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Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

I'm a DP, and don't think firing everyone is the solution. People complaining about public health decisions need to reframe this discussion. Educators aren't and never were public health experts; those public health decisions are past history. We can't change them.

However, I would like to hear the following statements addressed so that we can figure out why those providing their "expert" opinions about education (not health issues, but education) were so wrong:

1) Virtual learning is almost as good as in-person;
2) There is no such thing as learning loss (if that's true, are we realigning curriculum to account for missed learning?);
3) If there are any setbacks from closures (and the pandemic itself), we know what to do to address them quickly (apparently not, or at least the resources aren't there to address them, so perhaps the assurances should have come with caveats and specifics);
4) Kids are resilient; they will bounce back from this quickly.

All of these expert statements turned out to be wrong. Why?

We should ask questions about the claims made during those discussions based on educator expertise and try to understand what they got wrong and whether there are people who are more knowledgeable about education and child development who can offer some solutions that are more than "give us more money because we are experts and know what to do." To be clear, I'm not finding fault with individual teachers, but if professed experts don't understand why their assurances decision makers did not pan out and aren't willing to evaluate why their assumptions were faulty, all the money in the world won't help.

You want to rehash all of this in case there is another pandemic? Ok, but doesn’t seem to be the priority right now. What about the kids who are behind today?

No, I would like professed experts in education (which I am not) who claimed to know exactly what they were doing, not just three years ago but every year since, to explain how they got things wrong and what they learned from the pandemic experience for the purpose of informing the path forward. What did they miss? What could we be doing differently? What's the point of giving them more money if they don't know?

Who claimed they knew “exactly” what they were doing in an unprecedented global pandemic? School districts were making the best decisions they could with the info available at the time. No one claimed to be an expert.

The only reason to figure out “what to do differently” is to prepare for another pandemic. If we want to address the current (2023) issues then focus on what we can do without the constraints of a pandemic.

So you have followed the meetings of every district in the region and know exactly what was said? You are superwoman.

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Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

PLENTY OF BETTER QUALIFIED PEOPLE OUT THERE -- YOU HIRE THEM.

And then what?

THEY FOCUS ON THEIR JOB: EDUCATING CHILDREN.

You do not understand the hiring market for teachers.

You do not understand that we are not talking about teachers but about administrators.

They are going to get the kids caught up? LOL

Having the lunatics running the asylum is not the best recipe for anything.

Fix that first.

In your mind, the people who were following the CDC guidelines were the “lunatics”?

Well, we knew then and we know now that the CDC got a lot of things wrong. So people who blindly followed along and still want to believe the CDC is infallible, might have a screw loose.

Following the CDC in 2020 was a very reasonable approach to a global pandemic. Certainly nothing “lunatic” about it.

That's your opinion. But there was plenty to question and other organizations rebuking what the CDC said. You ignored everything else and followed the CDC because they said what you wanted to hear. And now you don't want to be faced with your questionable judgement and just want to move on. While that may be convenient for you, it's not going to work that way.

None of it was “convenient” for me.

There wasn’t substantial evidence at that point. Any way you slice it, it was reasonable for school districts to follow CDC guidelines. Potentially too conservative but certainly not “lunatic”.

False.

Reread NYT article. Also some of the top comments.

The evidence was there for anyone daring to see it.

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Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

I'm a DP, and don't think firing everyone is the solution. People complaining about public health decisions need to reframe this discussion. Educators aren't and never were public health experts; those public health decisions are past history. We can't change them.

However, I would like to hear the following statements addressed so that we can figure out why those providing their "expert" opinions about education (not health issues, but education) were so wrong:

1) Virtual learning is almost as good as in-person;
2) There is no such thing as learning loss (if that's true, are we realigning curriculum to account for missed learning?);
3) If there are any setbacks from closures (and the pandemic itself), we know what to do to address them quickly (apparently not, or at least the resources aren't there to address them, so perhaps the assurances should have come with caveats and specifics);
4) Kids are resilient; they will bounce back from this quickly.

All of these expert statements turned out to be wrong. Why?

We should ask questions about the claims made during those discussions based on educator expertise and try to understand what they got wrong and whether there are people who are more knowledgeable about education and child development who can offer some solutions that are more than "give us more money because we are experts and know what to do." To be clear, I'm not finding fault with individual teachers, but if professed experts don't understand why their assurances decision makers did not pan out and aren't willing to evaluate why their assumptions were faulty, all the money in the world won't help.

