When should DC drop its school mask mandate?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So it just seems like the "continuing maskers" people are doing some sort of intense tone-policing and gaslighting now. "Don't get hysterical!" "There were no problems!"

Your kid can continue masking. Other people's kids had different experiences than yours. Have some empathy that other kids have not had as easy of a time with masking as yours.

Right, it's the people who want children to be vaccinated and wear masks indoors when they can't/won't be vaccinated who are gas-lighting and engaging in town police. Cool story, bro.

My kids are vaccinated and they are still masking outdoors, masking indoors, getting tested every week, and checking in with an app every morning that says they should stay home if they have a runny nose. No one recommends doing this, but here we are. Yes, I'm annoyed.

That's crazy. What school is this?

It is crazy! Sela. We just got an email yesterday that they're doing additional antigen tests post spring break, plus the regular weekly testing, and also that 'in the coming days' they will make a determination about outdoor masking and other restrictions. It apparently takes a week just to tell us that they're considering whether to lift outdoor masking.

We're at Sela, and the reason that they have been able to be open since November 2020 (yup, 2020) is that they have been exceedingly careful. We cannot on one hand argue that charter schools are semi-autonomous entities, and then argue that they are bound to have fewer restrictions because DOH or OSSE says so at any given moment. Sadly, only 54% of eligible students are vaccinated and only 69% of teachers/staff are boosted (all are vaccinated). Those aren't great numbers in a school with five PK classes. It makes sense to have antigen tests after many families will be traveling. Weekly testing also makes sense. Sela is test-to-stay. Being opposed to testing is curious. The school will eventually lift on masking outdoors. I would not suspect that they will lift on masking indoors for younger grades - and they will likely maintain aftercare pods until after PK students can be vaccinated. We will see if the school decides to mandate the COVID vaccine next year. Hopefully, they will.

Have you been paying any other attention to what other schools are doing this year? They are all open. Most do not have higher vaccination rates. Very few are doing what Sela is doing, which now increasingly deviates from public health guidance with zero explanation as to why. This is not 2020 anymore. And why is 'eventually' ok for the most basic and no-brainer policy of lifting outdoor masking? What science do they have access to that practically no one else in the country is?

Are you opposed to testing? Where does the public health guidance discourage testing...I will wait. Are you opposed to test to stay...again, where is that discouraged? Sela doesn't have a vaccine mandate -but DCPS does, I am guessing you are opposed to vaccine mandates - which the "public health guidance" supports. You have a very agenda-driven, cafeteria approach to COVID mitigation. Charter schools are run by boards. I suggest you complain - but most of the parents at Sela are unlikely to sign onto your agenda to lift masks inside the school building.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid's DC private high school sent a note at 10:30 last night declaring mask optional. It is evident from this list that different kids have different experiences, but my son was to the moon with happiness as if it was Christmas morning. He is thrilled that the policy has finally caught up with community risk and that he can finish out the year in normal fashion. To those who say we parents are projecting our views on our kids, that is in no way the case in my household and a great many others in my experience. As for DCPS, it seems the teachers' union will have to fold like a deck of cards, albeit against their will. It is a travesty that DC governance is held hostage to union influence and the public school kids are not yet free from forced masking. Each day that the mandate persists, is another day of unjust masking.

It is so bizarre that you would center yourself as a private school parent with your cuckoo for cocoa puffs "unjust masking" and "travesty" rhetoric. You give exactly zero effs what goes on in the lived experiences of public school children and teachers.

I have just as much right as anyone else to express my views. Your "lived experience" is really just the latest trendy way to say that you alone have superior opinions that cannot be challenged because no one else walks in your shoes.

But you do recognize that your opinion, as someone whose shoes never tread the halls of a DCPS school, is less relevant on this thread?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So it just seems like the "continuing maskers" people are doing some sort of intense tone-policing and gaslighting now. "Don't get hysterical!" "There were no problems!"

Your kid can continue masking. Other people's kids had different experiences than yours. Have some empathy that other kids have not had as easy of a time with masking as yours.

Right, it's the people who want children to be vaccinated and wear masks indoors when they can't/won't be vaccinated who are gas-lighting and engaging in town police. Cool story, bro.

My kids are vaccinated and they are still masking outdoors, masking indoors, getting tested every week, and checking in with an app every morning that says they should stay home if they have a runny nose. No one recommends doing this, but here we are. Yes, I'm annoyed.

