Yellow and green school parents

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have heard that either way, teachers need to report in person. Is that true? Including for the first, asynchronous day or not? If so, then teachers at least have little incentive to go virtual, other than perhaps fewer bus or other duties.

Have not hear that. I'm guessing that would be a principal decision

[Anonymous]

What the heck? Faking positives? This is some extreme thinking, and it’s not healthy or based in reality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a parent of a disabled child, MCPS dishonesty and trickery to deny a child an education has been on full display for years.

Parents should be questioning the new number chart for schools. MCPS no longer is breaking out teacher and student cases. Also, current cases did not spread in school because schools have been closed for TWO WEEKS. Covid shows up in a matter of days after exposure, not weeks.

MCPS is only interested in vacations, half days, and school closures to appease their unions. The lack of transparency and test to stay shows how MCPS wants to manipulate data to force students online. The school by school model is also another way to deny students the in person instruction mandated by the state. MCPS is a disgusting institution not focused on the needs of students.

Every school should be starting in the green and zero cases. None of those infections are going to be in the school building. But they're disingenuous and simply creating the paper file to get it all shut down.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What can be done to stop pro-virtual parents from faking positive covid tests to shut down the yellow and green schools? Seems like we are screwed! Although green schools will turn red eventually but some parents can speed that up by fake positives

Whoa. What?! That is some serious conspiracy theory stuff. I and many other parents are very concerned about covid transmission post holidays, but people have only talked about keeping their own kids home or hoping for a few virtual days out or precaution. The whole idea that someone would fake a positive to close schools is ludicrous . No one wants to close schools. That is crazy talk.

I am more concerned that families will under report because they don't want to have to get a dr to sign off on reeentry.

This is my main concern as well. I am not a fan of virtual learning but as a teacher at a Title 1 school, we have a low number of positive COVID cases but we also have very few kids that are getting tested. If you don’t test for COVID, no one has it, right? It is so frustrating because the step one of the obvious answer is an opt-OUT form parents need to fill out if they don’t want their child tested. For various reasons, many of my school’s parents haven’t filled out the form (very hardworking people but also unaware, too busy, one more thing to have to do, don’t really understand, etc.). For in-person school, there should be weekly testing (not random samples of only kids who opted in). Step two is to switch to virtual learning for all schools for two weeks. This would allow parents to somewhat plan and not be worried about needing to find arrangements at the last minute.

At this point, we have more teachers out - either with COVID, or they are taking leave because their child has COVID (key takeaway is *they got tested*). We have had ZERO classes eat lunch outside so far this year, and have kids eating breakfast in classrooms (with windows that won’t open and very poor ventilation) and classes that rotate eating lunch in the classrooms. Not to mention that classes are combined when there are no subs (very frequently) and the kids that go to Bar T are coming from all different classes and grade levels and eating snack together. Impossible to contract trace. As a teacher and a parent, I am so disappointed in the way MCPS has chosen to handle this situation. The extra vacation for central office and admin is nice for them but a slap in the face to employees like para educators who, with the exception of Christmas Eve and NYE, are not paid for time time off during Winter Break. And paraeducators are always the first ones pulled to cover classes last minute, cover lunch duty, recess, etc. Morale is SO DOWN this year and I am nervous even thinking about next year knowing the number of teachers we will lose at the end of this year.

Weekly testing of all 180,000 students and staff is about 2.5 times the PCR testing capacity of the public and private labs in the county. That's not really practical without a lot of time to set up resources and a lot of money.

Rapid tests are slightly more plausible, but there's no staff to administer them at school, and no plausible way to set that up. Remember, MCPS hasn't even been able to do test-to-stay due to those challenges.

If you're serious about trying to identify ways to keep schools open, you need to ground your ideas in reality.

MCPS administrators should have been working during winter break to coordinate with DHHS for the need of more tests - PCR and rapid tests. DCPS came up with a workable plan to a test to stay program. Couldn’t MCPS ramp up testing if DHHS would set up drive through testing at county high schools to get everyone tested?

My child had a close contact before winter break. There was no testing in school even though I gave permission for testing. Teachers and para educators are regularly exposed but again, there’s no testing. It’s a MCPS administrative and a DHHS failure. The County Council should have an emergency meeting to improve coordination and transition testing to school populations.

DCPS did a one-time distribution of at-home rapid antigen tests that parents were to administer and report. It’s unclear what they will do with students that show up without a test.

With more time, MCPS could have done something similar to that.

But you seem to be imagining weekly PCR tests, or perhaps just PCR tests to true. That is wildly impractical. We could stop testing everyone else in the county and it would still take us 2.5 weeks to get through everyone in MCPS. And I don’t mean just stop testing everyone else just at county-run sites- I mean stop testing everyone else at private clinics and hospitals too.

[Anonymous]

With more time, MCPS could have come up with a plan like DCPS?

