Anyone listen to this week's this American Life? It is terrifying what school closures has done

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Folks who are angry now must have forgotten what it was like the first year of the pandemic. No one knew what the virus was capable of - what it would do to adults and kids alike. Hospitals were overwhelmed. Our leadership makes decisions based on the information available. It is unfortunate kids were out of school for so long, however, it’s now up to us to come together and help our kids and not expend unnecessary energy on the blame game. If it was your son/daughter who died because schools were open, you’d sing a different tune.

I work with children in a culture and a place where they are taken care of by multigenerational households, often primarily grandparents. A lot of those grandparents died. Sometimes it was because of transmission through the children. I saw a lot of teddy bears perched on top of the body bags coming out of the hospital -- the kids wanted the send what they loved to be a comfort to who they had loved.

Do you want to know what their mental health is like now?

Our community was hit harder than most. Nobody knew that it would shake out that way in the beginning.

So kids learning remotely gave COVID to their grandparents? Huh.

You are ignorant of the situation. That's me using polite language out of respect for the moderator.

Most did not have internet access. The problem was that kids went back and forth from parents (when home) to grandparents. And parents brought it home from their shitty jobs that they couldn't afford to lose, and then the kids took it to their grandparents, who were the only ones who could watch them.

Most of the country was not like this. But it was real, and it takes a helluva toll on children to know people are dead because of them. And guess who reports on abuse here? It's the grandparents, the aunties, the elders.

You don't want to see what it looks like when children have gone through this and have to live with it.

What kind of sick monster was TELLING the kids that it was "because of them?"

Are your kids really little stll?

Kids understand a lot in their own. If they're sick, then grandparent gets sick, they know what happened. You can explain it all appropriately, and how the kids had no agency, but kids still come to their own conclusions and grapple with their own role.

I'm not that pp, but do know of a couple similar situations. As kids get older, you can't just put things into perspective for them anymore.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Folks who are angry now must have forgotten what it was like the first year of the pandemic. No one knew what the virus was capable of - what it would do to adults and kids alike. Hospitals were overwhelmed. Our leadership makes decisions based on the information available. It is unfortunate kids were out of school for so long, however, it’s now up to us to come together and help our kids and not expend unnecessary energy on the blame game. If it was your son/daughter who died because schools were open, you’d sing a different tune.

I work with children in a culture and a place where they are taken care of by multigenerational households, often primarily grandparents. A lot of those grandparents died. Sometimes it was because of transmission through the children. I saw a lot of teddy bears perched on top of the body bags coming out of the hospital -- the kids wanted the send what they loved to be a comfort to who they had loved.

Do you want to know what their mental health is like now?

Our community was hit harder than most. Nobody knew that it would shake out that way in the beginning.

So kids learning remotely gave COVID to their grandparents? Huh.

You are ignorant of the situation. That's me using polite language out of respect for the moderator.

Most did not have internet access. The problem was that kids went back and forth from parents (when home) to grandparents. And parents brought it home from their shitty jobs that they couldn't afford to lose, and then the kids took it to their grandparents, who were the only ones who could watch them.

Most of the country was not like this. But it was real, and it takes a helluva toll on children to know people are dead because of them. And guess who reports on abuse here? It's the grandparents, the aunties, the elders.

You don't want to see what it looks like when children have gone through this and have to live with it.

What kind of sick monster was TELLING the kids that it was "because of them?"

Why do you think someone had to tell the child? They get sick, and they are staying with grandma because dad is in the oil fields and the mom is long gone. Grandma gets sick after they do, then goes to the hospital, and never comes back.

Do you think poor kids are so dumb that they can't put two and two together? Is that it? That a nine year old can't have learned about how illness is contagious? Jesus Christ.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ll be honest, I’m really pissed schools were closed for so long. It was done because unions refused to let their teachers return to school. Before anyone says I’m a Trumpie, I am not. I’m a lifelong Democrat! But that’s what happened and we can’t pretend otherwise. It made me change my opinion about teacher unions, for sure. I’m sorry for all the millions of kids who are behind in the US and no one cares. Affluent parents will just say “kids are resilient” - remember that line?

Also a dem here, glad my kid is back in school, but if I were a teacher, or my kids were (grown up) teachers, I'd want to support their choice not to go back into an unvaccinated environment.

My husband is a teacher and went back in August 2020 to a private school. Got vaccinated in January 2021 and he was fine. Even from an educator family, I will always loudly say that Democrats failed kids because we chose teachers.

