kids in your immediate class.

Frankly, I think it sounds horrid. My kids, however, want to go back. Our school district has asked for commitment by the end of next week so they can have accurate enrollment numbers. DH and I are torn over what to do.

This is a very practical and workable plan. I wish that my and my son's schools were also ready and willing to get back to school.

 

[GreatLakes]

We should treat each individual town/city as individualized.

I disagree with this. We tried that in our state and because people move between cities and counties it was ineffective to apply different rules to different areas.

In the school example you might have town A with very few cases while city B 100 miles away is spiking. It might sound logical to say town A goes back to in-person education while city B does it remotely. But then little Johnny from town B goes to visit his friend/family/a store/whatever in city B, comes in contact with the virus, and takes it back to town A where he infects his entire class.

If 100% of the people could be trusted to stay within a small radius of their homes and not move from highly impacted ares to low impacted areas and vice versa piecemeal would work. People can't be trusted to do that so one rule needs to be applied to regions and states.

 

[SaintsManiac]

So I spent the last 3 months fully preparing to homeschool: learning my state laws, choosing curriculum, etc. We will not do virtual, I will either send them or withdraw them and homeschool.

My school announced its plan the other night. Families have the choice of fully in-person or virtual. Based on a survey in June, they expect 80% will select in-person. At 80%, busing will be hard to maintain social distancing so they are encouraging parents who are able drive. Masks on busses, in hallways, and “anytime 6’ cannot be maintained”. (Which at 80% I would expect that to be while sitting in class.) Temperature checks each morning. K-8 will not leave their classrooms except for recess (1 class at a time, no playground equipment) or gym. Teachers will rotate, lunch in classrooms. Grab and go lunch purchases only. No field trips, assemblies, visits to the library. Essentially the only interaction will be with the kids in your immediate class.

Frankly, I think it sounds horrid. My kids, however, want to go back. Our school district has asked for commitment by the end of next week so they can have accurate enrollment numbers. DH and I are torn over what to do.

Will your school allow you to switch if they go for a week and hate it? Ours is giving a 2 week window and then you can switch when the grading periods end.