Allegedly there are several options for the fall none of which include being back full time?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When this tread started about a month ago, the county likely still had the opportunity to make some decisions about how open in the fall. It's now 2 months before MCPS is scheduled to start the new year on Aug 31, and I'd wager that shortly after July 14 (when it is scheduled to release its plan) is the latest they can truly commit and have enough time to implement. Which to me means that MCPS has already made a decision and is now just working to present and support it. Yes, I realize it is taking a survey, but that seems like eyewash. The survey should have been out in early May.

Regardless of the merits, it's impossible to see MCPS simply re-opening as usual in the fall. Yes, the COVID-19 situation seems to have been managed decently here, but has deteriorated rapidly elsewhere, and last I checked, we haven't instituted mandatory quarantines for persons traveling into the area from TX, FL, AL, etc. (Conversely, I know many, many families traveling out-of-state for vacation this summer.) I'm no fan of the MCPS administration, but they would be foolhardy to assume the continued improvement necessary to open schools full-time in-person on Aug. 31. We're not even in Phase 3 in MoCo, and I have my doubts that we will get there by the end of summer.

The best the system could accomplish is a hybrid model, but even that is going to be a challenge. I agree with others that creating enough space will require some group of students (HS) to go mostly DL, but the logistics of planning who goes where, including teachers and support personnel (not to mention transportation), is going to be enormous, and to give families enough lead time, you'd want to announce specifics by Aug 14 at the very latest. Which means starting that planning now. Of course, the worse case scenario is full-time DL. I'm sure (hope) that the county can do better than in the spring, but the same equity and access issues aren't going to be better in fall. Given the impact of the pandemic on the economy, they will be more acute.

I hope I'm proven wrong in all of this, and that it will be a great fall. It's just very hard to see that given how little time remains before the new year starts and the trajectory of the pandemic nationally.

We have been moving through phases every 1-3 weeks in Moco so far. We are a week into phase 2 with things still being stable/getting better each day. There is no reason we won't be in phase 3 in a week or two when we will still be in early July. That still leaves nearly 2 months before school. Test positivity has been hovering around 6-7% for at least a couple weeks. If that number was down to let's say a 3 or a 4 by mid August it's pretty safe to say things are moving in the right direction.

Again-the goal was never to completely get rid of Covid which most logical people know is not a realistic goal and we have zero control over the virus's longevity. The only thing we have control over is trying to contain/reduce the spread of it. Yet somehow flattening the curve/getting it under control and stable has gone out the window and now it seems school re-opening is 100% dependent on the virus being GONE. I'm not understanding why school administrations/teachers and staff seem to have a new unattainable goal for re-opening that nobody else sees as realistic in the least.

I’m very much for opening schools and agree that our long term goal needs to be herd immunity in some sort of controlled fashion, as brutal as some may view that. We know we can do that (perhaps without the controlled part) versus a vaccine. I just don’t see the system taking the political risk of fully opening with reasonable safety measures, nor do I see there being any more time to make that decision. The system has 160,000 students. Any decision other than opening as normal is going to take every day left available to implement. Nine days ago I would have agreed with you about Phase 3. In fact, I would have bet on it. I’m not as sanguine about that anymore because the rest of the country has become a cautionary tale for Elrich.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Given that teenagers are more like adults when it comes to their ability to contract and spread this disease and given that they are the most able to manage DL, why not keep the HS students on DL And spread the other students throughout the high schools?

You must not have high school students. The isolation is killing them. The mental health issues alone are enough to send them back to school. And when parents go back to work, having thousands of high school kids home alone is not a good idea.

Do parents of teens take every summer off to supervise them? Is that the only reason there aren’t massive packs of feral W MS and HS students rampaging through Bethesda and Potomac all day long?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

I’m very much for opening schools and agree that our long term goal needs to be herd immunity in some sort of controlled fashion, as brutal as some may view that. We know we can do that (perhaps without the controlled part) versus a vaccine. I just don’t see the system taking the political risk of fully opening with reasonable safety measures, nor do I see there being any more time to make that decision. The system has 160,000 students. Any decision other than opening as normal is going to take every day left available to implement. Nine days ago I would have agreed with you about Phase 3. In fact, I would have bet on it. I’m not as sanguine about that anymore because the rest of the country has become a cautionary tale for Elrich.