We are in the same pandemic. DCPS was able to respond to an evolving crisis because their school administrators and government agencies were working together during winter break. There weren’t bonuses and extra days off as a priority over teaching kids and keeping schools safe.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What can be done to stop pro-virtual parents from faking positive covid tests to shut down the yellow and green schools? Seems like we are screwed! Although green schools will turn red eventually but some parents can speed that up by fake positives

Whoa. What?! That is some serious conspiracy theory stuff. I and many other parents are very concerned about covid transmission post holidays, but people have only talked about keeping their own kids home or hoping for a few virtual days out or precaution. The whole idea that someone would fake a positive to close schools is ludicrous . No one wants to close schools. That is crazy talk.

I am more concerned that families will under report because they don't want to have to get a dr to sign off on reeentry.

This is my main concern as well. I am not a fan of virtual learning but as a teacher at a Title 1 school, we have a low number of positive COVID cases but we also have very few kids that are getting tested. If you don’t test for COVID, no one has it, right? It is so frustrating because the step one of the obvious answer is an opt-OUT form parents need to fill out if they don’t want their child tested. For various reasons, many of my school’s parents haven’t filled out the form (very hardworking people but also unaware, too busy, one more thing to have to do, don’t really understand, etc.). For in-person school, there should be weekly testing (not random samples of only kids who opted in). Step two is to switch to virtual learning for all schools for two weeks. This would allow parents to somewhat plan and not be worried about needing to find arrangements at the last minute.

At this point, we have more teachers out - either with COVID, or they are taking leave because their child has COVID (key takeaway is *they got tested*). We have had ZERO classes eat lunch outside so far this year, and have kids eating breakfast in classrooms (with windows that won’t open and very poor ventilation) and classes that rotate eating lunch in the classrooms. Not to mention that classes are combined when there are no subs (very frequently) and the kids that go to Bar T are coming from all different classes and grade levels and eating snack together. Impossible to contract trace. As a teacher and a parent, I am so disappointed in the way MCPS has chosen to handle this situation. The extra vacation for central office and admin is nice for them but a slap in the face to employees like para educators who, with the exception of Christmas Eve and NYE, are not paid for time time off during Winter Break. And paraeducators are always the first ones pulled to cover classes last minute, cover lunch duty, recess, etc. Morale is SO DOWN this year and I am nervous even thinking about next year knowing the number of teachers we will lose at the end of this year.

Weekly testing of all 180,000 students and staff is about 2.5 times the PCR testing capacity of the public and private labs in the county. That's not really practical without a lot of time to set up resources and a lot of money.

Rapid tests are slightly more plausible, but there's no staff to administer them at school, and no plausible way to set that up. Remember, MCPS hasn't even been able to do test-to-stay due to those challenges.

If you're serious about trying to identify ways to keep schools open, you need to ground your ideas in reality.

MCPS administrators should have been working during winter break to coordinate with DHHS for the need of more tests - PCR and rapid tests. DCPS came up with a workable plan to a test to stay program. Couldn’t MCPS ramp up testing if DHHS would set up drive through testing at county high schools to get everyone tested?

My child had a close contact before winter break. There was no testing in school even though I gave permission for testing. Teachers and para educators are regularly exposed but again, there’s no testing. It’s a MCPS administrative and a DHHS failure. The County Council should have an emergency meeting to improve coordination and transition testing to school populations.

DCPS did a one-time distribution of at-home rapid antigen tests that parents were to administer and report. It’s unclear what they will do with students that show up without a test.

With more time, MCPS could have done something similar to that.

But you seem to be imagining weekly PCR tests, or perhaps just PCR tests to true. That is wildly impractical. We could stop testing everyone else in the county and it would still take us 2.5 weeks to get through everyone in MCPS. And I don’t mean just stop testing everyone else just at county-run sites- I mean stop testing everyone else at private clinics and hospitals too.

It's a huge waste of time and resources to insist on testing to return and it's likely to be a huge mess whenever DCPS actually reopens. Are principals going to stand in doorways of schools and check each individual's test results? For a HS with 2k+ kids? In MoCo, it would have be done at each and every bus stop - how do you propose to implement that? And all that tells you is that someone tested negative yesterday. What happens when the MS & HS kids go to Starbucks at lunch or after school, or any other myriad opportunities people have to be exposed to the virus. Are you going to test 165k+ kids every single day? All to track exposure to an illness that MOST have been vaccinated against and that poses a relatively small risk to MOST kids?

And if we do this for schools, why not every other facility? Why don't we shut down society entirely until every single human being can be proven to be Covid free every single day?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What can be done to stop pro-virtual parents from faking positive covid tests to shut down the yellow and green schools? Seems like we are screwed! Although green schools will turn red eventually but some parents can speed that up by fake positives

Whoa. What?! That is some serious conspiracy theory stuff. I and many other parents are very concerned about covid transmission post holidays, but people have only talked about keeping their own kids home or hoping for a few virtual days out or precaution. The whole idea that someone would fake a positive to close schools is ludicrous . No one wants to close schools. That is crazy talk.

I am more concerned that families will under report because they don't want to have to get a dr to sign off on reeentry.

You do not need to get a Dr. note for re-entry in MCPS but I know people not reporting positive tests from over the break because their kids no longer have symptoms or fevers for 5 days and don’t want to miss another 5 days, without any instruction.