Are you living under a rock? Do you not realize how much safer most private schools are? Smaller classes, the funds to upgrade their systems, weekly testing, socioeconomic groups that are more likely to be telecommuting, if you are multigenerational household, etc. It’s like comparing apples and oranges

And yet throughout the U.S., there were public schools operating as well beginning in August, and they didn’t have all those things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was surprised about the lack of thought on the part of the administration at the 2nd girl's school to her missed learning and socializing. They knew she had disappeared, they knew she had not been attending school for the past 1.5+ years, they knew she was back and eagerly awaited her. Yet... they completely failed to anticipate any of these speed bumps (or not even speed bumps, but massive road barriers!). Instead of spending that 1-on-1 time with her figuring out getting her caught up, she spent it talking about high school applications! That just seemed so off and so tone deaf. I get the perspective that if they held her back, it would be demoralizing and maybe make her less likely to get through high school, although to me it could go both ways. But it seems like this is exactly the learning loss the whole education industry has been talking about during Covid and they did nothing for her. I hope they wake up and get her in some pull outs to get caught up in math, writing, reading. If administrators aren't getting organized about this, the ins and outs of the learning loss, then the kids really will be screwed long term. Plus, isn't this what the millions in Covid relief $ to schools is precisely for??

Same. My takeaway was that schools are doing a terrible job with the transition back to schools. They are so intent on catching up instead of really evaluating what kids need and can be expected of them, so it’s this bizarre sink or swim situation. Yeah it would take a lot of work to meet each kid where they are, but it seems like it wouldn’t be much harder than trying to “catch kids up” to a curriculum that’s arbitrary in the first place.

I am very much in favor of a strong, demanding curriculum, but there is nothing wrong with reevaluating what kids are expected to know and the skills they are expected to have by the time they graduate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I live in a highly blue school district and with the exception of the spring of 2020 my kids have been doing in-person school and in-person activities this entire time. None of us have gotten covid (at least not that we know) and I don't know anyone personally who had a severe case or died. The red areas around us were even more wide open. Your individual experience does not equate to what the entire country experienced.

That’s nice. Some of us know several people who had severe cases and multiple people who died. And the idiotic assertion that cramming kids, teachers and staff, all unvaccinated, into enclosed Petri dishes for 30+ hours a week “didn’t spread it” is a lie born out of convenience.

I'm truly sorry for your loss. However, my anecdotal experience is that of all the kids that I know who were exposed at school, only one actually contracted COVID. It was a lunch exposure when they were unmasked. All of the other cases that I know of came from eating out, carpooling, sports, outside of school activities. Again, I haven't done a peer-reviewed research study, but I find it hard to believe that the risk was ever that great when mitigations like masking, social distancing, and improved air filtration were in place.

This is still important to me because we could face another wave like Omicron, and as a society we need to be ready to react appropriately.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Folks who are angry now must have forgotten what it was like the first year of the pandemic. No one knew what the virus was capable of - what it would do to adults and kids alike. Hospitals were overwhelmed. Our leadership makes decisions based on the information available. It is unfortunate kids were out of school for so long, however, it’s now up to us to come together and help our kids and not expend unnecessary energy on the blame game. If it was your son/daughter who died because schools were open, you’d sing a different tune.

I work with children in a culture and a place where they are taken care of by multigenerational households, often primarily grandparents. A lot of those grandparents died. Sometimes it was because of transmission through the children. I saw a lot of teddy bears perched on top of the body bags coming out of the hospital -- the kids wanted the send what they loved to be a comfort to who they had loved.

Do you want to know what their mental health is like now?

Our community was hit harder than most. Nobody knew that it would shake out that way in the beginning.

So kids learning remotely gave COVID to their grandparents? Huh.

You are ignorant of the situation. That's me using polite language out of respect for the moderator.

Most did not have internet access. The problem was that kids went back and forth from parents (when home) to grandparents. And parents brought it home from their shitty jobs that they couldn't afford to lose, and then the kids took it to their grandparents, who were the only ones who could watch them.

Most of the country was not like this. But it was real, and it takes a helluva toll on children to know people are dead because of them. And guess who reports on abuse here? It's the grandparents, the aunties, the elders.

You don't want to see what it looks like when children have gone through this and have to live with it.

What kind of sick monster was TELLING the kids that it was "because of them?"

Are your kids really little stll?

