BOE Fall Plan Meeting

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gayle just said children can catch it and have complications.

https://montgomerycountymd.gov/covid19/data/

0 deaths in MoCo in 0-17 age group.

447 cases out of 100,000 population

If you don’t trust him, how can we reopen schools?

Kids will probably be okay if they get it, but their teachers, parents, and grandparents not so much.

Think about the many low income students at my school who live in crowded multigenerational households. That’s a lot of potential trauma. And there are usually 3 or 4 a year who are in family foster care with a grandparent raising them. If that grandparent dies, they will be placed with strangers or even in a group home.

If you actually cared about these ‘low income’ students, you would be actively advocating for them to go back to school.

Guess who is losing out the most with Distance Learning. Lower-income students. They don’t have the help at home to complete assignments, parents can’t hire tutors to fill in the gaps, like all the PPs on here.

We are at a lower income ES and my kid’s teacher only had 5 out of 21 kids participating in DL on a regular basis.

This will exacerbate the Achievement Gap for the next several years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Excellent first question from new SMOB. (What happens if a student tests positive?)

MCPS and Health department will coordinate. They will do full contact tracing in the building and will identify close contacts to quarantine and spaces that need cleaning. Might be just a classroom, might be the whole school.

My guess is that few people here have been through contact tracing. I have. It is very comprehensive. If I am in the copier room trying to make materials for all of my preps, I will be in there for more than 15 min. Anyone else trying to work in that room, to use the laminator or other equipment would have had sufficient exposure to be told to quarantine for 14 days. As a precaution, we would need to limit work room occupancy to one person at a time. However, our workroom also has all of things a teacher needs to create instructional materials, including printers.

Moreover, all of our teachers except art room share. This means that teachers spend their planning periods camped out in other spaces around the school. I prefer to work in my department office, but two other people are in there at the same time. If I went to the media center or lounge, I would be around even more people for more than 15 min. How can I social distance for my protection and that of others when there’s no available space in the school? Would you recommend that I sit outside of the building and try to plan or create materials sitting on the black top? For 85 min? In all weather?

I was reassured by that description, because it matches what has been happening at my husband's company which has on-site work for manufacturing and defense work that has to be done in a secured area. However, I think every other week they are having someone reporting a + test, and then a wing of a building is closed down and a team of 10-50 people have been put out for 2 weeks. It is very disruptive. I can't imagine adding that disruption on top of the rotating schedule. For HS, the hybrid is just less and less appealing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:HS courses with only 1 or 2 teachers (some electives) - student may be in-person at school, but for that class they would be learning online with the teacher if the teacher is unavailable to come in to school.

So my kid is supposed to go to school for "in-person" instruction via Chromebook? Seriously?

Or take a different elective? Spanish 1 rather than Chinese 1.

Is it possible that having both hybrid and DL will require MCPS to cut some specialized classes because the teachers can't teach both online and in person at the same time? I hope not...

I think it is very, very likely as a cost-saving measure. If, for example, you drop AP Human Geography, that teachers can be reassigned to a section of on level NSL or another often crowded course.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Excellent first question from new SMOB. (What happens if a student tests positive?)

MCPS and Health department will coordinate. They will do full contact tracing in the building and will identify close contacts to quarantine and spaces that need cleaning. Might be just a classroom, might be the whole school.

My guess is that few people here have been through contact tracing. I have. It is very comprehensive. If I am in the copier room trying to make materials for all of my preps, I will be in there for more than 15 min. Anyone else trying to work in that room, to use the laminator or other equipment would have had sufficient exposure to be told to quarantine for 14 days. As a precaution, we would need to limit work room occupancy to one person at a time. However, our workroom also has all of things a teacher needs to create instructional materials, including printers.

Moreover, all of our teachers except art room share. This means that teachers spend their planning periods camped out in other spaces around the school. I prefer to work in my department office, but two other people are in there at the same time. If I went to the media center or lounge, I would be around even more people for more than 15 min. How can I social distance for my protection and that of others when there’s no available space in the school? Would you recommend that I sit outside of the building and try to plan or create materials sitting on the black top? For 85 min? In all weather?

I was reassured by that description, because it matches what has been happening at my husband's company which has on-site work for manufacturing and defense work that has to be done in a secured area. However, I think every other week they are having someone reporting a + test, and then a wing of a building is closed down and a team of 10-50 people have been put out for 2 weeks. It is very disruptive. I can't imagine adding that disruption on top of the rotating schedule. For HS, the hybrid is just less and less appealing.

Because they made it that way on purpose.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gayle just said children can catch it and have complications.

https://montgomerycountymd.gov/covid19/data/

0 deaths in MoCo in 0-17 age group.

447 cases out of 100,000 population

If you don’t trust him, how can we reopen schools?

Kids will probably be okay if they get it, but their teachers, parents, and grandparents not so much.

Think about the many low income students at my school who live in crowded multigenerational households. That’s a lot of potential trauma. And there are usually 3 or 4 a year who are in family foster care with a grandparent raising them. If that grandparent dies, they will be placed with strangers or even in a group home.