This is us!

The quarantine rules are unreasonable. My kid had Covid over break. Is now negative and asymptomatic and MCPS wants me to keep her home? No thanks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What can be done to stop pro-virtual parents from faking positive covid tests to shut down the yellow and green schools? Seems like we are screwed! Although green schools will turn red eventually but some parents can speed that up by fake positives

Whoa. What?! That is some serious conspiracy theory stuff. I and many other parents are very concerned about covid transmission post holidays, but people have only talked about keeping their own kids home or hoping for a few virtual days out or precaution. The whole idea that someone would fake a positive to close schools is ludicrous . No one wants to close schools. That is crazy talk.

I am more concerned that families will under report because they don't want to have to get a dr to sign off on reeentry.

This is my main concern as well. I am not a fan of virtual learning but as a teacher at a Title 1 school, we have a low number of positive COVID cases but we also have very few kids that are getting tested. If you don’t test for COVID, no one has it, right? It is so frustrating because the step one of the obvious answer is an opt-OUT form parents need to fill out if they don’t want their child tested. For various reasons, many of my school’s parents haven’t filled out the form (very hardworking people but also unaware, too busy, one more thing to have to do, don’t really understand, etc.). For in-person school, there should be weekly testing (not random samples of only kids who opted in). Step two is to switch to virtual learning for all schools for two weeks. This would allow parents to somewhat plan and not be worried about needing to find arrangements at the last minute.

At this point, we have more teachers out - either with COVID, or they are taking leave because their child has COVID (key takeaway is *they got tested*). We have had ZERO classes eat lunch outside so far this year, and have kids eating breakfast in classrooms (with windows that won’t open and very poor ventilation) and classes that rotate eating lunch in the classrooms. Not to mention that classes are combined when there are no subs (very frequently) and the kids that go to Bar T are coming from all different classes and grade levels and eating snack together. Impossible to contract trace. As a teacher and a parent, I am so disappointed in the way MCPS has chosen to handle this situation. The extra vacation for central office and admin is nice for them but a slap in the face to employees like para educators who, with the exception of Christmas Eve and NYE, are not paid for time time off during Winter Break. And paraeducators are always the first ones pulled to cover classes last minute, cover lunch duty, recess, etc. Morale is SO DOWN this year and I am nervous even thinking about next year knowing the number of teachers we will lose at the end of this year.

Weekly testing of all 180,000 students and staff is about 2.5 times the PCR testing capacity of the public and private labs in the county. That's not really practical without a lot of time to set up resources and a lot of money.

Rapid tests are slightly more plausible, but there's no staff to administer them at school, and no plausible way to set that up. Remember, MCPS hasn't even been able to do test-to-stay due to those challenges.

If you're serious about trying to identify ways to keep schools open, you need to ground your ideas in reality.

MCPS administrators should have been working during winter break to coordinate with DHHS for the need of more tests - PCR and rapid tests. DCPS came up with a workable plan to a test to stay program. Couldn’t MCPS ramp up testing if DHHS would set up drive through testing at county high schools to get everyone tested?

My child had a close contact before winter break. There was no testing in school even though I gave permission for testing. Teachers and para educators are regularly exposed but again, there’s no testing. It’s a MCPS administrative and a DHHS failure. The County Council should have an emergency meeting to improve coordination and transition testing to school populations.

DCPS did a one-time distribution of at-home rapid antigen tests that parents were to administer and report. It’s unclear what they will do with students that show up without a test.

With more time, MCPS could have done something similar to that.

But you seem to be imagining weekly PCR tests, or perhaps just PCR tests to true. That is wildly impractical. We could stop testing everyone else in the county and it would still take us 2.5 weeks to get through everyone in MCPS. And I don’t mean just stop testing everyone else just at county-run sites- I mean stop testing everyone else at private clinics and hospitals too.

It's a huge waste of time and resources to insist on testing to return and it's likely to be a huge mess whenever DCPS actually reopens. Are principals going to stand in doorways of schools and check each individual's test results? For a HS with 2k+ kids? In MoCo, it would have be done at each and every bus stop - how do you propose to implement that? And all that tells you is that someone tested negative yesterday. What happens when the MS & HS kids go to Starbucks at lunch or after school, or any other myriad opportunities people have to be exposed to the virus. Are you going to test 165k+ kids every single day? All to track exposure to an illness that MOST have been vaccinated against and that poses a relatively small risk to MOST kids?

And if we do this for schools, why not every other facility? Why don't we shut down society entirely until every single human being can be proven to be Covid free every single day?

Agreed. Test to return is a huge waste.

And I don’t need to be tested to ‘return’ to a restaurant. Plenty of people traveling and eating out or going to bars over winter break.

I don’t have to provide a negative test to do ANYTHING, but my kid needs one to attend school? That’s crazy. DC is nuts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What can be done to stop pro-virtual parents from faking positive covid tests to shut down the yellow and green schools? Seems like we are screwed! Although green schools will turn red eventually but some parents can speed that up by fake positives

Whoa. What?! That is some serious conspiracy theory stuff. I and many other parents are very concerned about covid transmission post holidays, but people have only talked about keeping their own kids home or hoping for a few virtual days out or precaution. The whole idea that someone would fake a positive to close schools is ludicrous . No one wants to close schools. That is crazy talk.