That's crazy. What school is this?

It is crazy! Sela. We just got an email yesterday that they're doing additional antigen tests post spring break, plus the regular weekly testing, and also that 'in the coming days' they will make a determination about outdoor masking and other restrictions. It apparently takes a week just to tell us that they're considering whether to lift outdoor masking.

We're at Sela, and the reason that they have been able to be open since November 2020 (yup, 2020) is that they have been exceedingly careful. We cannot on one hand argue that charter schools are semi-autonomous entities, and then argue that they are bound to have fewer restrictions because DOH or OSSE says so at any given moment. Sadly, only 54% of eligible students are vaccinated and only 69% of teachers/staff are boosted (all are vaccinated). Those aren't great numbers in a school with five PK classes. It makes sense to have antigen tests after many families will be traveling. Weekly testing also makes sense. Sela is test-to-stay. Being opposed to testing is curious. The school will eventually lift on masking outdoors. I would not suspect that they will lift on masking indoors for younger grades - and they will likely maintain aftercare pods until after PK students can be vaccinated. We will see if the school decides to mandate the COVID vaccine next year. Hopefully, they will.

Have you been paying any other attention to what other schools are doing this year? They are all open. Most do not have higher vaccination rates. Very few are doing what Sela is doing, which now increasingly deviates from public health guidance with zero explanation as to why. This is not 2020 anymore. And why is 'eventually' ok for the most basic and no-brainer policy of lifting outdoor masking? What science do they have access to that practically no one else in the country is?

Are you opposed to testing? Where does the public health guidance discourage testing...I will wait. Are you opposed to test to stay...again, where is that discouraged? Sela doesn't have a vaccine mandate -but DCPS does, I am guessing you are opposed to vaccine mandates - which the "public health guidance" supports. You have a very agenda-driven, cafeteria approach to COVID mitigation. Charter schools are run by boards. I suggest you complain - but most of the parents at Sela are unlikely to sign onto your agenda to lift masks inside the school building.

Updated guidance from the DC Department of Health now explicitly says "Screening testing is not necessary when COVID-19 community levels are LOW." (Which, obviously, it is.) That's just as of yesterday. But there was also a period where the CDC explicitly said that vaccinated people should not be part of screening (that is, asymptomatic testing) programs, and Sela was still including them.

I think vaccine mandates for kids are unnecessary, and I don't think DCPS is really going to enforce them. I think if Sela tried to, they'd have fights with a lot of parents, but I would not be among them. I don't know where you got the idea that I'm opposed to vaccine mandates, since the only thing I said about vaccines was that my kids are vaccinated.

And if Sela is going to keep masking indefinitely regardless of community levels and regardless of DOH and of what DCPS does, I think that's a mistake, but also I just want to know so that I can make alternative decisions for my kids for next year. I object to some of their choices, but what I object to at least as much is the lack of information about under what conditions they stop doing this stuff. I have no idea what their decision-making processes are. And that's not because I haven't brought this up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid's DC private high school sent a note at 10:30 last night declaring mask optional. It is evident from this list that different kids have different experiences, but my son was to the moon with happiness as if it was Christmas morning. He is thrilled that the policy has finally caught up with community risk and that he can finish out the year in normal fashion. To those who say we parents are projecting our views on our kids, that is in no way the case in my household and a great many others in my experience. As for DCPS, it seems the teachers' union will have to fold like a deck of cards, albeit against their will. It is a travesty that DC governance is held hostage to union influence and the public school kids are not yet free from forced masking. Each day that the mandate persists, is another day of unjust masking.

It is so bizarre that you would center yourself as a private school parent with your cuckoo for cocoa puffs "unjust masking" and "travesty" rhetoric. You give exactly zero effs what goes on in the lived experiences of public school children and teachers.

I have just as much right as anyone else to express my views. Your "lived experience" is really just the latest trendy way to say that you alone have superior opinions that cannot be challenged because no one else walks in your shoes.

But you do recognize that your opinion, as someone whose shoes never tread the halls of a DCPS school, is less relevant on this thread?

Wait, I thoughts DCPS wasn't allowing parents to enter the schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So it just seems like the "continuing maskers" people are doing some sort of intense tone-policing and gaslighting now. "Don't get hysterical!" "There were no problems!"

