APS Outdoor Lunch Needs to Be Optional

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:These Bro dads and Trumo Moms are hilarious. They are ok with winging their kids safety with no masks, but afraid of some cold air? It's an extra 15-20 mins outside. Kids have always been doing recess in winter. These people!

They are nuts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's going to be 39 degrees at lunch time today. I invite all of these "kids must be forced to eat outdoors because my family is part of the tiny minority that doesn't eat indoors at restaurants" nuts to please go outside for 1 hour today during lunch. Eat your lunch outside and then hang out outside afterwards too.

In 20 years, people are going to laugh so hard about the hysteria of these nutters wanting to force kids to eat outside in freezing cold weather. They'll laugh even more too because COVID will still be here in 20 years. In fact, when I tell people who don't have kids here about this, they're already laughing.

My kid has realized the lunch monitors don't care if she sits for her entire "lunch period". So she SLAMS her lunch while chatting with friends and then she gets extra recess time. If anything, it's been AWESOME for her mental health to have a solid chunk of time outdoors in the middle of the day. She does come home starving, but she is healthy and FINE. Adults sit still the entire time. My child is running around like a maniac with her friends. Which is exactly what 7 year olds should be doing for a portion of every day.

I am open to indoor lunch. But for my particular child, it is not an improvement. I can concede that some kids are unhappy, and some may not have enough warm clothing to make it tolerable, and for that reason I hope they move indoors a bit more when it is really cold. But my child? Would eat outside in the blizzard and it would be the highlight of her day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:FCPS ES schools have been eating indoors since September and have very few Covid cases. I can't believe entire schools of children are being forced to eat lunch outside in the cold. Wow. Arlington is crazy.

My kid loves it! Is honestly a highlight of the year so far. So "crazy" it is I guess

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am begging, BEGGING, parents and community members to understand how very, very low risk kids are of severe illness from COVID. https://brownstone.org/articles/well-structured-german-study-shows-no-deaths-among-healthy-german-kids-ages-5-to-11/

Covid was a top 10 cause of death for kids in 2020.

Flu usually causes more death in kids, plus now there are vaccines. We don't require kids to eat outside in 45 degree weather and light rain because of the flu.

This is not true. Covid killed many more kids in 2020 than influenza kills during a typical flu season.

The vaccines do change things. But we need more kids to get vaccinated before we can change behavior.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The vaccines do change things. But we need more kids to get vaccinated before we can change behavior.

Can we have opt-in allowing parents to let school know about their kid's vax status and aggregate statics publishing of % of kids vaxxed in schools? That might:
1) encourage more parents to vax once seen a lot of others have (hopefully though it could go either way
2) once a school has X percentage vaxxed, allow loosing the policies such as outdoor lunch

Thoughts?

[Anonymous]

At ATS, my girls eat inside when it’s below a certain temperature. They really enjoy eating outside and hope they will continue to do so after covid restrictions are lifted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The vaccines do change things. But we need more kids to get vaccinated before we can change behavior.

Can we have opt-in allowing parents to let school know about their kid's vax status and aggregate statics publishing of % of kids vaxxed in schools? That might:
1) encourage more parents to vax once seen a lot of others have (hopefully though it could go either way
2) once a school has X percentage vaxxed, allow loosing the policies such as outdoor lunch

Thoughts?

Yes!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The vaccines do change things. But we need more kids to get vaccinated before we can change behavior.

Can we have opt-in allowing parents to let school know about their kid's vax status and aggregate statics publishing of % of kids vaxxed in schools? That might:
1) encourage more parents to vax once seen a lot of others have (hopefully though it could go either way
2) once a school has X percentage vaxxed, allow loosing the policies such as outdoor lunch

Thoughts?

“Loosening” lunch requires more staff.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“Loosening” lunch requires more staff.

It just means inside which they were doing before so back to status quo (maybe with physical dividers still). So why more staff?

[Anonymous]

Agreed. My kid just got her second shot, and it’s freezing out. That’s miserable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am begging, BEGGING, parents and community members to understand how very, very low risk kids are of severe illness from COVID. https://brownstone.org/articles/well-structured-german-study-shows-no-deaths-among-healthy-german-kids-ages-5-to-11/

Covid was a top 10 cause of death for kids in 2020.