I am more concerned that families will under report because they don't want to have to get a dr to sign off on reeentry.

This is my main concern as well. I am not a fan of virtual learning but as a teacher at a Title 1 school, we have a low number of positive COVID cases but we also have very few kids that are getting tested. If you don’t test for COVID, no one has it, right? It is so frustrating because the step one of the obvious answer is an opt-OUT form parents need to fill out if they don’t want their child tested. For various reasons, many of my school’s parents haven’t filled out the form (very hardworking people but also unaware, too busy, one more thing to have to do, don’t really understand, etc.). For in-person school, there should be weekly testing (not random samples of only kids who opted in). Step two is to switch to virtual learning for all schools for two weeks. This would allow parents to somewhat plan and not be worried about needing to find arrangements at the last minute.

At this point, we have more teachers out - either with COVID, or they are taking leave because their child has COVID (key takeaway is *they got tested*). We have had ZERO classes eat lunch outside so far this year, and have kids eating breakfast in classrooms (with windows that won’t open and very poor ventilation) and classes that rotate eating lunch in the classrooms. Not to mention that classes are combined when there are no subs (very frequently) and the kids that go to Bar T are coming from all different classes and grade levels and eating snack together. Impossible to contract trace. As a teacher and a parent, I am so disappointed in the way MCPS has chosen to handle this situation. The extra vacation for central office and admin is nice for them but a slap in the face to employees like para educators who, with the exception of Christmas Eve and NYE, are not paid for time time off during Winter Break. And paraeducators are always the first ones pulled to cover classes last minute, cover lunch duty, recess, etc. Morale is SO DOWN this year and I am nervous even thinking about next year knowing the number of teachers we will lose at the end of this year.

Weekly testing of all 180,000 students and staff is about 2.5 times the PCR testing capacity of the public and private labs in the county. That's not really practical without a lot of time to set up resources and a lot of money.

Rapid tests are slightly more plausible, but there's no staff to administer them at school, and no plausible way to set that up. Remember, MCPS hasn't even been able to do test-to-stay due to those challenges.

If you're serious about trying to identify ways to keep schools open, you need to ground your ideas in reality.

MCPS administrators should have been working during winter break to coordinate with DHHS for the need of more tests - PCR and rapid tests. DCPS came up with a workable plan to a test to stay program. Couldn’t MCPS ramp up testing if DHHS would set up drive through testing at county high schools to get everyone tested?

My child had a close contact before winter break. There was no testing in school even though I gave permission for testing. Teachers and para educators are regularly exposed but again, there’s no testing. It’s a MCPS administrative and a DHHS failure. The County Council should have an emergency meeting to improve coordination and transition testing to school populations.

DCPS did a one-time distribution of at-home rapid antigen tests that parents were to administer and report. It’s unclear what they will do with students that show up without a test.

With more time, MCPS could have done something similar to that.

But you seem to be imagining weekly PCR tests, or perhaps just PCR tests to true. That is wildly impractical. We could stop testing everyone else in the county and it would still take us 2.5 weeks to get through everyone in MCPS. And I don’t mean just stop testing everyone else just at county-run sites- I mean stop testing everyone else at private clinics and hospitals too.

It's a huge waste of time and resources to insist on testing to return and it's likely to be a huge mess whenever DCPS actually reopens. Are principals going to stand in doorways of schools and check each individual's test results? For a HS with 2k+ kids? In MoCo, it would have be done at each and every bus stop - how do you propose to implement that? And all that tells you is that someone tested negative yesterday. What happens when the MS & HS kids go to Starbucks at lunch or after school, or any other myriad opportunities people have to be exposed to the virus. Are you going to test 165k+ kids every single day? All to track exposure to an illness that MOST have been vaccinated against and that poses a relatively small risk to MOST kids?

And if we do this for schools, why not every other facility? Why don't we shut down society entirely until every single human being can be proven to be Covid free every single day?

Again, this shows that we are forcing kids (who are least at risk) to bear the greatest burden of sacrifice and testing when it comes to Covid. That is so wrong and parents should be pissed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What can be done to stop pro-virtual parents from faking positive covid tests to shut down the yellow and green schools? Seems like we are screwed! Although green schools will turn red eventually but some parents can speed that up by fake positives

Whoa. What?! That is some serious conspiracy theory stuff. I and many other parents are very concerned about covid transmission post holidays, but people have only talked about keeping their own kids home or hoping for a few virtual days out or precaution. The whole idea that someone would fake a positive to close schools is ludicrous . No one wants to close schools. That is crazy talk.

I am more concerned that families will under report because they don't want to have to get a dr to sign off on reeentry.