Your kid can continue masking. Other people's kids had different experiences than yours. Have some empathy that other kids have not had as easy of a time with masking as yours.

Right, it's the people who want children to be vaccinated and wear masks indoors when they can't/won't be vaccinated who are gas-lighting and engaging in town police. Cool story, bro.

My kids are vaccinated and they are still masking outdoors, masking indoors, getting tested every week, and checking in with an app every morning that says they should stay home if they have a runny nose. No one recommends doing this, but here we are. Yes, I'm annoyed.

That's crazy. What school is this?

It is crazy! Sela. We just got an email yesterday that they're doing additional antigen tests post spring break, plus the regular weekly testing, and also that 'in the coming days' they will make a determination about outdoor masking and other restrictions. It apparently takes a week just to tell us that they're considering whether to lift outdoor masking.

We're at Sela, and the reason that they have been able to be open since November 2020 (yup, 2020) is that they have been exceedingly careful. We cannot on one hand argue that charter schools are semi-autonomous entities, and then argue that they are bound to have fewer restrictions because DOH or OSSE says so at any given moment. Sadly, only 54% of eligible students are vaccinated and only 69% of teachers/staff are boosted (all are vaccinated). Those aren't great numbers in a school with five PK classes. It makes sense to have antigen tests after many families will be traveling. Weekly testing also makes sense. Sela is test-to-stay. Being opposed to testing is curious. The school will eventually lift on masking outdoors. I would not suspect that they will lift on masking indoors for younger grades - and they will likely maintain aftercare pods until after PK students can be vaccinated. We will see if the school decides to mandate the COVID vaccine next year. Hopefully, they will.

Have you been paying any other attention to what other schools are doing this year? They are all open. Most do not have higher vaccination rates. Very few are doing what Sela is doing, which now increasingly deviates from public health guidance with zero explanation as to why. This is not 2020 anymore. And why is 'eventually' ok for the most basic and no-brainer policy of lifting outdoor masking? What science do they have access to that practically no one else in the country is?

Are you opposed to testing? Where does the public health guidance discourage testing...I will wait. Are you opposed to test to stay...again, where is that discouraged? Sela doesn't have a vaccine mandate -but DCPS does, I am guessing you are opposed to vaccine mandates - which the "public health guidance" supports. You have a very agenda-driven, cafeteria approach to COVID mitigation. Charter schools are run by boards. I suggest you complain - but most of the parents at Sela are unlikely to sign onto your agenda to lift masks inside the school building.

Updated guidance from the DC Department of Health now explicitly says "Screening testing is not necessary when COVID-19 community levels are LOW." (Which, obviously, it is.) That's just as of yesterday. But there was also a period where the CDC explicitly said that vaccinated people should not be part of screening (that is, asymptomatic testing) programs, and Sela was still including them.

I think vaccine mandates for kids are unnecessary, and I don't think DCPS is really going to enforce them. I think if Sela tried to, they'd have fights with a lot of parents, but I would not be among them. I don't know where you got the idea that I'm opposed to vaccine mandates, since the only thing I said about vaccines was that my kids are vaccinated.

And if Sela is going to keep masking indefinitely regardless of community levels and regardless of DOH and of what DCPS does, I think that's a mistake, but also I just want to know so that I can make alternative decisions for my kids for next year. I object to some of their choices, but what I object to at least as much is the lack of information about under what conditions they stop doing this stuff. I have no idea what their decision-making processes are. And that's not because I haven't brought this up.

Well, honestly, there is a duty to read. There is a Tuesday folder with all of the COVID information and the Board meetings are publicized (with meeting notes online). There is also a monthly PTSA meeting, where they have discussed COVID policies multiple times. If you aren't doing that -you have zero standing to complain. The teachers don't determine policy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid's DC private high school sent a note at 10:30 last night declaring mask optional. It is evident from this list that different kids have different experiences, but my son was to the moon with happiness as if it was Christmas morning. He is thrilled that the policy has finally caught up with community risk and that he can finish out the year in normal fashion. To those who say we parents are projecting our views on our kids, that is in no way the case in my household and a great many others in my experience. As for DCPS, it seems the teachers' union will have to fold like a deck of cards, albeit against their will. It is a travesty that DC governance is held hostage to union influence and the public school kids are not yet free from forced masking. Each day that the mandate persists, is another day of unjust masking.