Flu usually causes more death in kids, plus now there are vaccines. We don't require kids to eat outside in 45 degree weather and light rain because of the flu.

This is not true. Covid killed many more kids in 2020 than influenza kills during a typical flu season.

The vaccines do change things. But we need more kids to get vaccinated before we can change behavior.

A regular flu season kills more kids (H1N1 killed way more kids annually), and we don't do this for the flu. Take a look at estimated flu deaths. And COVID just doesn't kill random healthy kids - it kills ones with significant comorbidities, who absolutely should be taking more precautions (just like they need to with the flu).
https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html

All of you nutters about COVID really need to understand you and your children will be exposed to it repeatedly the rest of their lives. Every single on of them will. Everyone will get it. The risk to health children is statistically 0, but if you're looking for it to be even less, there's a vaccine available. But will your kids forgive you when they're older for treating them like snowflake disease vectors?

Youngkin can't come soon enough.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“Loosening” lunch requires more staff.

It just means inside which they were doing before so back to status quo (maybe with physical dividers still). So why more staff?

Dividers aren't absolutely not needed. Do they have dividers at restaurants for adults? No.

The mitigation burden being put only on our children has to stop. COVID will be here the rest of our lives. Should they eat with dividers the rest of their lives? Or only until they become adults?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“Loosening” lunch requires more staff.

It just means inside which they were doing before so back to status quo (maybe with physical dividers still). So why more staff?

Right now the same staff can monitor outside lunch and recess at the same time. Indoor lunch means the staff can't mulitask lunch and recess because they're not in the same place.

On rainy days, our school has to use more staff for indoor lunch, which takes away from classroom support and planning time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The vaccines do change things. But we need more kids to get vaccinated before we can change behavior.

Can we have opt-in allowing parents to let school know about their kid's vax status and aggregate statics publishing of % of kids vaxxed in schools? That might:
1) encourage more parents to vax once seen a lot of others have (hopefully though it could go either way
2) once a school has X percentage vaxxed, allow loosing the policies such as outdoor lunch

Thoughts?

Yes!

This is a defacto vaccine mandate for kids. Nope. The FDA panel was VERY clear that vaccines should NOT be mandated for 5 to 11 year olds. It's the reason it's under Emergency Use Authorization. Europe is not even approving it for 5 to 11 year olds until they see more data out of the US (i.e., they're using US kids as their test data - demographically, the test subjects are predominantly affluent white kids with paranoid parents who can't assess risk).

And only 1/3 of US parents are planning to vaccinate their 5 to 11 year old kids. So you're essentially saying 2/3 of kids are excluded. For disadvantaged minorities, it's even higher percentages not getting vaccinated.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The vaccines do change things. But we need more kids to get vaccinated before we can change behavior.

Can we have opt-in allowing parents to let school know about their kid's vax status and aggregate statics publishing of % of kids vaxxed in schools? That might:
1) encourage more parents to vax once seen a lot of others have (hopefully though it could go either way
2) once a school has X percentage vaxxed, allow loosing the policies such as outdoor lunch

Thoughts?

Yes!

This is a defacto vaccine mandate for kids. Nope. The FDA panel was VERY clear that vaccines should NOT be mandated for 5 to 11 year olds. It's the reason it's under Emergency Use Authorization. Europe is not even approving it for 5 to 11 year olds until they see more data out of the US (i.e., they're using US kids as their test data - demographically, the test subjects are predominantly affluent white kids with paranoid parents who can't assess risk).

And only 1/3 of US parents are planning to vaccinate their 5 to 11 year old kids. So you're essentially saying 2/3 of kids are excluded. For disadvantaged minorities, it's even higher percentages not getting vaccinated.

Haha - OP's comment is the type of parent who doesn't eat indoors, only will start having indoor playdates once their kid is fully vaccinated, requires proof of vaccination at their kids' birthday parties, always wears a mask to show their virtue to the Arlington plebes, and demands low-level service workers be masked to make them "feel" safe.