What about the political risk of saying, "Sorry kids, sorry parents, sorry employers of parents, we're just going to continue to not have school because that's easier than figuring out how to have school."?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Given that teenagers are more like adults when it comes to their ability to contract and spread this disease and given that they are the most able to manage DL, why not keep the HS students on DL And spread the other students throughout the high schools?

You must not have high school students. The isolation is killing them. The mental health issues alone are enough to send them back to school. And when parents go back to work, having thousands of high school kids home alone is not a good idea.

Do parents of teens take every summer off to supervise them? Is that the only reason there aren’t massive packs of feral W MS and HS students rampaging through Bethesda and Potomac all day long?

I am not speaking for all parents of all teens. But my specific teenager was going to have a summer job. Now my specific teenager does not have a summer job.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t know where they’d done enough teachers but making high school remote and spreading the young kids out in every building makes so much sense. HSStidrnrs at great academic risk would be the exception.

And I have a high school sophomore. I know how awful that solution would be but they are most likely to survive it academically.

No, it doesn't make sense.

Yes, most would survive it academically. But then again, most survive covid. Is that the standard we should be using?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I’m very much for opening schools and agree that our long term goal needs to be herd immunity in some sort of controlled fashion, as brutal as some may view that. We know we can do that (perhaps without the controlled part) versus a vaccine. I just don’t see the system taking the political risk of fully opening with reasonable safety measures, nor do I see there being any more time to make that decision. The system has 160,000 students. Any decision other than opening as normal is going to take every day left available to implement. Nine days ago I would have agreed with you about Phase 3. In fact, I would have bet on it. I’m not as sanguine about that anymore because the rest of the country has become a cautionary tale for Elrich.

What about the political risk of saying, "Sorry kids, sorry parents, sorry employers of parents, we're just going to continue to not have school because that's easier than figuring out how to have school."?

You can bet on the latter. I’m betting on the former. We (voters in MoCo) put this board in place and keep doing it. And they extended the superintendent. We are getting what we voted for. I’m a cynic. Even this won’t be enough to remove them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I’m very much for opening schools and agree that our long term goal needs to be herd immunity in some sort of controlled fashion, as brutal as some may view that. We know we can do that (perhaps without the controlled part) versus a vaccine. I just don’t see the system taking the political risk of fully opening with reasonable safety measures, nor do I see there being any more time to make that decision. The system has 160,000 students. Any decision other than opening as normal is going to take every day left available to implement. Nine days ago I would have agreed with you about Phase 3. In fact, I would have bet on it. I’m not as sanguine about that anymore because the rest of the country has become a cautionary tale for Elrich.

What about the political risk of saying, "Sorry kids, sorry parents, sorry employers of parents, we're just going to continue to not have school because that's easier than figuring out how to have school."?

You can bet on the latter. I’m betting on the former. We (voters in MoCo) put this board in place and keep doing it. And they extended the superintendent. We are getting what we voted for. I’m a cynic. Even this won’t be enough to remove them.

I don't understand the connection between a BOE vote to renew the superintendent's contract and a county/state decision to keep schools closed. Please explain.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When this tread started about a month ago, the county likely still had the opportunity to make some decisions about how open in the fall. It's now 2 months before MCPS is scheduled to start the new year on Aug 31, and I'd wager that shortly after July 14 (when it is scheduled to release its plan) is the latest they can truly commit and have enough time to implement. Which to me means that MCPS has already made a decision and is now just working to present and support it. Yes, I realize it is taking a survey, but that seems like eyewash. The survey should have been out in early May.

Regardless of the merits, it's impossible to see MCPS simply re-opening as usual in the fall. Yes, the COVID-19 situation seems to have been managed decently here, but has deteriorated rapidly elsewhere, and last I checked, we haven't instituted mandatory quarantines for persons traveling into the area from TX, FL, AL, etc. (Conversely, I know many, many families traveling out-of-state for vacation this summer.) I'm no fan of the MCPS administration, but they would be foolhardy to assume the continued improvement necessary to open schools full-time in-person on Aug. 31. We're not even in Phase 3 in MoCo, and I have my doubts that we will get there by the end of summer.

