Why are most teachers too scared to return to in person teaching, but most parents want schools open

[Anonymous]

The kids will be in a more precarious situation than the teachers. They are more likely to spend extended amounts of time within close distance of each other than teachers are. No, kids aren’t as likely to get very sick, but they can still transmit it to their families.
Yer almost every survey shows most parents want schools to reopen while most teachers want them to reopen. Are we really to believe that teachers are just naturally more fearful than most other people? I’m a teacher, and I honestly believe that most teachers who are saying their too afraid to go back, really just want to work from home. I haven’t actually had a teacher confide that to me, but it’s just my suspicion. I don’t think that reflects poorly on them, most people working from home say they don’t want to go back, but why would larger numbers of teachers be more afraid of exposure to Covid than parents are?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The kids will be in a more precarious situation than the teachers. They are more likely to spend extended amounts of time within close distance of each other than teachers are. No, kids aren’t as likely to get very sick, but they can still transmit it to their families.
Yer almost every survey shows most parents want schools to reopen while most teachers want them to reopen. Are we really to believe that teachers are just naturally more fearful than most other people? I’m a teacher, and I honestly believe that most teachers who are saying their too afraid to go back, really just want to work from home. I haven’t actually had a teacher confide that to me, but it’s just my suspicion. I don’t think that reflects poorly on them, most people working from home say they don’t want to go back, but why would larger numbers of teachers be more afraid of exposure to Covid than parents are?

Most teachers want them to remain “closed”

[Anonymous]

Because the teachers don't want to die while the parents just want childcare.

C'mon, man, read any of the 29034723 threads on this topic that exist already.

[Anonymous]

My job is much harder to do at home. It’s hard enough to do at school. I live with my mom who is not in great health. So I’ll do much more work in order to keep her safe.

[Anonymous]

Your premise is faulty. A majority of parents don’t think it’s safe to reopen. It’s the reopen mob that screams their heads off.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/context/july-24-31-2020-washington-post-schar-school-poll-of-parents/f7552bde-6f87-4e1a-83a2-268953720ff5/?itid=lk_inline_manual_1&_gl=1*17dza6l*_ga*elRHTEpPMkZlcWtSRXNCTk16ZkczNGJ1R3hjODh1dGQtMWFoUjlQc3lvTTRldmNsTlVKQXFLRnhRUnlWTWVGVQ..

[Anonymous]

Most parents do NOT want schools to open. They are well aware of the risks! Many parents are voicing sadness and frustration that their children's lives are still upended for the upcoming school year, but it doesn't mean they WANT schools to reopen with the pandemic uncontrolled as it is.

[Anonymous]

Agree OP. I feel like you would need a epidemiologist to crunch the numbers, but given that the children are going to be in closer contact with each other, and of course COVID spreads mostly within households, parents are assuming considerable risk. It may be less than that of teachers, but it is not insignificant... So yes, I don’t get this aspect of the debate ... and certainly it does not lead me to believe the best of teachers’ motives.

[Anonymous]

^^Umm... that WaPo poll had the plurality of parents supporting hybrid! So you are further proving, not refuting, OP’s point...

[Anonymous]

I do think you are onto something, OP. My husband normally works full time out of the house and he is loving working from home. When we talk about his office reopening at some point, we kind of dread it. And we've already agreed that if they try to reopen the office anytime soon, he will say he doesn't feel comfortable in an office with Covid still so prevalent and ask to continue at home. It is partly that fear (he would have to commute via public transportation and his office has an ancient and notoriously terrible HVAC system), but it's also a good excuse to just keep working at home, get to spend more time with our kid, and skip his awful commute.

Surely there are teachers in the same position. Like you, I don't fault them -- there is so much more flexibility to working from home, especially if you have kids or normally have a tough commute. I've worked from home for years and have always loved it.

Meanwhile, I think parents want schools open because they are struggling to handle childcare and work. Which is also understandable! I don't think parents want to put teachers (or themselves) at risk of Covid. I just think they are in a tough situation and engaging in some optimistic thinking about how in-person schooling would go.

I don't understand all the vitriol towards teachers who want to stay home or parents who want their kids in school. These seem like understandable positions to me. I mostly blame all the public officials who have botched the whole decision making process and also have done so little to control the virus, making everything harder than it should be. Everyone else is just trying their best.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because the teachers don't want to die while the parents just want childcare.

C'mon, man, read any of the 29034723 threads on this topic that exist already.

But this doesn’t make sense because the kids are probably more likely to get Covid tha. The teachers are, and they can transmit it to their family members.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My job is much harder to do at home. It’s hard enough to do at school. I live with my mom who is not in great health. So I’ll do much more work in order to keep her safe.

Ok, but parents are just as likely to have a vulnerable family member living with them, as teachers, yet survey after survey shows the vast majority of parents want schools to reopen and the vast majority of teachers want schools virtual. Since there is no reason to think teachers are more naturally cautious than the public at large, I think it’s safe to assume that there something else at play here

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My job is much harder to do at home. It’s hard enough to do at school. I live with my mom who is not in great health. So I’ll do much more work in order to keep her safe.

Ok, but parents are just as likely to have a vulnerable family member living with them, as teachers, yet survey after survey shows the vast majority of parents want schools to reopen and the vast majority of teachers want schools virtual. Since there is no reason to think teachers are more naturally cautious than the public at large, I think it’s safe to assume that there something else at play here

And as a teacher, I would never admit this IRL - even though I’m nervous about online teaching in the fall, mainly because we still haven’t been told what the hell it will entail, I still think it will be nicer than dealing
with the commute, discipline issues, staff politics, expectation to run after school clubs, etc than teaching in person.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Your premise is faulty. A majority of parents don’t think it’s safe to reopen. It’s the reopen mob that screams their heads off.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/context/july-24-31-2020-washington-post-schar-school-poll-of-parents/f7552bde-6f87-4e1a-83a2-268953720ff5/?itid=lk_inline_manual_1&_gl=1*17dza6l*_ga*elRHTEpPMkZlcWtSRXNCTk16ZkczNGJ1R3hjODh1dGQtMWFoUjlQc3lvTTRldmNsTlVKQXFLRnhRUnlWTWVGVQ..

The article you posted said that parents favored the hybrid over 100% virtual, which still means they favor sending kids to school in person

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Most parents do NOT want schools to open. They are well aware of the risks! Many parents are voicing sadness and frustration that their children's lives are still upended for the upcoming school year, but it doesn't mean they WANT schools to reopen with the pandemic uncontrolled as it is.

Of course they do, all the polls shown that were done in every school district show that the percentage of parents who chose 100% virtual over hybrid (when it was still an option) were very much in the minority.

[Anonymous]

I'm a teacher and a parent.

I'm not scared to return to work in a school setting, but I don't see how we can teach a full group of students and I don't see how hybrid would really work. I could see returning to in school for a smaller group of selected students -- K-3rd grade. I always thought 4th-12th should distance learn and K-3 should be spread out among all the older kids schools.

That seems to make the most sense to me.

Of course, when I say return to schools, I mean when we are in a safe time to do so, with community spread of COVID down to 1 or 2 new cases, per 100,000 people, per day; and when we have enough tests and PPE to be reasonable secure.

We have NONE of the above in the DC area right now.

I do not want my own personal children going back to school until the above measures have been reached, either.