Teachers Not Wanting to Go Back in Person

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We're keeping our kids at home because we feel that the in-school operations are unsafe. If we feel that way for our kids then I can COMPLETELY understand why teachers feel that way for themselves. The kids who have gone back already are either 1) the kids whose moms want them out of the house because they are hellions, or 2) the kids who have special needs or need extra support. I think most of the kids are in the #1 category. No way do I want our kids in that mix and, again, I can completely understand why teachers would want to avoid them. I would, too.

JFC. You’re insane.

My kids have no special needs and they are ideal students. Straight 4s in the Life and Citizenship section of their report cards all through ES so far. Many of the kids in their classes who have returned are similar. And I loved having them home so much, in many respects, but kids need to be in school and with other kids. I'm not saying your kids will be (further) harmed by missing out on these 24 days my kids will get in the building, but I do think all of our kids have been harmed by a full year out in ways that may not be immediately apparent. That harm may have been worth it to keep as many people safe as possible, but it is a reasonable decision for many parents to start easing back in. Teachers and staff are vaccinated and most high risk parents are, too, or will be soon.

I don’t think my kid has been harmed at all. Has great typing and computer skills now as a bonus.

[Anonymous]

If a teacher is vaccinated (and let's just assume the other adults in their household are too), what is the argument for not coming back to teach in person?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Once teachers have been vaccinated, it is time to get their reluctant butts back in the classroom. If they don't feel they can do so because they are "scared," or it's too hard, time to find a new profession.

I am a prof who went back in the classroom in August in an old building, teaching adults, who are far more contagious, with no plexiglass screens, no hysterical hypercleaning, no constant temp check, no testing. Not one student or prof or staff got sick. So no sympathy from me on recalcitrant teachers.

Do you have to change their diapers? Do you get spit on and hit and scratched? Do your adults understand distancing and mask wearing? I am back in school with my special Ed preschoolers. I am not complaining, I am happy to be back and I know they learn better in person. But please don’t try to tell me that your job teaching adults is more difficult.

You seem mad. You also don't seem to understand how the PP is indeed at higher risk of COVID than yourself. I'm sorry you get scratched by toddlers, but you literally signed up for that, and "being scratched by toddlers" is not a known method of COVID transmission.

Nope, not mad at all. If you read my post you would see that I am happy to be back. I just think it is odd that the PP was insinuating that working with adults is harder.

I also teach special education and it’s insulting to state that any educator, or any person for that matter, shows up to work to be assaulted. You obviously have no idea what our jobs entail. Stay in your lane.

Veterinarians expect that every so often they'll be clawed by a patient. Home health aids expect that they'll have to deal with aggression and bodily fluids. Someone who works in daycare for infants knows there will be a lot of poop. Do you think they show up to work in order to be assaulted? No. But it's part of the job. If you went into special ed pre-k and didn't expect to have to deal with aggression and bodily fluids sometimes, you are a fool.

I teach special ed elementary, and I don’t expect to be injured at work. Kind of like how cops don’t “expect” to be attacked by a racist mob and soldiers don’t “expect” to lose an arm to an IED. Do you think it’s appropriate to shrug when those professionals are injured, due to the nature of their job? I would venture that you don’t. Dealing with bodily fluids has absolutely nothing to do with being injured. You seem like the kind of parent who refuses to take responsibility for your child’s inappropriate behavior.

You must not be military or you’d know that sone of the worst medical care is military. Good luck getting any medical help. My military doctors are in person at best a half of week and often I cannot get an appointment for the 6-8 weeks and have to see a random doctor. And, it can take weeks and multiple emails to get a response.

Love DL because like that poster said, all that stuff does not happen with DL.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Once teachers have been vaccinated, it is time to get their reluctant butts back in the classroom. If they don't feel they can do so because they are "scared," or it's too hard, time to find a new profession.

I am a prof who went back in the classroom in August in an old building, teaching adults, who are far more contagious, with no plexiglass screens, no hysterical hypercleaning, no constant temp check, no testing. Not one student or prof or staff got sick. So no sympathy from me on recalcitrant teachers.

Do you have to change their diapers? Do you get spit on and hit and scratched? Do your adults understand distancing and mask wearing? I am back in school with my special Ed preschoolers. I am not complaining, I am happy to be back and I know they learn better in person. But please don’t try to tell me that your job teaching adults is more difficult.

You seem mad. You also don't seem to understand how the PP is indeed at higher risk of COVID than yourself. I'm sorry you get scratched by toddlers, but you literally signed up for that, and "being scratched by toddlers" is not a known method of COVID transmission.