This is my main concern as well. I am not a fan of virtual learning but as a teacher at a Title 1 school, we have a low number of positive COVID cases but we also have very few kids that are getting tested. If you don’t test for COVID, no one has it, right? It is so frustrating because the step one of the obvious answer is an opt-OUT form parents need to fill out if they don’t want their child tested. For various reasons, many of my school’s parents haven’t filled out the form (very hardworking people but also unaware, too busy, one more thing to have to do, don’t really understand, etc.). For in-person school, there should be weekly testing (not random samples of only kids who opted in). Step two is to switch to virtual learning for all schools for two weeks. This would allow parents to somewhat plan and not be worried about needing to find arrangements at the last minute.

At this point, we have more teachers out - either with COVID, or they are taking leave because their child has COVID (key takeaway is *they got tested*). We have had ZERO classes eat lunch outside so far this year, and have kids eating breakfast in classrooms (with windows that won’t open and very poor ventilation) and classes that rotate eating lunch in the classrooms. Not to mention that classes are combined when there are no subs (very frequently) and the kids that go to Bar T are coming from all different classes and grade levels and eating snack together. Impossible to contract trace. As a teacher and a parent, I am so disappointed in the way MCPS has chosen to handle this situation. The extra vacation for central office and admin is nice for them but a slap in the face to employees like para educators who, with the exception of Christmas Eve and NYE, are not paid for time time off during Winter Break. And paraeducators are always the first ones pulled to cover classes last minute, cover lunch duty, recess, etc. Morale is SO DOWN this year and I am nervous even thinking about next year knowing the number of teachers we will lose at the end of this year.

Weekly testing of all 180,000 students and staff is about 2.5 times the PCR testing capacity of the public and private labs in the county. That's not really practical without a lot of time to set up resources and a lot of money.

Rapid tests are slightly more plausible, but there's no staff to administer them at school, and no plausible way to set that up. Remember, MCPS hasn't even been able to do test-to-stay due to those challenges.

If you're serious about trying to identify ways to keep schools open, you need to ground your ideas in reality.

MCPS administrators should have been working during winter break to coordinate with DHHS for the need of more tests - PCR and rapid tests. DCPS came up with a workable plan to a test to stay program. Couldn’t MCPS ramp up testing if DHHS would set up drive through testing at county high schools to get everyone tested?

My child had a close contact before winter break. There was no testing in school even though I gave permission for testing. Teachers and para educators are regularly exposed but again, there’s no testing. It’s a MCPS administrative and a DHHS failure. The County Council should have an emergency meeting to improve coordination and transition testing to school populations.

DCPS did a one-time distribution of at-home rapid antigen tests that parents were to administer and report. It’s unclear what they will do with students that show up without a test.

With more time, MCPS could have done something similar to that.

But you seem to be imagining weekly PCR tests, or perhaps just PCR tests to true. That is wildly impractical. We could stop testing everyone else in the county and it would still take us 2.5 weeks to get through everyone in MCPS. And I don’t mean just stop testing everyone else just at county-run sites- I mean stop testing everyone else at private clinics and hospitals too.

It's a huge waste of time and resources to insist on testing to return and it's likely to be a huge mess whenever DCPS actually reopens. Are principals going to stand in doorways of schools and check each individual's test results? For a HS with 2k+ kids? In MoCo, it would have be done at each and every bus stop - how do you propose to implement that? And all that tells you is that someone tested negative yesterday. What happens when the MS & HS kids go to Starbucks at lunch or after school, or any other myriad opportunities people have to be exposed to the virus. Are you going to test 165k+ kids every single day? All to track exposure to an illness that MOST have been vaccinated against and that poses a relatively small risk to MOST kids?

And if we do this for schools, why not every other facility? Why don't we shut down society entirely until every single human being can be proven to be Covid free every single day?

Again, this shows that we are forcing kids (who are least at risk) to bear the greatest burden of sacrifice and testing when it comes to Covid. That is so wrong and parents should be pissed.

OP here- agree with both PPs. And no I am not mentally unstable i just have lost faith in humanity. MCpS screwing us over and over again. With the vaccinations and omicron being milder it makes no sense to have a color coded system for in person return to school. This system based on self reporting can be manipulated by anyone. Yes i have no faith in mcps. But i am not insane. Think what you want.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What can be done to stop pro-virtual parents from faking positive covid tests to shut down the yellow and green schools? Seems like we are screwed! Although green schools will turn red eventually but some parents can speed that up by fake positives

Whoa. What?! That is some serious conspiracy theory stuff. I and many other parents are very concerned about covid transmission post holidays, but people have only talked about keeping their own kids home or hoping for a few virtual days out or precaution. The whole idea that someone would fake a positive to close schools is ludicrous . No one wants to close schools. That is crazy talk.

I am more concerned that families will under report because they don't want to have to get a dr to sign off on reeentry.

This is my main concern as well. I am not a fan of virtual learning but as a teacher at a Title 1 school, we have a low number of positive COVID cases but we also have very few kids that are getting tested. If you don’t test for COVID, no one has it, right? It is so frustrating because the step one of the obvious answer is an opt-OUT form parents need to fill out if they don’t want their child tested. For various reasons, many of my school’s parents haven’t filled out the form (very hardworking people but also unaware, too busy, one more thing to have to do, don’t really understand, etc.). For in-person school, there should be weekly testing (not random samples of only kids who opted in). Step two is to switch to virtual learning for all schools for two weeks. This would allow parents to somewhat plan and not be worried about needing to find arrangements at the last minute.

