Fccps will have all students in the buildings by the end of January. Woot woot

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:16:34 again. I don’t have an issue teaching from the building 1.5 weeks before students return. Mandating all of us return 2.5 weeks before students was not necessary.

All districts are doing it though. They are sending a message. They’re done working around covid. In Ohio the governor just announced that a student with a known positive contact with another student no longer has to quarantine if one of them was masked. They reallllllly don’t care what happens anymore.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t doubt the fed is speaking bare objective facts but I can also tell you, damn. I’m a mom, daughter, sister and I am NOT dying for this job LOL I hate to break it to you!

That’s fair. But people are dying because the feds can’t do their job. Eventually, one of those people could be you or your sister or your mother or your kid. At the rate we are now, every month vaccinations lag, 100,000 people die. If can’t reimburse PCPs they can’t stay open to treat people. If we can’t get genomic sequencing up and running, we can’t track this new variant. If we can’t scale up rapid testing, we can’t keep you safe in school. If we can’t push out logistics to hospitals, they ration care.

It can be not your problem so screw it. But at the rate this is devolving, it will become your problem because you or someone you love will get COVID when they didn’t have to, will die because of inadequate care for COVID or some other emergency, will have cancer progress because you can’t get screened.

It does make me wonder what would have happened if we were fighting an actual war.

Dude you’re a fed working at home. You reallllly do not need to be telling other people they should die for their jobs.

I’m a Fed who is working from home because schools aren’t open. It’s not exactly in my COVID best interest to push teachers to reopen. Your look at this on a micro level. I’m telling you what it looks like for those of us with a macro view. And it isn’t pretty. It suck for me too. Im scared I’m terrified about what happens if we need medical care and can’t get it. But the longer we wait, the scarier it gets. That’s just reality. And it’s like running up credit card debt. Eventually everyone pays a price.

Your individual office aside I see no proof schools opening = OPM reopens every federal agency with a full return. If anything, it’ll be opposite because they will claim they need everyone to stay home and limit spread to keep schools opening. I don’t disagree with EVERYTHING you say, but pinning government failure and hundreds of thousands of death on your colleagues who are mom not keeping everyone afloat because their kids aren’t in school is a weak argument.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Were teachers told yesterday to report on the 4th? Or had they been told previously that was the date, and the recent email just confirmed that.

It would be extremely short notice if they were just notified yesterday.

FCCPS teacher here. Previously, we were always allowed to teach from home when school virtual. Yesterday Noonan made an announcement that dates for students returning in person were being pushed back but staff were expected to report on the 4th and every day afterwards. This afternoon secondary staff were contacted and told this decision has been reevaluated and now they need to return in person on the 11th instead of the 4th.

Thanks for responding, and for your follow up re: 1.5 weeks vs 2.5 weeks ahead of time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Please ask anyone on that committee if he worked collaboratively with a group of teachers to come up with this planned and if they signed anything.

well he said they worked collaboratively and reached consensus. And their names are on the documents as members of the task force. That puts him head and shoulders above any other superintendent for the area.

Please find any email or news release that states he reached consensus with the task force. I did not see that written and heard otherwise.

Its what he told the school board at the meeting last week.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree that today’s email is so hard to understand and seems contradictory. I wish Noonan could keep it more to the point. Today’s email is more convoluted than most and that is really saying something.

Ha ha. He reminds me of me. I can’t help a bit of meandering in my writing so I end up bolding what I think are the essential points/ directives of a letter.

What might be confusing you is that he is taking the tack of extreme honesty, acknowledging some serious hiccups in the plan to return to school - namely, a shortage of custodial staff since a recent outbreak among them. He carefully worded this section, of course, so as to NOT acknowledge this happened during school hours and on school property.

In essence, he is saying “We shall charge forth anyway to reopen school, armed with our CDC approved ‘mitigation’ efforts.”

He then adds a couple of pointers for parents so as to optimize said mitigation methods: Don’t come to school sick and If you traveled over the break, wait a couple of weeks before coming in. (Guess that directive probably doesn’t apply to teachers).

I must say he has a lot of hutzpah to send EVERYONE back two weeks after an occupancy of probably 10 to a building arguably led to a staff “outbreak”... of course, I am sure all the custodians caught the virus at a mutually attended holiday soiree and NOT at work *cough cough*

Do you know this for a fact? I have heard nothing of the sort - yes there have been positives but no employee-to-employee transmission.