Kids understand a lot in their own. If they're sick, then grandparent gets sick, they know what happened. You can explain it all appropriately, and how the kids had no agency, but kids still come to their own conclusions and grapple with their own role.

I'm not that pp, but do know of a couple similar situations. As kids get older, you can't just put things into perspective for them anymore.

No, my kids are high school and older. But they know better than to blame little kids when old people die--unlike some of the sickos here on DCUM that insist that children have "their own role" in their grandparents death. Vile.

[Anonymous]

I don’t understand this conversation about how we had to close schools because otherwise kids would get Covid and give it to vulnerable family members.

Perhaps you all can afford nannies/tutors/SAHPs so school closures mean your kids are not in group care? That’s not how it works for most families.

Our friends got Covid (as did their parents) because their kindergartener was in daycare (old daycare offered spots for older kids who needed it, and they both work so they needed it). Kid gave it to parents and grandparents. Fortunately everyone came through okay but school closures didn’t prevent anything in their case. They have to work. They need childcare. A full time nanny wasn’t an option.

We knew another family who did have a nanny, they still all got Covid (nanny caught it from her son who she lives with who got it from his in person job). Again, school closures didn’t help at all.

My kid was in group care through the entire 18 mo closure. We never got Covid, though there were a few outbreaks in my kid’s classes. Again, we work do we didn’t have a choice.

The thing I never understood was why it was okay for our daycare and camp teachers to risk possible exposure, but not teachers. Daycare providers generally make a lot less, plus they have really limited protection in terms of sick leave or other things.

We just shortchanged kids on school to protect one well-educated, higher paid group of people, by keeping kids with a lower-paid, less respected group of people. We didn’t prevent spread of Covid, we just shifted it to others.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t understand this conversation about how we had to close schools because otherwise kids would get Covid and give it to vulnerable family members.

Perhaps you all can afford nannies/tutors/SAHPs so school closures mean your kids are not in group care? That’s not how it works for most families.

Our friends got Covid (as did their parents) because their kindergartener was in daycare (old daycare offered spots for older kids who needed it, and they both work so they needed it). Kid gave it to parents and grandparents. Fortunately everyone came through okay but school closures didn’t prevent anything in their case. They have to work. They need childcare. A full time nanny wasn’t an option.

We knew another family who did have a nanny, they still all got Covid (nanny caught it from her son who she lives with who got it from his in person job). Again, school closures didn’t help at all.

My kid was in group care through the entire 18 mo closure. We never got Covid, though there were a few outbreaks in my kid’s classes. Again, we work do we didn’t have a choice.

The thing I never understood was why it was okay for our daycare and camp teachers to risk possible exposure, but not teachers. Daycare providers generally make a lot less, plus they have really limited protection in terms of sick leave or other things.

We just shortchanged kids on school to protect one well-educated, higher paid group of people, by keeping kids with a lower-paid, less respected group of people. We didn’t prevent spread of Covid, we just shifted it to others.

This is so well put. I’d just add the “learning hubs” that were literally operating out of our local school (no change in risk but you got worse instruction and got to pay more than $1k for the pleasure). Or kids were just completely ignored all day long at home while their parents worked. I know a family that left their kids (including a 5 year old) with a grandparent who worked nights and slept while they did virtual learning. You can imagine how much that kid got out of the experience.

[Anonymous]

If you want to do shoulda coulda woulda on who opened schools and when, surely you also have to pull in the death rates, no?

DC has HALF the per capita death rate of Mississippi, Arizona, and Alabama.

I don't think anybody is arguing that virtual school is great. The choice was never "in person or virtual school, which is better." The choice was "virtual school or killing grandma, which is better."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you want to do shoulda coulda woulda on who opened schools and when, surely you also have to pull in the death rates, no?

DC has HALF the per capita death rate of Mississippi, Arizona, and Alabama.

I don't think anybody is arguing that virtual school is great. The choice was never "in person or virtual school, which is better." The choice was "virtual school or killing grandma, which is better."

Have you looked at their relative vaccination rates? You are comparing apples and monkeys

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t understand this conversation about how we had to close schools because otherwise kids would get Covid and give it to vulnerable family members.

Perhaps you all can afford nannies/tutors/SAHPs so school closures mean your kids are not in group care? That’s not how it works for most families.

Our friends got Covid (as did their parents) because their kindergartener was in daycare (old daycare offered spots for older kids who needed it, and they both work so they needed it). Kid gave it to parents and grandparents. Fortunately everyone came through okay but school closures didn’t prevent anything in their case. They have to work. They need childcare. A full time nanny wasn’t an option.