It is so bizarre that you would center yourself as a private school parent with your cuckoo for cocoa puffs "unjust masking" and "travesty" rhetoric. You give exactly zero effs what goes on in the lived experiences of public school children and teachers.

I have just as much right as anyone else to express my views. Your "lived experience" is really just the latest trendy way to say that you alone have superior opinions that cannot be challenged because no one else walks in your shoes.

But you do recognize that your opinion, as someone whose shoes never tread the halls of a DCPS school, is less relevant on this thread?

Where in this thread does say the conversation is limited to DCPS schools?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid's DC private high school sent a note at 10:30 last night declaring mask optional. It is evident from this list that different kids have different experiences, but my son was to the moon with happiness as if it was Christmas morning. He is thrilled that the policy has finally caught up with community risk and that he can finish out the year in normal fashion. To those who say we parents are projecting our views on our kids, that is in no way the case in my household and a great many others in my experience. As for DCPS, it seems the teachers' union will have to fold like a deck of cards, albeit against their will. It is a travesty that DC governance is held hostage to union influence and the public school kids are not yet free from forced masking. Each day that the mandate persists, is another day of unjust masking.

It is so bizarre that you would center yourself as a private school parent with your cuckoo for cocoa puffs "unjust masking" and "travesty" rhetoric. You give exactly zero effs what goes on in the lived experiences of public school children and teachers.

I have just as much right as anyone else to express my views. Your "lived experience" is really just the latest trendy way to say that you alone have superior opinions that cannot be challenged because no one else walks in your shoes.

But you do recognize that your opinion, as someone whose shoes never tread the halls of a DCPS school, is less relevant on this thread?

Wait, I thoughts DCPS wasn't allowing parents to enter the schools.

My soles were hitting halls at our MS this AM. Oops. My bad? Or yours?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So it just seems like the "continuing maskers" people are doing some sort of intense tone-policing and gaslighting now. "Don't get hysterical!" "There were no problems!"

Your kid can continue masking. Other people's kids had different experiences than yours. Have some empathy that other kids have not had as easy of a time with masking as yours.

Right, it's the people who want children to be vaccinated and wear masks indoors when they can't/won't be vaccinated who are gas-lighting and engaging in town police. Cool story, bro.

My kids are vaccinated and they are still masking outdoors, masking indoors, getting tested every week, and checking in with an app every morning that says they should stay home if they have a runny nose. No one recommends doing this, but here we are. Yes, I'm annoyed.

That's crazy. What school is this?

It is crazy! Sela. We just got an email yesterday that they're doing additional antigen tests post spring break, plus the regular weekly testing, and also that 'in the coming days' they will make a determination about outdoor masking and other restrictions. It apparently takes a week just to tell us that they're considering whether to lift outdoor masking.

We're at Sela, and the reason that they have been able to be open since November 2020 (yup, 2020) is that they have been exceedingly careful. We cannot on one hand argue that charter schools are semi-autonomous entities, and then argue that they are bound to have fewer restrictions because DOH or OSSE says so at any given moment. Sadly, only 54% of eligible students are vaccinated and only 69% of teachers/staff are boosted (all are vaccinated). Those aren't great numbers in a school with five PK classes. It makes sense to have antigen tests after many families will be traveling. Weekly testing also makes sense. Sela is test-to-stay. Being opposed to testing is curious. The school will eventually lift on masking outdoors. I would not suspect that they will lift on masking indoors for younger grades - and they will likely maintain aftercare pods until after PK students can be vaccinated. We will see if the school decides to mandate the COVID vaccine next year. Hopefully, they will.

Have you been paying any other attention to what other schools are doing this year? They are all open. Most do not have higher vaccination rates. Very few are doing what Sela is doing, which now increasingly deviates from public health guidance with zero explanation as to why. This is not 2020 anymore. And why is 'eventually' ok for the most basic and no-brainer policy of lifting outdoor masking? What science do they have access to that practically no one else in the country is?

Are you opposed to testing? Where does the public health guidance discourage testing...I will wait. Are you opposed to test to stay...again, where is that discouraged? Sela doesn't have a vaccine mandate -but DCPS does, I am guessing you are opposed to vaccine mandates - which the "public health guidance" supports. You have a very agenda-driven, cafeteria approach to COVID mitigation. Charter schools are run by boards. I suggest you complain - but most of the parents at Sela are unlikely to sign onto your agenda to lift masks inside the school building.