I think he is responsibly responding to parent and teacher desires to get back in classrooms.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Staff have been notified that they must all report and work from the building’s beginning January 4th. FCCPS should be encouraging everyone to stay home and keep numbers down. Teachers must now teach from school, even while students remain virtual. This is one of the most irresponsible decisions they have made. Why force teachers to come in when students are not there?

This has been explained. Did you miss it and want to hear? Or do you just not care about explanations?

Because your superintendent is a tool.

+1. FCPS parent who is very critical of the crap our unions and teachers pulled. But it’s silly. There is no point of having an extra risk for anyone while our healthcare system is stressed unless there is an educational upside. If your home setup/ young kids/ internet/ background distractions are an issue, you need to come in or find a better location. Besides that, the added risk accomplishes nothing. This is not the time for added risks without no discernible benefit. And no, my being happy you are getting screwed is not an educational benefit. In August, the kids should have been in school. In January, everyone who can be home should be home. Metrics y’all.

Thank you for being reasonable. I’m the FCCPS teacher. We had the option to work from the building all year and many teachers did. Many alternated working from school or home depending on personal reasons (childcare, etc). Teachers are not refusing to come in, but to mandate everyone is there without students does not seem to provide any benefit to anyone.

Isn't it mandating a week before the return of students for elementary and seniors in high school? So it's mandating teachers work from their place of work for five days before students return. That does not seem crazy to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree that today’s email is so hard to understand and seems contradictory. I wish Noonan could keep it more to the point. Today’s email is more convoluted than most and that is really saying something.

Ha ha. He reminds me of me. I can’t help a bit of meandering in my writing so I end up bolding what I think are the essential points/ directives of a letter.

What might be confusing you is that he is taking the tack of extreme honesty, acknowledging some serious hiccups in the plan to return to school - namely, a shortage of custodial staff since a recent outbreak among them. He carefully worded this section, of course, so as to NOT acknowledge this happened during school hours and on school property.

In essence, he is saying “We shall charge forth anyway to reopen school, armed with our CDC approved ‘mitigation’ efforts.”

He then adds a couple of pointers for parents so as to optimize said mitigation methods: Don’t come to school sick and If you traveled over the break, wait a couple of weeks before coming in. (Guess that directive probably doesn’t apply to teachers).

I must say he has a lot of hutzpah to send EVERYONE back two weeks after an occupancy of probably 10 to a building arguably led to a staff “outbreak”... of course, I am sure all the custodians caught the virus at a mutually attended holiday soiree and NOT at work *cough cough*

Do you know this for a fact? I have heard nothing of the sort - yes there have been positives but no employee-to-employee transmission.

I think he is responsibly responding to parent and teacher desires to get back in classrooms.

How on earth would you know there has been no employee transmission? Has the school been regularly testing all of its building occupants including those who might be asymptomatic? Yeah, I doubt it.

It galls me how many people in positions of power are using an absence of data as a convenient loophole for bad argumentation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree that today’s email is so hard to understand and seems contradictory. I wish Noonan could keep it more to the point. Today’s email is more convoluted than most and that is really saying something.

Ha ha. He reminds me of me. I can’t help a bit of meandering in my writing so I end up bolding what I think are the essential points/ directives of a letter.

What might be confusing you is that he is taking the tack of extreme honesty, acknowledging some serious hiccups in the plan to return to school - namely, a shortage of custodial staff since a recent outbreak among them. He carefully worded this section, of course, so as to NOT acknowledge this happened during school hours and on school property.

In essence, he is saying “We shall charge forth anyway to reopen school, armed with our CDC approved ‘mitigation’ efforts.”

He then adds a couple of pointers for parents so as to optimize said mitigation methods: Don’t come to school sick and If you traveled over the break, wait a couple of weeks before coming in. (Guess that directive probably doesn’t apply to teachers).

I must say he has a lot of hutzpah to send EVERYONE back two weeks after an occupancy of probably 10 to a building arguably led to a staff “outbreak”... of course, I am sure all the custodians caught the virus at a mutually attended holiday soiree and NOT at work *cough cough*

Do you know this for a fact? I have heard nothing of the sort - yes there have been positives but no employee-to-employee transmission.

I think he is responsibly responding to parent and teacher desires to get back in classrooms.

You think it’s responsible to go back in when we are in a post holiday surge with the highest community spread numbers we’ve had and when he admits the custodial staff keeps getting sick and can’t operate fully? Lol ok

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Please ask anyone on that committee if he worked collaboratively with a group of teachers to come up with this planned and if they signed anything.

well he said they worked collaboratively and reached consensus. And their names are on the documents as members of the task force. That puts him head and shoulders above any other superintendent for the area.