You want to rehash all of this in case there is another pandemic? Ok, but doesn’t seem to be the priority right now. What about the kids who are behind today?

No, I would like professed experts in education (which I am not) who claimed to know exactly what they were doing, not just three years ago but every year since, to explain how they got things wrong and what they learned from the pandemic experience for the purpose of informing the path forward. What did they miss? What could we be doing differently? What's the point of giving them more money if they don't know?

Who claimed they knew “exactly” what they were doing in an unprecedented global pandemic? School districts were making the best decisions they could with the info available at the time. No one claimed to be an expert.

The only reason to figure out “what to do differently” is to prepare for another pandemic. If we want to address the current (2023) issues then focus on what we can do without the constraints of a pandemic.

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Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

PLENTY OF BETTER QUALIFIED PEOPLE OUT THERE -- YOU HIRE THEM.

And then what?

THEY FOCUS ON THEIR JOB: EDUCATING CHILDREN.

You do not understand the hiring market for teachers.

You do not understand that we are not talking about teachers but about administrators.

They are going to get the kids caught up? LOL

Having the lunatics running the asylum is not the best recipe for anything.

Fix that first.

In your mind, the people who were following the CDC guidelines were the “lunatics”?

Well, we knew then and we know now that the CDC got a lot of things wrong. So people who blindly followed along and still want to believe the CDC is infallible, might have a screw loose.

Following the CDC in 2020 was a very reasonable approach to a global pandemic. Certainly nothing “lunatic” about it.

That's your opinion. But there was plenty to question and other organizations rebuking what the CDC said. You ignored everything else and followed the CDC because they said what you wanted to hear. And now you don't want to be faced with your questionable judgement and just want to move on. While that may be convenient for you, it's not going to work that way.

Are you under the impression that PP was the one making decisions? Ha. This thread is so crazy.

Do you also not believe "every vote counts"? If we don't learn from mistakes we are doomed to repeat them. PP hasn't learned anything. And she's not alone.

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Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

I'm a DP, and don't think firing everyone is the solution. People complaining about public health decisions need to reframe this discussion. Educators aren't and never were public health experts; those public health decisions are past history. We can't change them.

However, I would like to hear the following statements addressed so that we can figure out why those providing their "expert" opinions about education (not health issues, but education) were so wrong:

1) Virtual learning is almost as good as in-person;
2) There is no such thing as learning loss (if that's true, are we realigning curriculum to account for missed learning?);
3) If there are any setbacks from closures (and the pandemic itself), we know what to do to address them quickly (apparently not, or at least the resources aren't there to address them, so perhaps the assurances should have come with caveats and specifics);
4) Kids are resilient; they will bounce back from this quickly.

All of these expert statements turned out to be wrong. Why?

We should ask questions about the claims made during those discussions based on educator expertise and try to understand what they got wrong and whether there are people who are more knowledgeable about education and child development who can offer some solutions that are more than "give us more money because we are experts and know what to do." To be clear, I'm not finding fault with individual teachers, but if professed experts don't understand why their assurances decision makers did not pan out and aren't willing to evaluate why their assumptions were faulty, all the money in the world won't help.

You want to rehash all of this in case there is another pandemic? Ok, but doesn’t seem to be the priority right now. What about the kids who are behind today?

No, I would like professed experts in education (which I am not) who claimed to know exactly what they were doing, not just three years ago but every year since, to explain how they got things wrong and what they learned from the pandemic experience for the purpose of informing the path forward. What did they miss? What could we be doing differently? What's the point of giving them more money if they don't know?

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Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

PLENTY OF BETTER QUALIFIED PEOPLE OUT THERE -- YOU HIRE THEM.

And then what?

THEY FOCUS ON THEIR JOB: EDUCATING CHILDREN.

You do not understand the hiring market for teachers.

You do not understand that we are not talking about teachers but about administrators.

They are going to get the kids caught up? LOL

Having the lunatics running the asylum is not the best recipe for anything.

Fix that first.

In your mind, the people who were following the CDC guidelines were the “lunatics”?

Well, we knew then and we know now that the CDC got a lot of things wrong. So people who blindly followed along and still want to believe the CDC is infallible, might have a screw loose.

Following the CDC in 2020 was a very reasonable approach to a global pandemic. Certainly nothing “lunatic” about it.