Updated guidance from the DC Department of Health now explicitly says "Screening testing is not necessary when COVID-19 community levels are LOW." (Which, obviously, it is.) That's just as of yesterday. But there was also a period where the CDC explicitly said that vaccinated people should not be part of screening (that is, asymptomatic testing) programs, and Sela was still including them.

I think vaccine mandates for kids are unnecessary, and I don't think DCPS is really going to enforce them. I think if Sela tried to, they'd have fights with a lot of parents, but I would not be among them. I don't know where you got the idea that I'm opposed to vaccine mandates, since the only thing I said about vaccines was that my kids are vaccinated.

And if Sela is going to keep masking indefinitely regardless of community levels and regardless of DOH and of what DCPS does, I think that's a mistake, but also I just want to know so that I can make alternative decisions for my kids for next year. I object to some of their choices, but what I object to at least as much is the lack of information about under what conditions they stop doing this stuff. I have no idea what their decision-making processes are. And that's not because I haven't brought this up.

Well, honestly, there is a duty to read. There is a Tuesday folder with all of the COVID information and the Board meetings are publicized (with meeting notes online). There is also a monthly PTSA meeting, where they have discussed COVID policies multiple times. If you aren't doing that -you have zero standing to complain. The teachers don't determine policy.

I read everything they send out. I not only read it, I read the links to policy that come with it and I can tell you how they have differed. I have been to multiple meetings, but I'm not going to start an argument there. When I have pointed out to leadership discrepancies between what they are doing and what they are obligated to do (for instance, the stricter symptom policy which was only recently revised, which I had brought up to them months prior -- having a runny nose was on the list of reasons to keep your kid out of school, even with no other symptoms!), I have never received an actual answer, and certainly not one that points to when any of this ends. I am not raising this with teachers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid's DC private high school sent a note at 10:30 last night declaring mask optional. It is evident from this list that different kids have different experiences, but my son was to the moon with happiness as if it was Christmas morning. He is thrilled that the policy has finally caught up with community risk and that he can finish out the year in normal fashion. To those who say we parents are projecting our views on our kids, that is in no way the case in my household and a great many others in my experience. As for DCPS, it seems the teachers' union will have to fold like a deck of cards, albeit against their will. It is a travesty that DC governance is held hostage to union influence and the public school kids are not yet free from forced masking. Each day that the mandate persists, is another day of unjust masking.

It is so bizarre that you would center yourself as a private school parent with your cuckoo for cocoa puffs "unjust masking" and "travesty" rhetoric. You give exactly zero effs what goes on in the lived experiences of public school children and teachers.

I have just as much right as anyone else to express my views. Your "lived experience" is really just the latest trendy way to say that you alone have superior opinions that cannot be challenged because no one else walks in your shoes.

But you do recognize that your opinion, as someone whose shoes never tread the halls of a DCPS school, is less relevant on this thread?

Wait, I thoughts DCPS wasn't allowing parents to enter the schools.

My soles were hitting halls at our MS this AM. Oops. My bad? Or yours?

They won't let us in the building. They must think we have anthrax.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So it just seems like the "continuing maskers" people are doing some sort of intense tone-policing and gaslighting now. "Don't get hysterical!" "There were no problems!"

Your kid can continue masking. Other people's kids had different experiences than yours. Have some empathy that other kids have not had as easy of a time with masking as yours.

Right, it's the people who want children to be vaccinated and wear masks indoors when they can't/won't be vaccinated who are gas-lighting and engaging in town police. Cool story, bro.

My kids are vaccinated and they are still masking outdoors, masking indoors, getting tested every week, and checking in with an app every morning that says they should stay home if they have a runny nose. No one recommends doing this, but here we are. Yes, I'm annoyed.

That's crazy. What school is this?

It is crazy! Sela. We just got an email yesterday that they're doing additional antigen tests post spring break, plus the regular weekly testing, and also that 'in the coming days' they will make a determination about outdoor masking and other restrictions. It apparently takes a week just to tell us that they're considering whether to lift outdoor masking.

