Last June, as COVID-19 cases dropped and the vaccination rate climbed, school superintendent Piera Gravenor was feeling positive about the upcoming school year.
To be sure, all sorts of workplaces are wrestling now with these topics. But many employers can tweak return-to-office plans, delay them or stick with remote models. And the adult workforce is eligible for the shot. “We’re in better shape today about schooling than we certainly were in March 2020 or in other times” during the pandemic, said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers with 1.7 million members.
To mask, or not to mask Everyone should be masked inside schools regardless of vaccination status, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s latest guidance.States including Arizona, Florida, Iowa, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas and Utah say schools cannot require masking. Some school systems, like Dallas and Austin, are defying state orders with their own mask mandates.
Though lunch will be outside and spread out as much as possible, the teachers and aides on lunch duty will have to make sure students quickly drop their masks and pop them back up once they’re done eating, Gravenor said. Then there’s figuring out gym classes, where students don’t have to be masked, she noted. “There’s a whole lot more oversight that has to occur,” Gravenor said.
Pitts said as of late July, 40% of districts were requiring masks, 40% were making it optional and 20% had no policy for the new school year one way or another, according a running national survey from the Center on Reinventing Public Education. The participants are 100 mostly urban school districts across the country, she noted.
Washington D.C. said Thursday that all district employees — including teachers — would either need to be vaccinated by Sept. 19 or undergo regular testing. “We want our families to understand that our doors will be open on August 30, and we expect to have all of our students present, in-person, full-time, five days a week,” D.C. Public Schools Chancellor Lewis Ferebee said.
Likewise, Miller said requirements in Greene County Schools, N.C. “will not happen at a local level here,” Miller said. “If a state mandate came down, we would have to adhere to that.”
Stop with the fear porn.
It could also be deadly!
“The way I see it, every life is a pile of good things and bad things. The good things don’t always soften the bad things, but vice versa, the bad things don’t always spoil the good things and make them unimportant.” ~Doctor Who
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