Nope, not mad at all. If you read my post you would see that I am happy to be back. I just think it is odd that the PP was insinuating that working with adults is harder.

I also teach special education and it’s insulting to state that any educator, or any person for that matter, shows up to work to be assaulted. You obviously have no idea what our jobs entail. Stay in your lane.

Veterinarians expect that every so often they'll be clawed by a patient. Home health aids expect that they'll have to deal with aggression and bodily fluids. Someone who works in daycare for infants knows there will be a lot of poop. Do you think they show up to work in order to be assaulted? No. But it's part of the job. If you went into special ed pre-k and didn't expect to have to deal with aggression and bodily fluids sometimes, you are a fool.

I teach special ed elementary, and I don’t expect to be injured at work. Kind of like how cops don’t “expect” to be attacked by a racist mob and soldiers don’t “expect” to lose an arm to an IED. Do you think it’s appropriate to shrug when those professionals are injured, due to the nature of their job? I would venture that you don’t. Dealing with bodily fluids has absolutely nothing to do with being injured. You seem like the kind of parent who refuses to take responsibility for your child’s inappropriate behavior.

Actually I do shrug when someone whose profession is violence experiences violence.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Someone please tell me why teachers can’t go back to school ASAP.

Many other professions have gone back to work UNVACCINATED and no one cared about us (construction).

Remember: Everyone is replaceable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If a teacher is vaccinated (and let's just assume the other adults in their household are too), what is the argument for not coming back to teach in person?

It's generally one of these:
1. "think of the poor unvaccinated children!"
2. the vaccines are not 100% effective
3. I have anxiety about managing post-covid classrooms (I wish this was a joke but there's a blogger who quit her DCPS job because the school wouldn't accommodate her anxiety about having to make sure kids stay 6-feet-apart. That's after vaccination.)

There are other reasons why schools can't fully reopen that don't have to do with teacher vaccinations; here it's to do with cohorting and the 6-foot distancing rules.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Construction is different as you are in a persons home or building and separated. Much easier to keep safe than with 30+ students to a room. You sound entitled. Hire a nanny.

Construction workers are not in people’s homes, and they can’t pay for nannies.

If you can’t do, teach.

Construction workers work in large spaces with adults, often outside. Teachers work in enclosed petri dishes with kids who won't cooperate and admin who won't allow them to be made to cooperate. Google "prolonged indoor exposure + COVID" and maybe then you'll understand the difference between construction work and teaching in a pandemic. Thanks ever so.

If you went to school 20-30 years ago, it doesn't mean you know jack about the profession of teaching, including that idiotic backwards bumper sticker slogan you just dropped. How embarrassing for you.

Princess, that is not what a construction site is like at all. Workers put on hardhats and masks that fall off while they work in close contact. The work they do is not distanced. It's clear that you are too sheltered to have ever seen a construction site. How embarrassing for you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If a teacher is vaccinated (and let's just assume the other adults in their household are too), what is the argument for not coming back to teach in person?

It's generally one of these:
1. "think of the poor unvaccinated children!"
2. the vaccines are not 100% effective
3. I have anxiety about managing post-covid classrooms (I wish this was a joke but there's a blogger who quit her DCPS job because the school wouldn't accommodate her anxiety about having to make sure kids stay 6-feet-apart. That's after vaccination.)

There are other reasons why schools can't fully reopen that don't have to do with teacher vaccinations; here it's to do with cohorting and the 6-foot distancing rules.

You mean 3 ft.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:You see this a lot if you read between the lines of people who are upset with reopening (in general, not just schools). They have self-diagnosed “social anxiety,” don’t want to go back to interacting in person, love the working at home lifestyle, no commute or getting dressed in nicer clothes every day. Plus with teachers in particular, when working from home, there’s less stress about classroom behavior management.

There are some very vocal people who never want the Covid lifestyle to end and some of them happen to also be teachers. I do think most teachers who actually enjoy teaching and are good at their jobs want to be back in the classrooms, so don’t paint all teachers with a broad brush here. It’s far easier to be an EFFECTIVE teacher in the classroom with students who are also in person in the classroom. But it’s an easier lifestyle to work at home and never leave your house.

But it's so strange because all the teachers I know IRL hate distance learning and think it's MORE work, not less. They always talk about all the extra hours they're putting in. There's just a strange disconnect sometimes. And teaching is the wrong career choice for anyone with social anxiety.

I have heard it IS more work and I understand that. What I also have heard is that they are scared.