We're at Sela, and the reason that they have been able to be open since November 2020 (yup, 2020) is that they have been exceedingly careful. We cannot on one hand argue that charter schools are semi-autonomous entities, and then argue that they are bound to have fewer restrictions because DOH or OSSE says so at any given moment. Sadly, only 54% of eligible students are vaccinated and only 69% of teachers/staff are boosted (all are vaccinated). Those aren't great numbers in a school with five PK classes. It makes sense to have antigen tests after many families will be traveling. Weekly testing also makes sense. Sela is test-to-stay. Being opposed to testing is curious. The school will eventually lift on masking outdoors. I would not suspect that they will lift on masking indoors for younger grades - and they will likely maintain aftercare pods until after PK students can be vaccinated. We will see if the school decides to mandate the COVID vaccine next year. Hopefully, they will.

Have you been paying any other attention to what other schools are doing this year? They are all open. Most do not have higher vaccination rates. Very few are doing what Sela is doing, which now increasingly deviates from public health guidance with zero explanation as to why. This is not 2020 anymore. And why is 'eventually' ok for the most basic and no-brainer policy of lifting outdoor masking? What science do they have access to that practically no one else in the country is?

Are you opposed to testing? Where does the public health guidance discourage testing...I will wait. Are you opposed to test to stay...again, where is that discouraged? Sela doesn't have a vaccine mandate -but DCPS does, I am guessing you are opposed to vaccine mandates - which the "public health guidance" supports. You have a very agenda-driven, cafeteria approach to COVID mitigation. Charter schools are run by boards. I suggest you complain - but most of the parents at Sela are unlikely to sign onto your agenda to lift masks inside the school building.

Updated guidance from the DC Department of Health now explicitly says "Screening testing is not necessary when COVID-19 community levels are LOW." (Which, obviously, it is.) That's just as of yesterday. But there was also a period where the CDC explicitly said that vaccinated people should not be part of screening (that is, asymptomatic testing) programs, and Sela was still including them.

I think vaccine mandates for kids are unnecessary, and I don't think DCPS is really going to enforce them. I think if Sela tried to, they'd have fights with a lot of parents, but I would not be among them. I don't know where you got the idea that I'm opposed to vaccine mandates, since the only thing I said about vaccines was that my kids are vaccinated.

And if Sela is going to keep masking indefinitely regardless of community levels and regardless of DOH and of what DCPS does, I think that's a mistake, but also I just want to know so that I can make alternative decisions for my kids for next year. I object to some of their choices, but what I object to at least as much is the lack of information about under what conditions they stop doing this stuff. I have no idea what their decision-making processes are. And that's not because I haven't brought this up.

Well, honestly, there is a duty to read. There is a Tuesday folder with all of the COVID information and the Board meetings are publicized (with meeting notes online). There is also a monthly PTSA meeting, where they have discussed COVID policies multiple times. If you aren't doing that -you have zero standing to complain. The teachers don't determine policy.

I read everything they send out. I not only read it, I read the links to policy that come with it and I can tell you how they have differed. I have been to multiple meetings, but I'm not going to start an argument there. When I have pointed out to leadership discrepancies between what they are doing and what they are obligated to do (for instance, the stricter symptom policy which was only recently revised, which I had brought up to them months prior -- having a runny nose was on the list of reasons to keep your kid out of school, even with no other symptoms!), I have never received an actual answer, and certainly not one that points to when any of this ends. I am not raising this with teachers.

Your position is that they cannot have a stricter policy than the Department of Health or CDC? There is no obligation that they have the same standards. The obligation is that they have no lower standard. For example, Sela required a seven-day quarantine period for unvaccinated students who travelled - at one point DOH policy only said "should quarantine for seven days" not "must quarantine for seven days" and there were parents that were upset because in theory Sela could have said it only says should - we are not going to follow this. Schools need bright-line rules. They haven't required the wellness check application in months, so I am not sure why you are bringing that up - and it was the CMI app, anyway, so it's not like Sela was the only school saying if you had symptoms stay home. Your expectation that a school tell you "when any of this ends" in a pandemic that is ongoing with a low level of school vaccination is not fair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So it just seems like the "continuing maskers" people are doing some sort of intense tone-policing and gaslighting now. "Don't get hysterical!" "There were no problems!"

Your kid can continue masking. Other people's kids had different experiences than yours. Have some empathy that other kids have not had as easy of a time with masking as yours.