Please find any email or news release that states he reached consensus with the task force. I did not see that written and heard otherwise.

Its what he told the school board at the meeting last week.

Oh, well that means it is 100 percent true. No doubts whatsoever. /s

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree that today’s email is so hard to understand and seems contradictory. I wish Noonan could keep it more to the point. Today’s email is more convoluted than most and that is really saying something.

Ha ha. He reminds me of me. I can’t help a bit of meandering in my writing so I end up bolding what I think are the essential points/ directives of a letter.

What might be confusing you is that he is taking the tack of extreme honesty, acknowledging some serious hiccups in the plan to return to school - namely, a shortage of custodial staff since a recent outbreak among them. He carefully worded this section, of course, so as to NOT acknowledge this happened during school hours and on school property.

In essence, he is saying “We shall charge forth anyway to reopen school, armed with our CDC approved ‘mitigation’ efforts.”

He then adds a couple of pointers for parents so as to optimize said mitigation methods: Don’t come to school sick and If you traveled over the break, wait a couple of weeks before coming in. (Guess that directive probably doesn’t apply to teachers).

I must say he has a lot of hutzpah to send EVERYONE back two weeks after an occupancy of probably 10 to a building arguably led to a staff “outbreak”... of course, I am sure all the custodians caught the virus at a mutually attended holiday soiree and NOT at work *cough cough*

Do you know this for a fact? I have heard nothing of the sort - yes there have been positives but no employee-to-employee transmission.

I think he is responsibly responding to parent and teacher desires to get back in classrooms.

How on earth would you know there has been no employee transmission? Has the school been regularly testing all of its building occupants including those who might be asymptomatic? Yeah, I doubt it.

It galls me how many people in positions of power are using an absence of data as a convenient loophole for bad argumentation.

Why would it gall you? Look at their constituents who let them get away with it. Every single thread same mom here is parroting that same line. “It doesn’t spread in schools!”- when community spread is low. When it is high - it does. But our area was just determined to experience that for ourselves. Everyone seems to think it just can’t or won’t be their kid but look, it will be for many of you. I have a friend whose K kid brought it home from school and they all got it. Even the 2 year old with asthma. They went down one by one so were quarantined for 6 weeks total. It could be any of us once all these schools open in a couple weeks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a Fed. And there is a piece of this people are missing in the discussion of the DMV’s push to reopen. My agency is massive and employees skew female. And we have been circling for months in an almost entirely telework posture. We are in the same posture in the DMV that we were in March. We are a public contact heavy agency and right now, those positions are trying to work over the phone, but key pieces don’t work. A few people have volunteered to go in and process mail, which is months behind despite us having time sensitive legal deadlines.

And right now, my agency can’t open until schools reopen. Because the reality is they have too many women a s there are too many childcare issues for them to even try. And they are literally saying, once schools reopen, we will start the return to work phase in. In the meantime, we have folks working split shift of 5am to 9am and 4pm to 8pm to deal with DL and childcare.

Mind you, I’m not rooting for a fast reopening of the government, because that pushes me back into the office. But the cold, hard reality of having the federal government as the massive local employer is that the needs of the federal government are considered. And the federal government needs DMV schools open. And since Fauci and the CDC say schools should open, it looks bad that May agency can’t process mail from citizens in Texas and provide a response because schools in the DMV aren’t open.

Just a different perspective. It’s been ten months. Reopening the economy and the nation has to start somewhere. And it logistically, the schools have to open so that federal agencies can reopen, and federal agencies have to reopen so that various other parts of the economy that rely on some of our services are shutdown right now can reopen. It’s dominos. Schools aren’t open, so agencies aren’t able to do all of their tasks, so some types of Medicaid reimbursements can’t happen, so they are getting backlogged, which is stressing health care providers and hospital, who are already stressed by COVID. Now react this across multiple sectors. Significant portions of the federal government are not fully reopened and are stalled.

And ai know you are going to say, well feds should just find other childcare. But the reality is there are too many of us. And then we have to take the leave to which we are entitled for COVID related childcare. And you can’t replace people easily in specialized positions with background check. When background checks are... performed y people who are waiting for schools to reopen.

And, of course, our schools also serve a military heavy community. Whose moms can’t quit or take a day off.

Understand what is happening in the DMV is much bigger than parents had a temper tantrum and won. We are in a unique position in that people in all 50 states are stuck until our schools reopen.