I think they're more scared than they are afraid of a lot more work. I can't disagree with that.

You couldn't pay me enough money to be a teacher in a school right now with people like you as parents. It is pretty clear that you don't have any regard at all for the health and safety of teachers and you're only concerned about getting your kids out of your houses.

You know that parents didn't decide to reopen right? It was the school board who decided that after a year, maybe teachers don't have an absolute right to take on zero COVID risk regardless of consequences for students?

No, it was the insane parents who were insistent that schools HAD to reopen.

Those in charge could have said "no." They didn't. Don't blame parents.

Parents can choose to stay DL.

And if they don't choose DL...watch out kiddies.

[Anonymous]

My husband and I are feds who have been working in person in our crowded, old offices with rats and windows that don't work and people who aren't wearing masks (not just former Trump administration but career civil servants) since March. My husband received a recall notice. I did not but as a supervisor was told to be in person or my entire team would have to come in including a 70 year old cancer survivor, a mom whose baby is in the NICU from being born premature, a colleague with sickle cell anemia and another colleague who has COPD.

My husband was told no exceptions. Not health, not child care, not virtual learning. So I have very little patience for teachers who think they are special and unique. My husband and I are not special. We are not different. We know that as civil servants, we work even when we don't get paid. I have worked in hurricanes, at the border, lived in a tent, had no running water. All in the US. My husband has been traveling this entire time on behalf of the government.

We had to get child care for our school age boys. We had to get a tutor and a babysitter because there is only after care at a different site location and our kids are only two days a week.

My opinion of people who want to work from home as a profession that is in person has really caused me to not like some people. I understand people with a health issue, but guess what? Until this month I was not vaccinated. My agency didn't bother registering us. My husband got his vaccinations in February. After almost a year of being in crowded places in public (he works in law enforcement).

If we did not return to work, we were fired. We are not bargaining unit employees. Without jobs, our kids don't have a home, food or anything else. We can't afford to live in DC. I am sick of people telling me I have a "cush government job". Come live out of a tent in an area plagued by poverty, disease, homelessness and social unrest.

I have two boys, 7 and 5. Imagine being away from your kids for several months for your job because you are deployed. No I am not military. My husband and I both have been away from our sons for months during the pandemic. Protecting you. And we don't think we are heroes, special or unique. We are doing a job we are committed to doing and believe in because we are public servants. Public service is a public trust. We signed up for this, even in a global pandemic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If a teacher is vaccinated (and let's just assume the other adults in their household are too), what is the argument for not coming back to teach in person?

It's generally one of these:
1. "think of the poor unvaccinated children!"
2. the vaccines are not 100% effective
3. I have anxiety about managing post-covid classrooms (I wish this was a joke but there's a blogger who quit her DCPS job because the school wouldn't accommodate her anxiety about having to make sure kids stay 6-feet-apart. That's after vaccination.)

There are other reasons why schools can't fully reopen that don't have to do with teacher vaccinations; here it's to do with cohorting and the 6-foot distancing rules.

You mean 3 ft.

It's only 3 feet it the school district says so. And thus far they haven't. (Which is annoying, but they also have more conservative rules than CDC on some other covid-prevention measures.) Also, if they measure desk-to-desk, the 3 foot rule means you STILL can't get all kids into classrooms here.

[Anonymous]

We have been treated poorly by our kids' teachers because our son's are at a child care site for virtual. We don't have jobs where you can work from home. We get a lot of guilt from the teacher like we are bad parents. I wish I could tell the teachers what my partner and I do day in and day out to keep them and the other teachers safe. I wish they knew how much my kids have had to grow up to be on Zoom school everyday. I wish they knew that everyone has it hard, but as parents who can't work for home because of our security clearance, we can never tell others what we are doing that can't WFH. Maybe then you would cut my kid some slack for skipping class or needing a private tutor when he's been in Zoom school for over a year. We are not anti science people either. We actually work in public health. SMH

[Anonymous]

Why is he skipping class? Shouldn't he log on each day from the child care center?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why is he skipping class? Shouldn't he log on each day from the child care center?

Many daycare or child care facilities are not set up for DL -- for ex., don't have the wifi capacity, can't manage multiple children's schedules, don't have training in managing the multiple apps of multiple children, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why is he skipping class? Shouldn't he log on each day from the child care center?

I'm sorry, you must not be familiar with a daycare center. It's a place with many children, lower paid workers who are unvaccinated and without unions. They cannot juggle logging kids into DL on their many different platforms and schedules all day long so that a vaccinated teacher can be safe in their home. It's the reality of it all.