Caitlyn Peetz on Twitter: 8am MCPS press conference for a “COVID-19 update”

[Anonymous]

What's the problem? This is exactly what MCPS said it would do. They aren't switching the entire school district to virtual; they are switching an individual school to virtual if it reaches a certain threshhold of absences due to COVID (or presumably any other illness).

Yes, there will soon be a LOT of school moved to virtual when all those yellow schools enter the red zone. But wasn't that expected?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Will they release the yellow list to parents can prepare?

I missed the plan for yellow school. Are they also starting virtual?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Will they release the yellow list to parents can prepare?

I missed the plan for yellow school. Are they also starting virtual?

No, of course not,

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:You guys I can’t take it anymore. I just want the kids to go to school, to do my job as well as I used to, have some occasional play dates and birthday parties to break up the month. Anyone else hate this feeling of being consumed by thoughts of what MCPS is going to do next to screw your life over again. This feeling takes me back to summer 2020 (remember when they ditched hybrid?) and august 2021 when people were freaking out about delta buy thank god MCPs stuck to its plan. Sigh. I’m so tired. When will it end.

What did you think having kids was going to be? An endless round of birthday parties? Raising kids takes some effort.

If you want to do those things you need to be part of the solution.

And given that nearly 2 years of restrictions, and 1 year of availability of vaccines that remain highly effective at preventing serious illness, hasn't allowed us to get back to normal, the only plausible option left is letting Omicron burn through the community as fast as possible.

If we let covid run rampant (not that we seem to have a choice at this point) it will be over in 3 weeks. I say let it burn.

Agreed. We saw this in South Africa. Give Omicron the 3 weeks to run through.

Also, it is clear that we are not shutting down other aspects of society - hair salons, bars, restaurants, hookah bars, strip clubs, Caps games - all continue as normal. If we’re not going to go around shutting everything down (which I agree that we should not), we need to just accept that this needs to work it’s way through.

+1. Plus MCPS is delusional if they think kids will be staying home. A lot of these schools are ES- I assume aftercare programs will run distance learning programs again? Plus you can expect families to pod up or take their kids to family/friends houses instead- so many more parents are back at their workplaces compared to even a year ago. Maybe they just assume parents won’t report new Covid cases over the two week period so that the numbers will look better in two weeks time, i.e., don’t ask don’t tell.

What would you like MCPS to do? I bet a lot of the staff at these schools is sick. Who will watch the kids?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What's the problem? This is exactly what MCPS said it would do. They aren't switching the entire school district to virtual; they are switching an individual school to virtual if it reaches a certain threshhold of absences due to COVID (or presumably any other illness).

Yes, there will soon be a LOT of school moved to virtual when all those yellow schools enter the red zone. But wasn't that expected?

So, I guess I don’t understand switching to virtual right now when the kids have been out for nearly two weeks already. The positive kids haven’t been in school yet. If in a week’s time 5% is testing positive, I could understand that a bit more.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What's the problem? This is exactly what MCPS said it would do. They aren't switching the entire school district to virtual; they are switching an individual school to virtual if it reaches a certain threshhold of absences due to COVID (or presumably any other illness).

Yes, there will soon be a LOT of school moved to virtual when all those yellow schools enter the red zone. But wasn't that expected?

No and they won’t. Some will but they certainly won’t all.

What makes no sense here is that this is after the break. When they announced the 5 percent plan it seemed to be about stopping school spread. Closing schools whose population have caught Covid while out of school over the holidays makes zero sense. School wasn’t driving that transmission as they were at home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:You guys I can’t take it anymore. I just want the kids to go to school, to do my job as well as I used to, have some occasional play dates and birthday parties to break up the month. Anyone else hate this feeling of being consumed by thoughts of what MCPS is going to do next to screw your life over again. This feeling takes me back to summer 2020 (remember when they ditched hybrid?) and august 2021 when people were freaking out about delta buy thank god MCPs stuck to its plan. Sigh. I’m so tired. When will it end.

What did you think having kids was going to be? An endless round of birthday parties? Raising kids takes some effort.

If you want to do those things you need to be part of the solution.

And given that nearly 2 years of restrictions, and 1 year of availability of vaccines that remain highly effective at preventing serious illness, hasn't allowed us to get back to normal, the only plausible option left is letting Omicron burn through the community as fast as possible.

If we let covid run rampant (not that we seem to have a choice at this point) it will be over in 3 weeks. I say let it burn.

Agreed. We saw this in South Africa. Give Omicron the 3 weeks to run through.

Also, it is clear that we are not shutting down other aspects of society - hair salons, bars, restaurants, hookah bars, strip clubs, Caps games - all continue as normal. If we’re not going to go around shutting everything down (which I agree that we should not), we need to just accept that this needs to work it’s way through.

+1. Plus MCPS is delusional if they think kids will be staying home. A lot of these schools are ES- I assume aftercare programs will run distance learning programs again? Plus you can expect families to pod up or take their kids to family/friends houses instead- so many more parents are back at their workplaces compared to even a year ago. Maybe they just assume parents won’t report new Covid cases over the two week period so that the numbers will look better in two weeks time, i.e., don’t ask don’t tell.

What would you like MCPS to do? I bet a lot of the staff at these schools is sick. Who will watch the kids?

So this is due to a staffing shortage then? Are the sick teachers even going to be able to teach virtually?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You guys I can’t take it anymore. I just want the kids to go to school, to do my job as well as I used to, have some occasional play dates and birthday parties to break up the month. Anyone else hate this feeling of being consumed by thoughts of what MCPS is going to do next to screw your life over again. This feeling takes me back to summer 2020 (remember when they ditched hybrid?) and august 2021 when people were freaking out about delta buy thank god MCPs stuck to its plan. Sigh. I’m so tired. When will it end.

