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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I love how "keen observers" miss the alarmingly high COVID rates in countries with open schools, and in areas of the US with open schools. If anything, politics have forced schools to open when they should have stayed shut.[/quote]

Did you read the article? There is no correlation between covid rates and school openings. I’m still agog at supposedly progressive and intelligent DC parents who don’t get this. [/quote]
NP. My observational data...
I'm not in DMV. Live just outside a mid-sized city in Pennsylvania.  County has a mix of urban, suburban, and rural population. State shut down severely in late March.  Phased re-opening started mid-May, but my county did not re-open until mid-June.  The limitations have varied from month to month with the government updating / changing /refining restrictions, but restaurants and bars have been open since mid-June. Kids returned to travel soccer and baseball in June. Gyms re-opened in June. Kids camps opened, to include indoor (like gymnastics) in June.  Churches began in person services - initially limited to 25 in person, but that increased to 50% of fire code max occupancy. 
State has a mandatory mask mandate. I rarely see anyone not wearing a mask, except for outside.
My county has 8 school districts, plus a variety of private and charter schools. Roughly half began school in late August or early September under a hybrid model, and half went back full time. A few remained full online.  One of my children went back in a hybrid model in late August (in the biggest district in the county with 14k students), the other remained online (charter). In October, the largest district began full in person for elementary (middle and high remained hybrid). My son's charter school went hybrid in October. Since late September, various schools have had some classes / sections / grades /entire school quarantined for 2 weeks.  
July - averaged 19 new cases a day  
August - averaged 22 new cases a day
September - averaged 17 new cases per day
October - averaged 36 new cases per day - over double the month prior
November - so far, averaging 76 new cases per day - again, over double the previous month.
Correlation does not equal causation... but the what changed from August to October? Schools re-opening.  [/quote]

Except the actual research I posted above states that school reopening is NOT correlated with spread.  [/quote]
 Except it wasn't research.
https://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2020/11/03/schools-need-to-be-bolder-about-reopening.html - editorial
https://www.npr.org/2020/10/21/925794511/were-the-risks-of-reopening-schools-exaggerated - 2 were international studies, one from a daycare setting, plus "anecdotal." If you haven't noticed, schools in the US vary from schools in Europe. Plus in the Spain study, there was already high community spread, so it didn't really matter. 
https://policylab.chop.edu/sites/default/files/pdf/publications/PolicyLab-Policy-Review-Evidence-Guidance-In-Person-Schooling-COVID-19-Nov-2020.pdf - not a study. Plus, the recommendation was: 
"we would encourage continued reopening of schools in the absence of evidence of linked transmission occurring in schools within the area, and in the absence of rapidly accelerating community
transmission (i.e., quickly approaching or reaching 9% or greater test positivity)."
In my county, percent positivity went from 5% before school re-opening to 9% in November. So, it would recommend closure at this point in time.
So sorry your limited hasty "studies" don't apply to every school district in the US. And thanks for cherry picking studies that only support your argument. There's a lot more that don't. 
[/quote]

Right - you're smarter and better in formed than the dean of Public Health at Brown, the experts at CHOP, and numerous researchers world-wide.  Oh, and you're also smarter than countless private school administrators and parents, as well as the leadership of the entire nation of Germany.

But hey, I would welcome an actual, informed debate on this, but as you very well know, all we had was the teacher's unions screaming "IT'S NOT SAFE" in cities where all the wealthy white kids were going to private schools in person. [/quote]
Actually, I am informed and used the words from the study against you. Helps if you actually read the study to see the conditions.[/quote]

Way to miss the point. (As well as misrepresent that research, but you do you.)[/quote]
Way to miss the point... I quoted the CHOP recommendations, which specifically point to percent positivity as a criteria... but hey, you do you. [/quote]

Where did I disagree with the CHOP positivity recommendations? I didn't. What's uncontroverted is that in cities like DC and SF, we MET those criteria and still did not open. Because politics tilted towards the teachers union, and not towards children and parents.

As for you dismissing Dr. Jha's opinion -- well, that's pretty arrogant of you.

And moreover, my entire point is that these decisions should be made in consideration of the actual research and public health recommendations, which they quite clearly were not.  They were decided based on local politics, not science or public health.   [/quote]
My point is there's plenty of research to support any argument/decision. Any school that reopened - or stay closed - or used hybrid - cherry picked research and professional opinions to support whatever model they decided to go with.
I'm not "dismissing" his opinion - but you called it research. Words have meaning... It's his opinion.[/quote]

That’s such a dishonest argument. The great weight of the research and experience is that schools can reopen safely - or could have in the summer. And WTU (and its other big city analogues) made no attempt to engage with the research at all.  It wasn’t science; it was politics - that’s what the study I linked to in the OP showed. [/quote]

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