The best the system could accomplish is a hybrid model, but even that is going to be a challenge. I agree with others that creating enough space will require some group of students (HS) to go mostly DL, but the logistics of planning who goes where, including teachers and support personnel (not to mention transportation), is going to be enormous, and to give families enough lead time, you'd want to announce specifics by Aug 14 at the very latest. Which means starting that planning now. Of course, the worse case scenario is full-time DL. I'm sure (hope) that the county can do better than in the spring, but the same equity and access issues aren't going to be better in fall. Given the impact of the pandemic on the economy, they will be more acute.

I hope I'm proven wrong in all of this, and that it will be a great fall. It's just very hard to see that given how little time remains before the new year starts and the trajectory of the pandemic nationally.

We have been moving through phases every 1-3 weeks in Moco so far. We are a week into phase 2 with things still being stable/getting better each day. There is no reason we won't be in phase 3 in a week or two when we will still be in early July. That still leaves nearly 2 months before school. Test positivity has been hovering around 6-7% for at least a couple weeks. If that number was down to let's say a 3 or a 4 by mid August it's pretty safe to say things are moving in the right direction.

Again-the goal was never to completely get rid of Covid which most logical people know is not a realistic goal and we have zero control over the virus's longevity. The only thing we have control over is trying to contain/reduce the spread of it. Yet somehow flattening the curve/getting it under control and stable has gone out the window and now it seems school re-opening is 100% dependent on the virus being GONE. I'm not understanding why school administrations/teachers and staff seem to have a new unattainable goal for re-opening that nobody else sees as realistic in the least.

I’m very much for opening schools and agree that our long term goal needs to be herd immunity in some sort of controlled fashion, as brutal as some may view that. We know we can do that (perhaps without the controlled part) versus a vaccine. I just don’t see the system taking the political risk of fully opening with reasonable safety measures, nor do I see there being any more time to make that decision. The system has 160,000 students. Any decision other than opening as normal is going to take every day left available to implement. Nine days ago I would have agreed with you about Phase 3. In fact, I would have bet on it. I’m not as sanguine about that anymore because the rest of the country has become a cautionary tale for Elrich.

The states that are doing poorly are because of their own mistakes with their shutdown plan or lack therof. It should not influence our counties decisions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Given that teenagers are more like adults when it comes to their ability to contract and spread this disease and given that they are the most able to manage DL, why not keep the HS students on DL And spread the other students throughout the high schools?

That is similar to one of the options outlined in the state plan: MS and HS students do DL full-time, and ES students spread among all the buildings. But that’s still really expensive. You will need to have many more SS teachers because class sizes will be so much smaller.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When this tread started about a month ago, the county likely still had the opportunity to make some decisions about how open in the fall. It's now 2 months before MCPS is scheduled to start the new year on Aug 31, and I'd wager that shortly after July 14 (when it is scheduled to release its plan) is the latest they can truly commit and have enough time to implement. Which to me means that MCPS has already made a decision and is now just working to present and support it. Yes, I realize it is taking a survey, but that seems like eyewash. The survey should have been out in early May.

Regardless of the merits, it's impossible to see MCPS simply re-opening as usual in the fall. Yes, the COVID-19 situation seems to have been managed decently here, but has deteriorated rapidly elsewhere, and last I checked, we haven't instituted mandatory quarantines for persons traveling into the area from TX, FL, AL, etc. (Conversely, I know many, many families traveling out-of-state for vacation this summer.) I'm no fan of the MCPS administration, but they would be foolhardy to assume the continued improvement necessary to open schools full-time in-person on Aug. 31. We're not even in Phase 3 in MoCo, and I have my doubts that we will get there by the end of summer.