That's your opinion. But there was plenty to question and other organizations rebuking what the CDC said. You ignored everything else and followed the CDC because they said what you wanted to hear. And now you don't want to be faced with your questionable judgement and just want to move on. While that may be convenient for you, it's not going to work that way.

Are you under the impression that PP was the one making decisions? Ha. This thread is so crazy.

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Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

PLENTY OF BETTER QUALIFIED PEOPLE OUT THERE -- YOU HIRE THEM.

And then what?

THEY FOCUS ON THEIR JOB: EDUCATING CHILDREN.

You do not understand the hiring market for teachers.

You do not understand that we are not talking about teachers but about administrators.

They are going to get the kids caught up? LOL

Having the lunatics running the asylum is not the best recipe for anything.

Fix that first.

In your mind, the people who were following the CDC guidelines were the “lunatics”?

Well, we knew then and we know now that the CDC got a lot of things wrong. So people who blindly followed along and still want to believe the CDC is infallible, might have a screw loose.

Following the CDC in 2020 was a very reasonable approach to a global pandemic. Certainly nothing “lunatic” about it.

That's your opinion. But there was plenty to question and other organizations rebuking what the CDC said. You ignored everything else and followed the CDC because they said what you wanted to hear. And now you don't want to be faced with your questionable judgement and just want to move on. While that may be convenient for you, it's not going to work that way.

None of it was “convenient” for me.

There wasn’t substantial evidence at that point. Any way you slice it, it was reasonable for school districts to follow CDC guidelines. Potentially too conservative but certainly not “lunatic”.

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Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

PLENTY OF BETTER QUALIFIED PEOPLE OUT THERE -- YOU HIRE THEM.

And then what?

THEY FOCUS ON THEIR JOB: EDUCATING CHILDREN.

You do not understand the hiring market for teachers.

You do not understand that we are not talking about teachers but about administrators.

They are going to get the kids caught up? LOL

Having the lunatics running the asylum is not the best recipe for anything.

Fix that first.

In your mind, the people who were following the CDC guidelines were the “lunatics”?

Well, we knew then and we know now that the CDC got a lot of things wrong. So people who blindly followed along and still want to believe the CDC is infallible, might have a screw loose.

Following the CDC in 2020 was a very reasonable approach to a global pandemic. Certainly nothing “lunatic” about it.

That's your opinion. But there was plenty to question and other organizations rebuking what the CDC said. You ignored everything else and followed the CDC because they said what you wanted to hear. And now you don't want to be faced with your questionable judgement and just want to move on. While that may be convenient for you, it's not going to work that way.

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Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

I'm a DP, and don't think firing everyone is the solution. People complaining about public health decisions need to reframe this discussion. Educators aren't and never were public health experts; those public health decisions are past history. We can't change them.

However, I would like to hear the following statements addressed so that we can figure out why those providing their "expert" opinions about education (not health issues, but education) were so wrong:

1) Virtual learning is almost as good as in-person;
2) There is no such thing as learning loss (if that's true, are we realigning curriculum to account for missed learning?);
3) If there are any setbacks from closures (and the pandemic itself), we know what to do to address them quickly (apparently not, or at least the resources aren't there to address them, so perhaps the assurances should have come with caveats and specifics);
4) Kids are resilient; they will bounce back from this quickly.

All of these expert statements turned out to be wrong. Why?

We should ask questions about the claims made during those discussions based on educator expertise and try to understand what they got wrong and whether there are people who are more knowledgeable about education and child development who can offer some solutions that are more than "give us more money because we are experts and know what to do." To be clear, I'm not finding fault with individual teachers, but if professed experts don't understand why their assurances decision makers did not pan out and aren't willing to evaluate why their assumptions were faulty, all the money in the world won't help.

You want to rehash all of this in case there is another pandemic? Ok, but doesn’t seem to be the priority right now. What about the kids who are behind today?

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Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

PLENTY OF BETTER QUALIFIED PEOPLE OUT THERE -- YOU HIRE THEM.

And then what?

THEY FOCUS ON THEIR JOB: EDUCATING CHILDREN.

You do not understand the hiring market for teachers.

You do not understand that we are not talking about teachers but about administrators.

They are going to get the kids caught up? LOL

Having the lunatics running the asylum is not the best recipe for anything.

Fix that first.

In your mind, the people who were following the CDC guidelines were the “lunatics”?

Well, we knew then and we know now that the CDC got a lot of things wrong. So people who blindly followed along and still want to believe the CDC is infallible, might have a screw loose.