We knew another family who did have a nanny, they still all got Covid (nanny caught it from her son who she lives with who got it from his in person job). Again, school closures didn’t help at all.

My kid was in group care through the entire 18 mo closure. We never got Covid, though there were a few outbreaks in my kid’s classes. Again, we work do we didn’t have a choice.

The thing I never understood was why it was okay for our daycare and camp teachers to risk possible exposure, but not teachers. Daycare providers generally make a lot less, plus they have really limited protection in terms of sick leave or other things.

We just shortchanged kids on school to protect one well-educated, higher paid group of people, by keeping kids with a lower-paid, less respected group of people. We didn’t prevent spread of Covid, we just shifted it to others.

This is so well put. I’d just add the “learning hubs” that were literally operating out of our local school (no change in risk but you got worse instruction and got to pay more than $1k for the pleasure). Or kids were just completely ignored all day long at home while their parents worked. I know a family that left their kids (including a 5 year old) with a grandparent who worked nights and slept while they did virtual learning. You can imagine how much that kid got out of the experience.

DP and agree with all of the above. We put our elementary kids in learning hubs (yes, in their school) because we needed childcare and they needed social contact. Closing schools to reduce transmission was utter BS.

Re: the posts about grandparents catching COVID from children, yeah, there are some people who practically lick their chops while making that argument. They love it. They don't realize (or don't care) how much damage they're doing by perpetuating that line of thinking. Because it wasn't the kids who brought home COVID from the schools they weren't attending, it was their parents. So, we really need to stop blaming kids for our own purposes, okay? Okay.

[Anonymous]

my kid's iready pecentile dropped when she went back in person, probably because of all the distractions at the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you want to do shoulda coulda woulda on who opened schools and when, surely you also have to pull in the death rates, no?

DC has HALF the per capita death rate of Mississippi, Arizona, and Alabama.

I don't think anybody is arguing that virtual school is great. The choice was never "in person or virtual school, which is better." The choice was "virtual school or killing grandma, which is better."

No, it wasn't a choice that of that. Are there SOME kids that live with gramma? Sure but not all. Why destroy ALL the kids because a few live with their gramma? If one kid broke their arm, should we put casts on ALL the kids?

[Anonymous]

Terrifying??

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Folks who are angry now must have forgotten what it was like the first year of the pandemic. No one knew what the virus was capable of - what it would do to adults and kids alike. Hospitals were overwhelmed. Our leadership makes decisions based on the information available. It is unfortunate kids were out of school for so long, however, it’s now up to us to come together and help our kids and not expend unnecessary energy on the blame game. If it was your son/daughter who died because schools were open, you’d sing a different tune.

I work with children in a culture and a place where they are taken care of by multigenerational households, often primarily grandparents. A lot of those grandparents died. Sometimes it was because of transmission through the children. I saw a lot of teddy bears perched on top of the body bags coming out of the hospital -- the kids wanted the send what they loved to be a comfort to who they had loved.

Do you want to know what their mental health is like now?

Our community was hit harder than most. Nobody knew that it would shake out that way in the beginning.

So kids learning remotely gave COVID to their grandparents? Huh.

You are ignorant of the situation. That's me using polite language out of respect for the moderator.

Most did not have internet access. The problem was that kids went back and forth from parents (when home) to grandparents. And parents brought it home from their shitty jobs that they couldn't afford to lose, and then the kids took it to their grandparents, who were the only ones who could watch them.

Most of the country was not like this. But it was real, and it takes a helluva toll on children to know people are dead because of them. And guess who reports on abuse here? It's the grandparents, the aunties, the elders.

You don't want to see what it looks like when children have gone through this and have to live with it.

What kind of sick monster was TELLING the kids that it was "because of them?"

Are your kids really little stll?

Kids understand a lot in their own. If they're sick, then grandparent gets sick, they know what happened. You can explain it all appropriately, and how the kids had no agency, but kids still come to their own conclusions and grapple with their own role.

I'm not that pp, but do know of a couple similar situations. As kids get older, you can't just put things into perspective for them anymore.

No, my kids are high school and older. But they know better than to blame little kids when old people die--unlike some of the sickos here on DCUM that insist that children have "their own role" in their grandparents death. Vile.

That's not what that means. You're choosing to be obtuse.