Also a fed. So I get it. But why NOW. It’s not safe now. My agency isn’t mom-heavy and we also perform an in person function. But we are still telework because it’s not safe for us to be back. Wait 2-3 months. None of what you write above is wrong. It’s valid insight. But it doesn’t explain why now is the right time, except that people are fed up. Doesn’t make it safe.

There is some try to what you say. For us, the cold, hard reality is that we’ve been creative with tape and glue over a system not designed for full telework. In our case, with 1980s legacy systems. Just like teachers have getting creative to make it work. But, there are things we cannot do in this operational status, and the longer this goes on and the bigger the backlog is getting and the more we are are unable to meet legal obligations. It’s like pressure in a pipe. It’s now, because we’re going to explode. Just like we can make things okay for the public for a while during a normal funding spat shutdown, the longer it goes on, the more problems pile up. And in this case, the pressure is so much we are going to explode.

It’s not like Trump or Trump appointees are making any of this any easier.

And no. It’s not safe now. We should have had school open from August to November so Feds could really push out the worst of the COVID backlog. Then have a second closure Thanksgiving to early spring. This would have reduced stress on the federal government by clearing the backlog in a safer environment. But school didn’t open in August. And to be fair, since the federal government need is so great, the feds should have been pouring money and PPE and logistical support into making it as safe as possible to get as many kids back as soon as possible. But, that would have required common sense and planning by the Trump Admin. So, here we are.

It’s a bad situation. I get teachers are afraid of going in and getting sick. I’m afraid of going in and getting sick. But, we have people in this country literally dying because because DMV public schools are closed. And I especially see the healthcare sector, where federal response is stalled in part by telework. To some extent that is driving the piss poor government response the in vaccinations and testing and PPE and the stress in the healthcare system.

I would imagine the answer to why NOW is that Biden is getting sworn in in 3 weeks and his COVID and transition teams see the nasty cycle of schools not opening due to the poor response to COVID and the poor response to COVID a being due to schools not opening. I hope this means the Federal government gets serious about helping DMV publics specifically. When Biden says back to school in 100 days, I’m sure the DMV and schools on military bases get priority. There was at least money in the COVID bill that just passed.

And here’s the calculus that is being made. If a dozen or 100 or 10000 DMV area teachers die and a dozen or 100 or 1000 DMV area feds die, its worth it to save 100,000 people or more by getting our COVID response act together. It’s a cost benefit analysis.

Why are people dying because DMV schools are closed?

[Anonymous]

Because the moms at his office can’t come in and work so nothing is getting done apparently. He believes if schools open federal offices would open since moms could come in again.

[Anonymous]

It's mind-boggling how some people are actually so stupid that they believe FCPS will reopen at the very worse possible time of the pandemic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:






It's mind-boggling how some people are actually so stupid that they believe FCPS will reopen at the very worse possible time of the pandemic.

I work for FCPS and would not be at all surprised if they do this. I think the wheels will fall off within two weeks, though. I'm not kidding when I say most of us who have been in person already know at least one coworker who caught it from a student. It's going to be hard to hide or explain away in-school spread when entire departments and grade levels have to quarantine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because the moms at his office can’t come in and work so nothing is getting done apparently. He believes if schools open federal offices would open since moms could come in again.

Okay. SHE is a mom herself. With kids in public schools in the DMV. And is saying her agency with public facing and medical components is in a holding pattern. And our head honchos have said we will being to phase back in as soon as schools phase back in. Something employees were told. Not a guess. Because our workforce is very skewed female. And in the DMV, the federal government is a haven for moms. As it is we are at max telework with people flexing in and out at all times of day to get things done however they can. And we had very set hours without a huge flex band and core during which no flex could occur this time last year. Now, it’s do your work whenever you can do your work. And not having access to the office is impairing our piece of COVID response and the ways we support this country’s healthcare infrastructure. Not that the Teump Admin cares. And we have been creative and done work arounds for 10 months. But, like distance learning, it isn’t as good and key things are t happening. I am certainly assuming that with the money in the second stimulus bill, DMV and any military base schools will be top priority of the Biden Admins all school open in 100 days plan. And we will at least see resources.

And, it’s also dads. But, mostly moms. Sorry we had the audacity to reproduce and then take a job as a public servant. War is why daycare was originally established. Because the country needed moms in the workforce.

Geez. I’m sorry I mentioned the huge issue facing all schools in the DMV that is unique to the DMV and creating the pressure to get kids back in everyone is griping about.