If you actually cared about these ‘low income’ students, you would be actively advocating for them to go back to school.

Guess who is losing out the most with Distance Learning. Lower-income students. They don’t have the help at home to complete assignments, parents can’t hire tutors to fill in the gaps, like all the PPs on here.

We are at a lower income ES and my kid’s teacher only had 5 out of 21 kids participating in DL on a regular basis.

This will exacerbate the Achievement Gap for the next several years.

THANK YOU.
that post was ridiculous.

[Anonymous]

I have been watching since 1230 and my biggest takeaway is that I appear to be entirely qualified to be on the BoE. The student member seems to be the most intelligent and thoughtful, and is asking the best questions. Most of the others do not appear to be paying attention.
It is becoming extremely clear that we won't have most of the useful details until AFTER we've selected our option. Which means that many, many parents will be switching at the last minute, which will further impact this shitshow.
Remember how everyone watched FCPS become a dumpster fire in March? That will be MCPS in the fall.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gayle just said children can catch it and have complications.

https://montgomerycountymd.gov/covid19/data/

0 deaths in MoCo in 0-17 age group.

447 cases out of 100,000 population

If you don’t trust him, how can we reopen schools?

Kids will probably be okay if they get it, but their teachers, parents, and grandparents not so much.

Think about the many low income students at my school who live in crowded multigenerational households. That’s a lot of potential trauma. And there are usually 3 or 4 a year who are in family foster care with a grandparent raising them. If that grandparent dies, they will be placed with strangers or even in a group home.

If you actually cared about these ‘low income’ students, you would be actively advocating for them to go back to school.

Guess who is losing out the most with Distance Learning. Lower-income students. They don’t have the help at home to complete assignments, parents can’t hire tutors to fill in the gaps, like all the PPs on here.

We are at a lower income ES and my kid’s teacher only had 5 out of 21 kids participating in DL on a regular basis.

This will exacerbate the Achievement Gap for the next several years.

I was a low income kid and losing a grandparent destabilized my life through HS. We were significantly poorer which led my dad to take a job in another state. It opened a door for my parents to leave me with a “relative“ who sexually abused me. If my grandmother had lived, that never would have happened. We can provide students with engagement safely at home.

[Anonymous]

Finally - the hybrid question for the out-of-school cohort for ES.

The student's will not be directly engaging with their teacher, but the system is looking at outside partners to give help. More opportunities for synchronous instruction will be people not teacher of record. (It's only the 2 days in-person right now.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Excellent first question from new SMOB. (What happens if a student tests positive?)

MCPS and Health department will coordinate. They will do full contact tracing in the building and will identify close contacts to quarantine and spaces that need cleaning. Might be just a classroom, might be the whole school.

My guess is that few people here have been through contact tracing. I have. It is very comprehensive. If I am in the copier room trying to make materials for all of my preps, I will be in there for more than 15 min. Anyone else trying to work in that room, to use the laminator or other equipment would have had sufficient exposure to be told to quarantine for 14 days. As a precaution, we would need to limit work room occupancy to one person at a time. However, our workroom also has all of things a teacher needs to create instructional materials, including printers.

Moreover, all of our teachers except art room share. This means that teachers spend their planning periods camped out in other spaces around the school. I prefer to work in my department office, but two other people are in there at the same time. If I went to the media center or lounge, I would be around even more people for more than 15 min. How can I social distance for my protection and that of others when there’s no available space in the school? Would you recommend that I sit outside of the building and try to plan or create materials sitting on the black top? For 85 min? In all weather?

I was reassured by that description, because it matches what has been happening at my husband's company which has on-site work for manufacturing and defense work that has to be done in a secured area. However, I think every other week they are having someone reporting a + test, and then a wing of a building is closed down and a team of 10-50 people have been put out for 2 weeks. It is very disruptive. I can't imagine adding that disruption on top of the rotating schedule. For HS, the hybrid is just less and less appealing.

Because they made it that way on purpose.

Then let’s stop wasting time and just work on getting the best DL ever.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gayle just said children can catch it and have complications.

https://montgomerycountymd.gov/covid19/data/

0 deaths in MoCo in 0-17 age group.

447 cases out of 100,000 population

If you don’t trust him, how can we reopen schools?

Kids will probably be okay if they get it, but their teachers, parents, and grandparents not so much.

Think about the many low income students at my school who live in crowded multigenerational households. That’s a lot of potential trauma. And there are usually 3 or 4 a year who are in family foster care with a grandparent raising them. If that grandparent dies, they will be placed with strangers or even in a group home.

If you actually cared about these ‘low income’ students, you would be actively advocating for them to go back to school.

Guess who is losing out the most with Distance Learning. Lower-income students. They don’t have the help at home to complete assignments, parents can’t hire tutors to fill in the gaps, like all the PPs on here.

We are at a lower income ES and my kid’s teacher only had 5 out of 21 kids participating in DL on a regular basis.

This will exacerbate the Achievement Gap for the next several years.