Following the CDC in 2020 was a very reasonable approach to a global pandemic. Certainly nothing “lunatic” about it.

That's your opinion. But there was plenty to question and other organizations rebuking what the CDC said. You ignored everything else and followed the CDC because they said what you wanted to hear. And now you don't want to be faced with your questionable judgement and just want to move on. While that may be convenient for you, it's not going to work that way.

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

PLENTY OF BETTER QUALIFIED PEOPLE OUT THERE -- YOU HIRE THEM.

And then what?

THEY FOCUS ON THEIR JOB: EDUCATING CHILDREN.

You do not understand the hiring market for teachers.

You do not understand that we are not talking about teachers but about administrators.

They are going to get the kids caught up? LOL

Having the lunatics running the asylum is not the best recipe for anything.

Fix that first.

In your mind, the people who were following the CDC guidelines were the “lunatics”?

Well, we knew then and we know now that the CDC got a lot of things wrong. So people who blindly followed along and still want to believe the CDC is infallible, might have a screw loose.

Following the CDC in 2020 was a very reasonable approach to a global pandemic. Certainly nothing “lunatic” about it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

PLENTY OF BETTER QUALIFIED PEOPLE OUT THERE -- YOU HIRE THEM.

And then what?

THEY FOCUS ON THEIR JOB: EDUCATING CHILDREN.

You do not understand the hiring market for teachers.

You do not understand that we are not talking about teachers but about administrators.

They are going to get the kids caught up? LOL

Having the lunatics running the asylum is not the best recipe for anything.

Fix that first.

In your mind, the people who were following the CDC guidelines were the “lunatics”?

Well, we knew then and we know now that the CDC got a lot of things wrong. So people who blindly followed along and still want to believe the CDC is infallible, might have a screw loose.

Following the CDC in 2020 was a very reasonable approach to a global pandemic. Certainly nothing “lunatic” about it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

PLENTY OF BETTER QUALIFIED PEOPLE OUT THERE -- YOU HIRE THEM.

And then what?

THEY FOCUS ON THEIR JOB: EDUCATING CHILDREN.

You do not understand the hiring market for teachers.

You do not understand that we are not talking about teachers but about administrators.

They are going to get the kids caught up? LOL

Having the lunatics running the asylum is not the best recipe for anything.

Fix that first.

In your mind, the people who were following the CDC guidelines were the “lunatics”?

Well, we knew then and we know now that the CDC got a lot of things wrong. So people who blindly followed along and still want to believe the CDC is infallible, might have a screw loose.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

You are touched, but not in the way you think. I am concerned for kids, yes, and make no apologies. Shouldn't we all be? Why would you think I didn't advocate for it at the time? I did.

But I am not so far gone in worthless anger that I cannot see that they thing we need RIGHT NOW is to focus on what kids need to move forward. Blame game is a waste of time, because this whole thing has been tainted by political BS and there is no way we will get honest, meaningful introspection from people on this.

So again, blowhard, what do you propose we do to help kids right now?

Again, you can't walk and chew gum at the same time. That's your issue.

Again, the blame game isn't going to be productive, so why waste the energy? Focus the energy on things that will have an impact.

But you just want to rant. Useless blowhard. That's your issue.

You're the one ranting and raving. Blowhard, indeed.

DP. Still waiting to hear your proposal to deal with learning gaps.

Private schools should close down for two years, same as public ones did. That's the best way to close the gap.

So you have no real proposals?

Dump the school boards and start over. Back to the drawing board. The current people in place who created the problems aren't going to be the ones to fix the mess they created.

The mess exists in school districts that were closed for a year and a half and in districts that were largely open after the spring of 2020.

So I guess you don't see any problems that need fixing. We'll just keep doing the same thing and get surprised at at the results?

Of course there are things that need fixing but they need fixing everywhere, not just in districts that were closed longer three years ago than districts that were not.

Well at least you admit things are bad. But 'it's bad everywhere!" isn't really a compelling argument as to why we can't take a close look at public schools.

Ok. Schools need fixing. What should we do?

I can only speak to my personal experience, but I think that a fundamental sense of community and "we're in this together" was broken during Covid and has not been repaired. I don't think we can really do anything until we fix that. Families, at worst, feel that they were abandoned by a public school system they'd previously believed was one the rare public supports for families (as a form of education, childcare, and community and connection) that would be a constant. Teachers, at worst, feel that families were trying to sacrifice their well being for the sake of babysitting.