Right, it's the people who want children to be vaccinated and wear masks indoors when they can't/won't be vaccinated who are gas-lighting and engaging in town police. Cool story, bro.

My kids are vaccinated and they are still masking outdoors, masking indoors, getting tested every week, and checking in with an app every morning that says they should stay home if they have a runny nose. No one recommends doing this, but here we are. Yes, I'm annoyed.

That's crazy. What school is this?

It is crazy! Sela. We just got an email yesterday that they're doing additional antigen tests post spring break, plus the regular weekly testing, and also that 'in the coming days' they will make a determination about outdoor masking and other restrictions. It apparently takes a week just to tell us that they're considering whether to lift outdoor masking.

We're at Sela, and the reason that they have been able to be open since November 2020 (yup, 2020) is that they have been exceedingly careful. We cannot on one hand argue that charter schools are semi-autonomous entities, and then argue that they are bound to have fewer restrictions because DOH or OSSE says so at any given moment. Sadly, only 54% of eligible students are vaccinated and only 69% of teachers/staff are boosted (all are vaccinated). Those aren't great numbers in a school with five PK classes. It makes sense to have antigen tests after many families will be traveling. Weekly testing also makes sense. Sela is test-to-stay. Being opposed to testing is curious. The school will eventually lift on masking outdoors. I would not suspect that they will lift on masking indoors for younger grades - and they will likely maintain aftercare pods until after PK students can be vaccinated. We will see if the school decides to mandate the COVID vaccine next year. Hopefully, they will.

Have you been paying any other attention to what other schools are doing this year? They are all open. Most do not have higher vaccination rates. Very few are doing what Sela is doing, which now increasingly deviates from public health guidance with zero explanation as to why. This is not 2020 anymore. And why is 'eventually' ok for the most basic and no-brainer policy of lifting outdoor masking? What science do they have access to that practically no one else in the country is?

Are you opposed to testing? Where does the public health guidance discourage testing...I will wait. Are you opposed to test to stay...again, where is that discouraged? Sela doesn't have a vaccine mandate -but DCPS does, I am guessing you are opposed to vaccine mandates - which the "public health guidance" supports. You have a very agenda-driven, cafeteria approach to COVID mitigation. Charter schools are run by boards. I suggest you complain - but most of the parents at Sela are unlikely to sign onto your agenda to lift masks inside the school building.

Updated guidance from the DC Department of Health now explicitly says "Screening testing is not necessary when COVID-19 community levels are LOW." (Which, obviously, it is.) That's just as of yesterday. But there was also a period where the CDC explicitly said that vaccinated people should not be part of screening (that is, asymptomatic testing) programs, and Sela was still including them.

I think vaccine mandates for kids are unnecessary, and I don't think DCPS is really going to enforce them. I think if Sela tried to, they'd have fights with a lot of parents, but I would not be among them. I don't know where you got the idea that I'm opposed to vaccine mandates, since the only thing I said about vaccines was that my kids are vaccinated.

And if Sela is going to keep masking indefinitely regardless of community levels and regardless of DOH and of what DCPS does, I think that's a mistake, but also I just want to know so that I can make alternative decisions for my kids for next year. I object to some of their choices, but what I object to at least as much is the lack of information about under what conditions they stop doing this stuff. I have no idea what their decision-making processes are. And that's not because I haven't brought this up.

Well, honestly, there is a duty to read. There is a Tuesday folder with all of the COVID information and the Board meetings are publicized (with meeting notes online). There is also a monthly PTSA meeting, where they have discussed COVID policies multiple times. If you aren't doing that -you have zero standing to complain. The teachers don't determine policy.

I read everything they send out. I not only read it, I read the links to policy that come with it and I can tell you how they have differed. I have been to multiple meetings, but I'm not going to start an argument there. When I have pointed out to leadership discrepancies between what they are doing and what they are obligated to do (for instance, the stricter symptom policy which was only recently revised, which I had brought up to them months prior -- having a runny nose was on the list of reasons to keep your kid out of school, even with no other symptoms!), I have never received an actual answer, and certainly not one that points to when any of this ends. I am not raising this with teachers.