That really is the sad irony. This board is incredibly focused, maybe too much so, on the achievement gap. Every decision they are making seems geared to protecting the interests of lower performing students. But, the choices they are making are going to hurt those students the most, and no amount of food or chromebook distribution is going to change that. To be clear, I’m not saying they shouldn’t do those things to try to lessen the impact, but students who need food and computers from school are going to be hurt most even with those things provided.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gayle just said children can catch it and have complications.

https://montgomerycountymd.gov/covid19/data/

0 deaths in MoCo in 0-17 age group.

447 cases out of 100,000 population

If you don’t trust him, how can we reopen schools?

Kids will probably be okay if they get it, but their teachers, parents, and grandparents not so much.

Think about the many low income students at my school who live in crowded multigenerational households. That’s a lot of potential trauma. And there are usually 3 or 4 a year who are in family foster care with a grandparent raising them. If that grandparent dies, they will be placed with strangers or even in a group home.

If you actually cared about these ‘low income’ students, you would be actively advocating for them to go back to school.

Guess who is losing out the most with Distance Learning. Lower-income students. They don’t have the help at home to complete assignments, parents can’t hire tutors to fill in the gaps, like all the PPs on here.

We are at a lower income ES and my kid’s teacher only had 5 out of 21 kids participating in DL on a regular basis.

This will exacerbate the Achievement Gap for the next several years.

That really is the sad irony. This board is incredibly focused, maybe too much so, on the achievement gap. Every decision they are making seems geared to protecting the interests of lower performing students. But, the choices they are making are going to hurt those students the most, and no amount of food or chromebook distribution is going to change that. To be clear, I’m not saying they shouldn’t do those things to try to lessen the impact, but students who need food and computers from school are going to be hurt most even with those things provided.

This is 100% correct. This BOE has hung its hat on equity - and now when they have a chance to make decisions in favor of it, they cower. Not surprising, but wholly upsetting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Did they just make mention of no fall high school sports? Is there more clarity on that?

Smondrowski said that there wouldn't be any fall sports but also that parents are waiting to get definitive answers on questions like this. She's proposed assembling an "official" FAQ to help address the volume of emails she's getting from parents with questions like this. She's saying she will email a proposal for this FAQ to other board members.

It would be helpful to have a FAQ, but the Qs on the FAQ should be the Qs that people actually have, and there should be answers to them in plain language that people can understand.

In the draft plan, the answer to the question “how will face coverings be enforced?” was “in accordance with state and local regulations.”

No word on whether they plan to expel a first grader who keeps pulling off his mask in reading group.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gayle just said children can catch it and have complications.

https://montgomerycountymd.gov/covid19/data/

0 deaths in MoCo in 0-17 age group.

447 cases out of 100,000 population

If you don’t trust him, how can we reopen schools?

I think ALL the evidence is pointing to schools not being vectors and he should address that instead of consistently pandering to whatever he perceives the current party line to be.

It's just the opposite. All the evidence shows that schools are vectors as is any place where there are crowds packed in with poor ventilation.

also the numbers were low because children were at home during this spring and did not have school or extracurriculars or other activities where they were going out in public in large crowds. People weren't taking their kids to the store even unless they couldn't get childcare.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

I was a low income kid and losing a grandparent destabilized my life through HS. We were significantly poorer which led my dad to take a job in another state. It opened a door for my parents to leave me with a “relative“ who sexually abused me. If my grandmother had lived, that never would have happened. We can provide students with engagement safely at home.

"Safe provision of engagement with students" =/= education.

I'm sorry about your childhood trauma, PP. Childhood trauma sticks with people. I'm afraid that the closed schools will cause childhood trauma too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Excellent first question from new SMOB. (What happens if a student tests positive?)

MCPS and Health department will coordinate. They will do full contact tracing in the building and will identify close contacts to quarantine and spaces that need cleaning. Might be just a classroom, might be the whole school.

My guess is that few people here have been through contact tracing. I have. It is very comprehensive. If I am in the copier room trying to make materials for all of my preps, I will be in there for more than 15 min. Anyone else trying to work in that room, to use the laminator or other equipment would have had sufficient exposure to be told to quarantine for 14 days. As a precaution, we would need to limit work room occupancy to one person at a time. However, our workroom also has all of things a teacher needs to create instructional materials, including printers.

Moreover, all of our teachers except art room share. This means that teachers spend their planning periods camped out in other spaces around the school. I prefer to work in my department office, but two other people are in there at the same time. If I went to the media center or lounge, I would be around even more people for more than 15 min. How can I social distance for my protection and that of others when there’s no available space in the school? Would you recommend that I sit outside of the building and try to plan or create materials sitting on the black top? For 85 min? In all weather?

I was reassured by that description, because it matches what has been happening at my husband's company which has on-site work for manufacturing and defense work that has to be done in a secured area. However, I think every other week they are having someone reporting a + test, and then a wing of a building is closed down and a team of 10-50 people have been put out for 2 weeks. It is very disruptive. I can't imagine adding that disruption on top of the rotating schedule. For HS, the hybrid is just less and less appealing.

Because they made it that way on purpose.

And what is your brilliant plan for HS that meets guidelines?