Should DCPS follow suit with MCPS starting year 100% Virtual?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My insight- Mayor is full steam ahead with opening schools. She wants people back to work. And she is worried about the increase in crime. Everyone is advising her against opening but she currently hasn’t been persuaded.

This would not surprise me

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My insight- Mayor is full steam ahead with opening schools. She wants people back to work. And she is worried about the increase in crime. Everyone is advising her against opening but she currently hasn’t been persuaded.

That's pretty frustrating. But I feel like she can announce whatever she wants to announce on Thursday, and I'll believe that schools are open when they actually open up and manage to stay open.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My insight- Mayor is full steam ahead with opening schools. She wants people back to work. And she is worried about the increase in crime. Everyone is advising her against opening but she currently hasn’t been persuaded.

This would not surprise me

There is no way DCPS will open when all the surrounding districts are DL.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My insight- Mayor is full steam ahead with opening schools. She wants people back to work. And she is worried about the increase in crime. Everyone is advising her against opening but she currently hasn’t been persuaded.

This is exactly it. Gotta get DC back to work to line the pockets of Douglas Development and her other donors.

[Anonymous]

MCPS will not have any live instruction this year. it isnt because they are cautious and monitoring the situation. it's because their teacher union has them wrapped around their fingers and wont allow teachers back in the building. it's a shit show and parents are scrambling to find private schools and tutors since the DL curriculum does not exist. it will be a repeat of the spring. trust me.

What makes you say they won’t have live instruction?

[Anonymous]

Why do you think MC won’t have live?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah we should reopen schools, but not handwaving away the CDC’s guidelines in the hopes that it will all work out. Distance learning isn’t ideal, but I don’t know what kind of socialization (or education) is going to happen if school is all about maintaining social distancing and masks, and it’s certainly not going to happen if there are more cases like the one in Texas where a kid infected both of his parents who subsequently died. And cleaning surfaces doesn’t do a darn bit of good if the spread is, as increasingly thought, through aerosols. Why not err on the side of caution until we know more, and have the supports in place to proceed with the least amount of risk to students, staff, teachers, and parents? Again, it’s no ideal but ... it’s a (hopefully) once in a lifetime situation.

NP. I agree, and I agree that MCPS may end up doing DL all year. But I appreciate that MCPS is watching what is happening and will adjust as possible/needed.

MCPS will not have any live instruction this year. it isnt because they are cautious and monitoring the situation. it's because their teacher union has them wrapped around their fingers and wont allow teachers back in the building. it's a shit show and parents are scrambling to find private schools and tutors since the DL curriculum does not exist. it will be a repeat of the spring. trust me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My insight- Mayor is full steam ahead with opening schools. She wants people back to work. And she is worried about the increase in crime. Everyone is advising her against opening but she currently hasn’t been persuaded.

This would not surprise me

There is no way DCPS will open when all the surrounding districts are DL.

DC is the school system that almost never cancels due to snow when ALL surrounding districts do. I tend to agree with the poster above EXCEPT Bowser is surely loathe to agree with Trump (ie: opening schools). It’s almost like the moment he went there is signaled to all the sane reasonable people that DL must be the right answer (which I don’t personally agree with).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Regular in-person school seems to be working in Europe and Asia. Children apparently are not as susceptible to the disease. High school students are more likely to get it than younger kids. There are few reports of students "bringing it home." If I were an older teacher and could retire, I would probably consider that. We are not in Houston or Miami or some other place where the virus is rampant.

I believe we should start with in-person learning but be ready to go to DL if that becomes necessary.

Oh, for God's sake, keep up, and stop repeating the tired old untrue lines from April and May that "children apparently as not as susceptible to the disease" or "we all know kids don't spread it anyway." It is July, we have much more information and that is JUST. NOT. TRUE.

And please, for the love of crap, don't try to compare the United States to Europe or Asia. Compare their national response and their case rates to ours. NO comparison. None. What they do or do not do there is wildly irrelevant to the U.S.