At this point, we have more teachers out - either with COVID, or they are taking leave because their child has COVID (key takeaway is *they got tested*). We have had ZERO classes eat lunch outside so far this year, and have kids eating breakfast in classrooms (with windows that won’t open and very poor ventilation) and classes that rotate eating lunch in the classrooms. Not to mention that classes are combined when there are no subs (very frequently) and the kids that go to Bar T are coming from all different classes and grade levels and eating snack together. Impossible to contract trace. As a teacher and a parent, I am so disappointed in the way MCPS has chosen to handle this situation. The extra vacation for central office and admin is nice for them but a slap in the face to employees like para educators who, with the exception of Christmas Eve and NYE, are not paid for time time off during Winter Break. And paraeducators are always the first ones pulled to cover classes last minute, cover lunch duty, recess, etc. Morale is SO DOWN this year and I am nervous even thinking about next year knowing the number of teachers we will lose at the end of this year.

Weekly testing of all 180,000 students and staff is about 2.5 times the PCR testing capacity of the public and private labs in the county. That's not really practical without a lot of time to set up resources and a lot of money.

Rapid tests are slightly more plausible, but there's no staff to administer them at school, and no plausible way to set that up. Remember, MCPS hasn't even been able to do test-to-stay due to those challenges.

If you're serious about trying to identify ways to keep schools open, you need to ground your ideas in reality.

MCPS administrators should have been working during winter break to coordinate with DHHS for the need of more tests - PCR and rapid tests. DCPS came up with a workable plan to a test to stay program. Couldn’t MCPS ramp up testing if DHHS would set up drive through testing at county high schools to get everyone tested?

My child had a close contact before winter break. There was no testing in school even though I gave permission for testing. Teachers and para educators are regularly exposed but again, there’s no testing. It’s a MCPS administrative and a DHHS failure. The County Council should have an emergency meeting to improve coordination and transition testing to school populations.

DCPS did a one-time distribution of at-home rapid antigen tests that parents were to administer and report. It’s unclear what they will do with students that show up without a test.

With more time, MCPS could have done something similar to that.

But you seem to be imagining weekly PCR tests, or perhaps just PCR tests to true. That is wildly impractical. We could stop testing everyone else in the county and it would still take us 2.5 weeks to get through everyone in MCPS. And I don’t mean just stop testing everyone else just at county-run sites- I mean stop testing everyone else at private clinics and hospitals too.

It's a huge waste of time and resources to insist on testing to return and it's likely to be a huge mess whenever DCPS actually reopens. Are principals going to stand in doorways of schools and check each individual's test results? For a HS with 2k+ kids? In MoCo, it would have be done at each and every bus stop - how do you propose to implement that? And all that tells you is that someone tested negative yesterday. What happens when the MS & HS kids go to Starbucks at lunch or after school, or any other myriad opportunities people have to be exposed to the virus. Are you going to test 165k+ kids every single day? All to track exposure to an illness that MOST have been vaccinated against and that poses a relatively small risk to MOST kids?

And if we do this for schools, why not every other facility? Why don't we shut down society entirely until every single human being can be proven to be Covid free every single day?

Again, this shows that we are forcing kids (who are least at risk) to bear the greatest burden of sacrifice and testing when it comes to Covid. That is so wrong and parents should be pissed.

OP here- agree with both PPs. And no I am not mentally unstable i just have lost faith in humanity. MCpS screwing us over and over again. With the vaccinations and omicron being milder it makes no sense to have a color coded system for in person return to school. This system based on self reporting can be manipulated by anyone. Yes i have no faith in mcps. But i am not insane. Think what you want.

I could be wrong but I'm guessing your kids are 5-11 or 16+? A lot of people with kids 12-15 are not thrilled about sending their kids into school with waning protection. Including me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:What can be done to stop pro-virtual parents from faking positive covid tests to shut down the yellow and green schools? Seems like we are screwed! Although green schools will turn red eventually but some parents can speed that up by fake positives

Whoa. What?! That is some serious conspiracy theory stuff. I and many other parents are very concerned about covid transmission post holidays, but people have only talked about keeping their own kids home or hoping for a few virtual days out or precaution. The whole idea that someone would fake a positive to close schools is ludicrous . No one wants to close schools. That is crazy talk.

I am more concerned that families will under report because they don't want to have to get a dr to sign off on reeentry.

This is my main concern as well. I am not a fan of virtual learning but as a teacher at a Title 1 school, we have a low number of positive COVID cases but we also have very few kids that are getting tested. If you don’t test for COVID, no one has it, right? It is so frustrating because the step one of the obvious answer is an opt-OUT form parents need to fill out if they don’t want their child tested. For various reasons, many of my school’s parents haven’t filled out the form (very hardworking people but also unaware, too busy, one more thing to have to do, don’t really understand, etc.). For in-person school, there should be weekly testing (not random samples of only kids who opted in). Step two is to switch to virtual learning for all schools for two weeks. This would allow parents to somewhat plan and not be worried about needing to find arrangements at the last minute.