Your position is that they cannot have a stricter policy than the Department of Health or CDC? There is no obligation that they have the same standards. The obligation is that they have no lower standard. For example, Sela required a seven-day quarantine period for unvaccinated students who travelled - at one point DOH policy only said "should quarantine for seven days" not "must quarantine for seven days" and there were parents that were upset because in theory Sela could have said it only says should - we are not going to follow this. Schools need bright-line rules. They haven't required the wellness check application in months, so I am not sure why you are bringing that up - and it was the CMI app, anyway, so it's not like Sela was the only school saying if you had symptoms stay home. Your expectation that a school tell you "when any of this ends" in a pandemic that is ongoing with a low level of school vaccination is not fair.

My position is that they *can* have whatever policy they want. I'm not arguing anything about their legal rights here. But if they are going to do something that is increasingly an outlier nationally and locally, that is at odds with public health policy, and they can't tell me *why* they are doing this in any way which points to some set of conditions where this ends, then this is a problem for me as a parent. If it's not for you, great. I'm not asking for a date where this ends, I'm asking for something that points to some underlying reasoning here. (Which, for instance, the CDC and DOH have given for both indoor masking and testing -- not a date, but where caseloads have to be for masking/screening, in a way that currently recommends neither.) And this is especially an issue for me because all year we've heard variations on "we are obligated to do these things." Which was true for some things and not true for others. But now it's not true at all, except for quarantine/isolation. But you say you think Sela will continue indoor masking, and I think that's likely true, and I find that intensely frustrating.

Again with vaccinations -- Sela does not have especially low levels of vaccination, a lot of parents in general and in DC in particular have decided not to vaccinate their kids. Not my decision, but I don't think it's unreasonable given how low-risk kids in general are even without vaccination and the only somewhat bigger effects on spread. Other schools can manage to be open and not do 100% asymptomatic testing, and let their kids be unmasked outside. I am not claiming Sela is the only one doing this, but just like DC was an outlier nationally, Sela is now becoming an outlier even in DC. Why? I don't know the answer to this.

[Anonymous]

Seems like residents in some Wards don't want to vaccinate their kids but want everyone who did to mask up to "protect" them? (Even though as omicron showed, masks aren't all that protective in any case).

This is just ridiculous.

"Some educators in Wards 7 and 8, areas of the city with schools that educate mostly Black students, are worried dropping the mask requirement could disproportionately hurt Black students.

COVID-19 vaccination rates among Black children lag behind their white, Hispanic and Asian peers."

https://dcist.com/story/22/03/08/dc-health-lifts-school-mask-mandate-leaving-decision-to-schools/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Seems like residents in some Wards don't want to vaccinate their kids but want everyone who did to mask up to "protect" them? (Even though as omicron showed, masks aren't all that protective in any case).

This is just ridiculous.

"Some educators in Wards 7 and 8, areas of the city with schools that educate mostly Black students, are worried dropping the mask requirement could disproportionately hurt Black students.

COVID-19 vaccination rates among Black children lag behind their white, Hispanic and Asian peers."

https://dcist.com/story/22/03/08/dc-health-lifts-school-mask-mandate-leaving-decision-to-schools/

I think it's pertinent to separate the residents and the educators, here. I don't think the DCist article provides a good window into what Ward 7 and 8 residents think, as the people (person?) asked were teachers. I can hazard a guess that one of the "Ward 7 educators" interviewed was Laura No Fuchs Left to Give. She's not really known for....well....rationality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seems like residents in some Wards don't want to vaccinate their kids but want everyone who did to mask up to "protect" them? (Even though as omicron showed, masks aren't all that protective in any case).

This is just ridiculous.

"Some educators in Wards 7 and 8, areas of the city with schools that educate mostly Black students, are worried dropping the mask requirement could disproportionately hurt Black students.

COVID-19 vaccination rates among Black children lag behind their white, Hispanic and Asian peers."

https://dcist.com/story/22/03/08/dc-health-lifts-school-mask-mandate-leaving-decision-to-schools/

I think it's pertinent to separate the residents and the educators, here. I don't think the DCist article provides a good window into what Ward 7 and 8 residents think, as the people (person?) asked were teachers. I can hazard a guess that one of the "Ward 7 educators" interviewed was Laura No Fuchs Left to Give. She's not really known for....well....rationality.

Some educators are "worried"... not very scientific! And "it could hurt..."

The journalist should have asked more questions beyond someone's "feeling".

[Anonymous]

COVID-19 vaccination rates among Black children lag behind their white, Hispanic and Asian peers.

The shift key is lagging too.