The best the system could accomplish is a hybrid model, but even that is going to be a challenge. I agree with others that creating enough space will require some group of students (HS) to go mostly DL, but the logistics of planning who goes where, including teachers and support personnel (not to mention transportation), is going to be enormous, and to give families enough lead time, you'd want to announce specifics by Aug 14 at the very latest. Which means starting that planning now. Of course, the worse case scenario is full-time DL. I'm sure (hope) that the county can do better than in the spring, but the same equity and access issues aren't going to be better in fall. Given the impact of the pandemic on the economy, they will be more acute.

I hope I'm proven wrong in all of this, and that it will be a great fall. It's just very hard to see that given how little time remains before the new year starts and the trajectory of the pandemic nationally.

We have been moving through phases every 1-3 weeks in Moco so far. We are a week into phase 2 with things still being stable/getting better each day. There is no reason we won't be in phase 3 in a week or two when we will still be in early July. That still leaves nearly 2 months before school. Test positivity has been hovering around 6-7% for at least a couple weeks. If that number was down to let's say a 3 or a 4 by mid August it's pretty safe to say things are moving in the right direction.

Again-the goal was never to completely get rid of Covid which most logical people know is not a realistic goal and we have zero control over the virus's longevity. The only thing we have control over is trying to contain/reduce the spread of it. Yet somehow flattening the curve/getting it under control and stable has gone out the window and now it seems school re-opening is 100% dependent on the virus being GONE. I'm not understanding why school administrations/teachers and staff seem to have a new unattainable goal for re-opening that nobody else sees as realistic in the least.

I’m very much for opening schools and agree that our long term goal needs to be herd immunity in some sort of controlled fashion, as brutal as some may view that. We know we can do that (perhaps without the controlled part) versus a vaccine. I just don’t see the system taking the political risk of fully opening with reasonable safety measures, nor do I see there being any more time to make that decision. The system has 160,000 students. Any decision other than opening as normal is going to take every day left available to implement. Nine days ago I would have agreed with you about Phase 3. In fact, I would have bet on it. I’m not as sanguine about that anymore because the rest of the country has become a cautionary tale for Elrich.

The states that are doing poorly are because of their own mistakes with their shutdown plan or lack therof. It should not influence our counties decisions.

Our Phase 3 (or even full Phase 2) isn't going to look all that different than other parts of the country that re-opened, even fully. Why do people think the result is going to be different?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Our Phase 3 (or even full Phase 2) isn't going to look all that different than other parts of the country that re-opened, even fully. Why do people think the result is going to be different?

Because we will go into Phase 3 at the appropriate time, rather than rushing into it prematurely.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When this tread started about a month ago, the county likely still had the opportunity to make some decisions about how open in the fall. It's now 2 months before MCPS is scheduled to start the new year on Aug 31, and I'd wager that shortly after July 14 (when it is scheduled to release its plan) is the latest they can truly commit and have enough time to implement. Which to me means that MCPS has already made a decision and is now just working to present and support it. Yes, I realize it is taking a survey, but that seems like eyewash. The survey should have been out in early May.

Regardless of the merits, it's impossible to see MCPS simply re-opening as usual in the fall. Yes, the COVID-19 situation seems to have been managed decently here, but has deteriorated rapidly elsewhere, and last I checked, we haven't instituted mandatory quarantines for persons traveling into the area from TX, FL, AL, etc. (Conversely, I know many, many families traveling out-of-state for vacation this summer.) I'm no fan of the MCPS administration, but they would be foolhardy to assume the continued improvement necessary to open schools full-time in-person on Aug. 31. We're not even in Phase 3 in MoCo, and I have my doubts that we will get there by the end of summer.

The best the system could accomplish is a hybrid model, but even that is going to be a challenge. I agree with others that creating enough space will require some group of students (HS) to go mostly DL, but the logistics of planning who goes where, including teachers and support personnel (not to mention transportation), is going to be enormous, and to give families enough lead time, you'd want to announce specifics by Aug 14 at the very latest. Which means starting that planning now. Of course, the worse case scenario is full-time DL. I'm sure (hope) that the county can do better than in the spring, but the same equity and access issues aren't going to be better in fall. Given the impact of the pandemic on the economy, they will be more acute.

I hope I'm proven wrong in all of this, and that it will be a great fall. It's just very hard to see that given how little time remains before the new year starts and the trajectory of the pandemic nationally.