At this point, we have more teachers out - either with COVID, or they are taking leave because their child has COVID (key takeaway is *they got tested*). We have had ZERO classes eat lunch outside so far this year, and have kids eating breakfast in classrooms (with windows that won’t open and very poor ventilation) and classes that rotate eating lunch in the classrooms. Not to mention that classes are combined when there are no subs (very frequently) and the kids that go to Bar T are coming from all different classes and grade levels and eating snack together. Impossible to contract trace. As a teacher and a parent, I am so disappointed in the way MCPS has chosen to handle this situation. The extra vacation for central office and admin is nice for them but a slap in the face to employees like para educators who, with the exception of Christmas Eve and NYE, are not paid for time time off during Winter Break. And paraeducators are always the first ones pulled to cover classes last minute, cover lunch duty, recess, etc. Morale is SO DOWN this year and I am nervous even thinking about next year knowing the number of teachers we will lose at the end of this year.

Weekly testing of all 180,000 students and staff is about 2.5 times the PCR testing capacity of the public and private labs in the county. That's not really practical without a lot of time to set up resources and a lot of money.

Rapid tests are slightly more plausible, but there's no staff to administer them at school, and no plausible way to set that up. Remember, MCPS hasn't even been able to do test-to-stay due to those challenges.

If you're serious about trying to identify ways to keep schools open, you need to ground your ideas in reality.

MCPS administrators should have been working during winter break to coordinate with DHHS for the need of more tests - PCR and rapid tests. DCPS came up with a workable plan to a test to stay program. Couldn’t MCPS ramp up testing if DHHS would set up drive through testing at county high schools to get everyone tested?

My child had a close contact before winter break. There was no testing in school even though I gave permission for testing. Teachers and para educators are regularly exposed but again, there’s no testing. It’s a MCPS administrative and a DHHS failure. The County Council should have an emergency meeting to improve coordination and transition testing to school populations.

DCPS did a one-time distribution of at-home rapid antigen tests that parents were to administer and report. It’s unclear what they will do with students that show up without a test.

With more time, MCPS could have done something similar to that.

But you seem to be imagining weekly PCR tests, or perhaps just PCR tests to true. That is wildly impractical. We could stop testing everyone else in the county and it would still take us 2.5 weeks to get through everyone in MCPS. And I don’t mean just stop testing everyone else just at county-run sites- I mean stop testing everyone else at private clinics and hospitals too.

It's a huge waste of time and resources to insist on testing to return and it's likely to be a huge mess whenever DCPS actually reopens. Are principals going to stand in doorways of schools and check each individual's test results? For a HS with 2k+ kids? In MoCo, it would have be done at each and every bus stop - how do you propose to implement that? And all that tells you is that someone tested negative yesterday. What happens when the MS & HS kids go to Starbucks at lunch or after school, or any other myriad opportunities people have to be exposed to the virus. Are you going to test 165k+ kids every single day? All to track exposure to an illness that MOST have been vaccinated against and that poses a relatively small risk to MOST kids?

And if we do this for schools, why not every other facility? Why don't we shut down society entirely until every single human being can be proven to be Covid free every single day?

Again, this shows that we are forcing kids (who are least at risk) to bear the greatest burden of sacrifice and testing when it comes to Covid. That is so wrong and parents should be pissed.

OP here- agree with both PPs. And no I am not mentally unstable i just have lost faith in humanity. MCpS screwing us over and over again. With the vaccinations and omicron being milder it makes no sense to have a color coded system for in person return to school. This system based on self reporting can be manipulated by anyone. Yes i have no faith in mcps. But i am not insane. Think what you want.

I could be wrong but I'm guessing your kids are 5-11 or 16+? A lot of people with kids 12-15 are not thrilled about sending their kids into school with waning protection. Including me.

You are wrong. I have a HS student and a MS student. The MS student has chronic asthma and reactive airway disorder. But he left just now in an N95 mask (with KN95 and a surgical one as backups if he can't stand the discomfort. He is a straight A student and sports fanatic who suffered severe anxiety and depression during DL. We avoided travel and restaurants due to Omicron but I'm completely prepared to take the risk for school. So is he, btw, and so is his HS-aged sibling who couldn't care less about school for learning's sake but really wants to stay because DL is incredibly lonely, even for kids who are social online.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have heard that either way, teachers need to report in person. Is that true? Including for the first, asynchronous day or not? If so, then teachers at least have little incentive to go virtual, other than perhaps fewer bus or other duties.

Have not hear that. I'm guessing that would be a principal decision

Hallie Wells' staff are in person. At least the ones who haven't tested positive!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What can be done to stop pro-virtual parents from faking positive covid tests to shut down the yellow and green schools? Seems like we are screwed! Although green schools will turn red eventually but some parents can speed that up by fake positives

Whoa. What?! That is some serious conspiracy theory stuff. I and many other parents are very concerned about covid transmission post holidays, but people have only talked about keeping their own kids home or hoping for a few virtual days out or precaution. The whole idea that someone would fake a positive to close schools is ludicrous . No one wants to close schools. That is crazy talk.