What did you think having kids was going to be? An endless round of birthday parties? Raising kids takes some effort.

If you want to do those things you need to be part of the solution.

And given that nearly 2 years of restrictions, and 1 year of availability of vaccines that remain highly effective at preventing serious illness, hasn't allowed us to get back to normal, the only plausible option left is letting Omicron burn through the community as fast as possible.

If we let covid run rampant (not that we seem to have a choice at this point) it will be over in 3 weeks. I say let it burn.

Agreed. We saw this in South Africa. Give Omicron the 3 weeks to run through.

Also, it is clear that we are not shutting down other aspects of society - hair salons, bars, restaurants, hookah bars, strip clubs, Caps games - all continue as normal. If we’re not going to go around shutting everything down (which I agree that we should not), we need to just accept that this needs to work it’s way through.

+1. Plus MCPS is delusional if they think kids will be staying home. A lot of these schools are ES- I assume aftercare programs will run distance learning programs again? Plus you can expect families to pod up or take their kids to family/friends houses instead- so many more parents are back at their workplaces compared to even a year ago. Maybe they just assume parents won’t report new Covid cases over the two week period so that the numbers will look better in two weeks time, i.e., don’t ask don’t tell.

What would you like MCPS to do? I bet a lot of the staff at these schools is sick. Who will watch the kids?

Well, if that many staff are sick just close altogether for two weeks, extend the school year by two weeks into the summer, and encourage the staff who are well to STAY HOME for these two weeks. For all the complaining about parents taking their kids on travel and activities over the break, plenty of teachers I know were doing the same.

[Anonymous]

What’s the plan for yellow schools?? Anyone?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What's the problem? This is exactly what MCPS said it would do. They aren't switching the entire school district to virtual; they are switching an individual school to virtual if it reaches a certain threshhold of absences due to COVID (or presumably any other illness).

Yes, there will soon be a LOT of school moved to virtual when all those yellow schools enter the red zone. But wasn't that expected?

So, I guess I don’t understand switching to virtual right now when the kids have been out for nearly two weeks already. The positive kids haven’t been in school yet. If in a week’s time 5% is testing positive, I could understand that a bit more.

They don't have enough staff at the school to open safely. Plus, this give them some slack with bus drivers and cafeteria workers to temporarily move them to backfill other staff out sick.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What’s the plan for yellow schools?? Anyone?

Wait until they turn red? Probably during the next random testing day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You guys I can’t take it anymore. I just want the kids to go to school, to do my job as well as I used to, have some occasional play dates and birthday parties to break up the month. Anyone else hate this feeling of being consumed by thoughts of what MCPS is going to do next to screw your life over again. This feeling takes me back to summer 2020 (remember when they ditched hybrid?) and august 2021 when people were freaking out about delta buy thank god MCPs stuck to its plan. Sigh. I’m so tired. When will it end.

What did you think having kids was going to be? An endless round of birthday parties? Raising kids takes some effort.

If you want to do those things you need to be part of the solution.

And given that nearly 2 years of restrictions, and 1 year of availability of vaccines that remain highly effective at preventing serious illness, hasn't allowed us to get back to normal, the only plausible option left is letting Omicron burn through the community as fast as possible.

If we let covid run rampant (not that we seem to have a choice at this point) it will be over in 3 weeks. I say let it burn.

Agreed. We saw this in South Africa. Give Omicron the 3 weeks to run through.

Also, it is clear that we are not shutting down other aspects of society - hair salons, bars, restaurants, hookah bars, strip clubs, Caps games - all continue as normal. If we’re not going to go around shutting everything down (which I agree that we should not), we need to just accept that this needs to work it’s way through.

+1. Plus MCPS is delusional if they think kids will be staying home. A lot of these schools are ES- I assume aftercare programs will run distance learning programs again? Plus you can expect families to pod up or take their kids to family/friends houses instead- so many more parents are back at their workplaces compared to even a year ago. Maybe they just assume parents won’t report new Covid cases over the two week period so that the numbers will look better in two weeks time, i.e., don’t ask don’t tell.

What would you like MCPS to do? I bet a lot of the staff at these schools is sick. Who will watch the kids?

So this is due to a staffing shortage then? Are the sick teachers even going to be able to teach virtually?

Some of them will be able to.
When lots of kids are out + staff, learning will be compromised. This might be a better alternative.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What's the problem? This is exactly what MCPS said it would do. They aren't switching the entire school district to virtual; they are switching an individual school to virtual if it reaches a certain threshhold of absences due to COVID (or presumably any other illness).

Yes, there will soon be a LOT of school moved to virtual when all those yellow schools enter the red zone. But wasn't that expected?

So, I guess I don’t understand switching to virtual right now when the kids have been out for nearly two weeks already. The positive kids haven’t been in school yet. If in a week’s time 5% is testing positive, I could understand that a bit more.

They don't have enough staff at the school to open safely. Plus, this give them some slack with bus drivers and cafeteria workers to temporarily move them to backfill other staff out sick.

Which school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What’s the plan for yellow schools?? Anyone?

I wasn't listening to that part as carefully. Something about prioritization for testing - they plan on providing rapid tests for everybody, I think. I believe there will be more information coming later today.

[Anonymous]

I thought the idea was if they close the schools it’s because there is community spread within the schools. Everyone now got Covid on break. The safest place is to be in school! This is ridiculous!!