We have been moving through phases every 1-3 weeks in Moco so far. We are a week into phase 2 with things still being stable/getting better each day. There is no reason we won't be in phase 3 in a week or two when we will still be in early July. That still leaves nearly 2 months before school. Test positivity has been hovering around 6-7% for at least a couple weeks. If that number was down to let's say a 3 or a 4 by mid August it's pretty safe to say things are moving in the right direction.

Again-the goal was never to completely get rid of Covid which most logical people know is not a realistic goal and we have zero control over the virus's longevity. The only thing we have control over is trying to contain/reduce the spread of it. Yet somehow flattening the curve/getting it under control and stable has gone out the window and now it seems school re-opening is 100% dependent on the virus being GONE. I'm not understanding why school administrations/teachers and staff seem to have a new unattainable goal for re-opening that nobody else sees as realistic in the least.

I’m very much for opening schools and agree that our long term goal needs to be herd immunity in some sort of controlled fashion, as brutal as some may view that. We know we can do that (perhaps without the controlled part) versus a vaccine. I just don’t see the system taking the political risk of fully opening with reasonable safety measures, nor do I see there being any more time to make that decision. The system has 160,000 students. Any decision other than opening as normal is going to take every day left available to implement. Nine days ago I would have agreed with you about Phase 3. In fact, I would have bet on it. I’m not as sanguine about that anymore because the rest of the country has become a cautionary tale for Elrich.

The states that are doing poorly are because of their own mistakes with their shutdown plan or lack therof. It should not influence our counties decisions.

Our Phase 3 (or even full Phase 2) isn't going to look all that different than other parts of the country that re-opened, even fully. Why do people think the result is going to be different?

Because the states having issues never went into stay at home orders in the first place. They just basically remained fully opened and had low spread for a while until they didn't. If you have been actually keeping up with things you would see that all these states having massive outbreaks now are states that never really took any precautions from the get go.

They are having a surge now and they didn't have one before. We had a surge (or more so just continuous increases in cases for some time) prior and things are stabilizing. It's really not that hard to understand.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Given that teenagers are more like adults when it comes to their ability to contract and spread this disease and given that they are the most able to manage DL, why not keep the HS students on DL And spread the other students throughout the high schools?

That is similar to one of the options outlined in the state plan: MS and HS students do DL full-time, and ES students spread among all the buildings. But that’s still really expensive. You will need to have many more SS teachers because class sizes will be so much smaller.

That's unacceptable.

Middle-schoolers and high-schoolers are less completely unable to manage distance learning, is all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Our Phase 3 (or even full Phase 2) isn't going to look all that different than other parts of the country that re-opened, even fully. Why do people think the result is going to be different?

Because we will go into Phase 3 at the appropriate time, rather than rushing into it prematurely.

Exactly.

[Anonymous]

For those of you who favor having schools open with in person instruction, how do you envision that working? I'm genuinely curious.

Can you lay out the precautions and COVID-related procedures? Seems to me that any sensible attempt at this would require:

- masks on everyone, all day long except when eating lunch.
-- keep a classroom cohort together all day long as much as possible. You don't want the entire student population to mix with one another.
-- social distancing to the extent possible, which may involve kids coming in only on certain days of the week.
- basic health checks, such as daily temperature screenings and health questionnaire asking if you've been around anyone with COVID. Kids who have a temp or who answer yes would have to be sent home immediately.
- a system (perhaps county run) for testing people regularly and for disseminating the word about positive tests of kids who are in school. Students and teachers who were in close proximity to someone who tested positive would need to self isolate at home for 2 weeks, or at the very least could not come to school.
- a system to provide fill in teachers to replace teachers who are out sick.
- A system or method for keeping self-isolating students on track with their schoolwork at home, if they feel well enough to study.
-- No sports teams or clubs and certainly no games between schools.
-- Bus transportation would need to be modified --- more buses to run the same number of kids, so kids can spread out on the bus more.

If you do all that, maybe you can pull off a year of school with in person instruction supplemented with some distance learning when necessary.

Even then, substantial numbers of students and staff to get sick. My guess is about 50 percent over the course of the year, but that's purely a guess.