I am more concerned that families will under report because they don't want to have to get a dr to sign off on reeentry.

This is my main concern as well. I am not a fan of virtual learning but as a teacher at a Title 1 school, we have a low number of positive COVID cases but we also have very few kids that are getting tested. If you don’t test for COVID, no one has it, right? It is so frustrating because the step one of the obvious answer is an opt-OUT form parents need to fill out if they don’t want their child tested. For various reasons, many of my school’s parents haven’t filled out the form (very hardworking people but also unaware, too busy, one more thing to have to do, don’t really understand, etc.). For in-person school, there should be weekly testing (not random samples of only kids who opted in). Step two is to switch to virtual learning for all schools for two weeks. This would allow parents to somewhat plan and not be worried about needing to find arrangements at the last minute.

At this point, we have more teachers out - either with COVID, or they are taking leave because their child has COVID (key takeaway is *they got tested*). We have had ZERO classes eat lunch outside so far this year, and have kids eating breakfast in classrooms (with windows that won’t open and very poor ventilation) and classes that rotate eating lunch in the classrooms. Not to mention that classes are combined when there are no subs (very frequently) and the kids that go to Bar T are coming from all different classes and grade levels and eating snack together. Impossible to contract trace. As a teacher and a parent, I am so disappointed in the way MCPS has chosen to handle this situation. The extra vacation for central office and admin is nice for them but a slap in the face to employees like para educators who, with the exception of Christmas Eve and NYE, are not paid for time time off during Winter Break. And paraeducators are always the first ones pulled to cover classes last minute, cover lunch duty, recess, etc. Morale is SO DOWN this year and I am nervous even thinking about next year knowing the number of teachers we will lose at the end of this year.

Weekly testing of all 180,000 students and staff is about 2.5 times the PCR testing capacity of the public and private labs in the county. That's not really practical without a lot of time to set up resources and a lot of money.

Rapid tests are slightly more plausible, but there's no staff to administer them at school, and no plausible way to set that up. Remember, MCPS hasn't even been able to do test-to-stay due to those challenges.

If you're serious about trying to identify ways to keep schools open, you need to ground your ideas in reality.

MCPS administrators should have been working during winter break to coordinate with DHHS for the need of more tests - PCR and rapid tests. DCPS came up with a workable plan to a test to stay program. Couldn’t MCPS ramp up testing if DHHS would set up drive through testing at county high schools to get everyone tested?

My child had a close contact before winter break. There was no testing in school even though I gave permission for testing. Teachers and para educators are regularly exposed but again, there’s no testing. It’s a MCPS administrative and a DHHS failure. The County Council should have an emergency meeting to improve coordination and transition testing to school populations.

DCPS did a one-time distribution of at-home rapid antigen tests that parents were to administer and report. It’s unclear what they will do with students that show up without a test.

With more time, MCPS could have done something similar to that.

But you seem to be imagining weekly PCR tests, or perhaps just PCR tests to true. That is wildly impractical. We could stop testing everyone else in the county and it would still take us 2.5 weeks to get through everyone in MCPS. And I don’t mean just stop testing everyone else just at county-run sites- I mean stop testing everyone else at private clinics and hospitals too.

It's a huge waste of time and resources to insist on testing to return and it's likely to be a huge mess whenever DCPS actually reopens. Are principals going to stand in doorways of schools and check each individual's test results? For a HS with 2k+ kids? In MoCo, it would have be done at each and every bus stop - how do you propose to implement that? And all that tells you is that someone tested negative yesterday. What happens when the MS & HS kids go to Starbucks at lunch or after school, or any other myriad opportunities people have to be exposed to the virus. Are you going to test 165k+ kids every single day? All to track exposure to an illness that MOST have been vaccinated against and that poses a relatively small risk to MOST kids?

And if we do this for schools, why not every other facility? Why don't we shut down society entirely until every single human being can be proven to be Covid free every single day?

Agreed. Test to return is a huge waste.

And I don’t need to be tested to ‘return’ to a restaurant. Plenty of people traveling and eating out or going to bars over winter break.

I don’t have to provide a negative test to do ANYTHING, but my kid needs one to attend school? That’s crazy. DC is nuts.

1) Two wrongs don't make a right. The fact that there's no protections against you exposing others and getting them sick at a restaurant, doesn't magically make it okay to expose other people and get them sick at a school.
2) Except it's even worse because people can choose whether or not to go to a restaurant and willingly decide whether to take that risk-- whereas kids are forced to go to school and get exposed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What can be done to stop pro-virtual parents from faking positive covid tests to shut down the yellow and green schools? Seems like we are screwed! Although green schools will turn red eventually but some parents can speed that up by fake positives

the irony is - that the virtual group is saying that the keep schools open group will lie about covid positives or not test at all to keep the rate low. I remain neutral. i just thought it was interesting....