And, of course, it matters not in the slightest that "we are not in Houston ir Miami," as borders do not protect us, and as a whole slew of selfish jerks are about to come streaming home to the DMV from Florida and Disney. It takes one case to start a new spread. Just wait.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes! Start with DL and slowly go through phases 1-3. It makes so much sense to gradually allow students to come in, just like how the states reopened, in phases.

and these teachers who are doing DL so that everyone is SAFE, will they also forgo getting nails done, hair done, eating out and going to bars because we know those are DANGEROUS places for them
and they must be kept SAFE

Yep! Something seriously wrong with our priorities when we can open for shopping, dining, grooming, and even boozing, but we can’t open schools to educate our children.

When society starts placing 300 - 1500 people in restaurant, salon, barber shop, liquor store for 6 - 8 hours a day, five days a week, then you have a decent comparison. Otherwise, something seriously wrong when you think children can't get sick and spread respitory viruses, especially during/after PE and recess. However, since you don't know how many children, in a given school, have asthma treatment plans or compromised immune systems, because it's none of your damn business, you would foolishly think that schools need to be open. Open 'em up. That way, when children start losing classmates to COVID, your dumb ass can complain about the lack of grief counseling available in public schools. Be the solution, not the problem.

Exactly. What does this stupid false comparison keep being made over and over ad nauseum on these boards? Aren't DCUM-ers supposed to be intelligent?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DP responding to above ^^. at our particular school, it was "no new material will be presented live." So the live sessions were mainly social.

Whaaaat? That's crazy! No wonder so many parents are making us out to be villains. What are we supposed to do when the 'higher ups' suck?

This was our school too. There was no new material presented live. And I was working and didn’t have capacity to print worksheets and be the teacher myself. I’m scared educationally for my child who is at least still young but was already struggling. In retrospect the failure to keep teaching looks like a big mistake but one that hopefully will not occur again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Regular in-person school seems to be working in Europe and Asia. Children apparently are not as susceptible to the disease. High school students are more likely to get it than younger kids. There are few reports of students "bringing it home." If I were an older teacher and could retire, I would probably consider that. We are not in Houston or Miami or some other place where the virus is rampant.

I believe we should start with in-person learning but be ready to go to DL if that becomes necessary.

Oh, for God's sake, keep up, and stop repeating the tired old untrue lines from April and May that "children apparently as not as susceptible to the disease" or "we all know kids don't spread it anyway." It is July, we have much more information and that is JUST. NOT. TRUE.

And please, for the love of crap, don't try to compare the United States to Europe or Asia. Compare their national response and their case rates to ours. NO comparison. None. What they do or do not do there is wildly irrelevant to the U.S.

And, of course, it matters not in the slightest that "we are not in Houston ir Miami," as borders do not protect us, and as a whole slew of selfish jerks are about to come streaming home to the DMV from Florida and Disney. It takes one case to start a new spread. Just wait.

This is not yet settled science—I spoke with an epi colleague who works in infectious diseases this week, and he feels that there are conflicting data on this.

This recent article lays out some of the evidence suggesting that kids don’t spread CV as well as teens. The available epi data on outbreaks around the world, combined with contact tracing data, suggest the kids do not spread it very well, unlike the influenza virus.

“Transmission in elementary school seems lower than in high schools, according to Dr. Naomi Bardach, associate professor of UCSF’s Department of Pediatrics. There’s limited data on middle-school and preschool children, she said.

Based on her analysis of research, “staff and teachers, as adults, are more likely to transmit it to each other,” she said.”

Also, there are some biological hypotheses discusses in the article that may explain why kids don’t seem to spread it as much as teens and adults. Basically, younger kids don’t have as much of a particular receptor that the virus attaches itself to, relative to teenagers and adults:

“ So why aren’t young kids super-spreaders? It’s a mystery. Surely, we thought, their dripping noses and sticky little hands are loaded with germs. A new study found that younger children have less of a receptor called angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), which the virus needs to enter cells. Expression of the gene for this receptor is lowest in 4- to 9-year-olds. It is higher in 10- to 17-year-olds, although still lower than in adults.”

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.mercurynews.com/2020/07/10/coronavirus-why-kids-arent-the-germbags-and-grownups-are/amp/

[Anonymous]

I hope DC follows the surrounding jurisdictions. Closure is inevitable. It’s just how many people we kill to get to that decision.