Until you can have a frank conversation with your school community about why decisions were made regarding reopening that will address this loss of trust, I think things will stay broken. When families don't feel that the school cares about their kids well being, or the overall well being of the family, they are unlikely to care about things like meeting attendance targets, improving test scores, raising money for extras to support teachers, etc. And when teachers think families don't care about their health or well being, they are unlikely to invest in the kind of community building that makes schools the kind of place families are excited to send their kids. It will always be a battle.

Both sides have points, by the way. I actually think it's a problem that there was never a true airing of grievances and a chance to come together. We just wallpapered over those wounds and "moved on." But as threads like this show, that didn't work so well. You can ask people to pretend everything is fine but you can't make them actually feel fine.

Huh? That’s been discussed extensively in most school communities. There can be no consensus when some people are irrational and beating a dead horse will never become productive.

Nobody thinks “everything is fine”. Most people just want to address the real issues in the schools today.

Lets take the largest districts near us, how are FCPS, DCPS, MCPS and PGPS addressing the real issues today? Most seem to be going full speed ahead at status quo and pretending school closures never happened

Where are your kids in school?

This is 100% untrue in VA.

I add HCPSS to the list as well. And PP, I am going to assume you have young kids. As this drags out and deficiencies aren't addressed, kids are graduating and moving on to higher education that they aren't prepared for. That's a huge deal because the grace you demand for districts that have not acted with urgency to address these issues is not being extended to these kids in college.

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Anonymous wrote:Ok. To some of us this was obvious from the get-go. Now go apologize to Ron DeSantis.

+ a billion.

Plus, let's demand some accountability. Time for NYT Editorial Board to resign. All of them.

Ha ha. Some of you are really pieces of work.

Worried you will lose your job?

What?

What is your interest in trying to shut down any discussion about where things went wrong? You are awfully defensive and paranoid that we might have to admit mistakes were made. Why is that?

My kids go to Catholic school, so they were back in person school in fall 2020.

Some of you are kind of crazy.

Mine too, but I had to move from a batshit crazy place to get that. Had we stayed put the kids would have been out until late spring 2021. That's messed up. There was no reason for that whatsoever. There were some terrible decisions and we should hold people accountable for that. Why not?

And you think you get to command the NYT editorial board to resign? Move on. It is 2023. The kids who were hurt the most are the ones who have crazy parents.

Why don't you just sit this conversation out if you aren't interested? What harm is it to you if people want to learn where we went wrong and how do to better in the future?

Let it go. Let it go. Some of you have lost your minds. Go for a walk or something.

You are obsessed with shutting this down. What are you so worried about? Go for a walk yourself if this doesn't interest you.

I realize that posting on a message board that the NYT editorial board must resign is crazy. And ineffective. Go run for your school board if you want to make decisions. Instead of posting nonsense here.

It's amusing how much this bothers you. Must be hitting close to home.

Everyone should be concerned with the nutters running around in 2023 trying to blame people for handling the pandemic in a reasonable, rational way. I’m sorry that the pandemic was hard for you but you’re misdirecting your anger.

The important thing now is addressing educational gaps. Focus on that.

(And glad you finally care about some of the many educational challenges that have existed for a long time and were magnified by the pandemic.)

How do you suggest we do that without admitting that there are problems? Why did the closures set kids back? What do you propose we do right now to address the problems in our public schools?

Have you ever been in a school? These problems existed before the pandemic. The pandemic just exacerbated them. Glad you are paying attention now.

Exactly.

Instead of attacking the people who are actively addressing these issues why don’t you find a way to support them.

Unless you have ulterior (political) motives.

So you are a teacher, is that why you're hyper defensive?

I’m a parent who detests irrational a-holes still attacking our schools/teachers YEARS later. It’s almost as if you don’t want to fix anything at all, just complain about it.

At least you admit your bias.

Yes, I’m biased against school-hating a-holes.

You didn't tolerate the complaining back in 2020 either. Not all of us agree that teachers and admins are beyond reproach. It's ok to hold their feet to the fire now. They were wrong.

OMG, I'm a DP and you are just gone. Out there. You don't want solutions. You want blood. Honestly, seek therapy. This anger won't help anyone. Not your kids. Not the school system. This kind of anger will lead to stupid decisions that make the situation worse.

Our kids need help. There are already teacher shortages. We need more, good teachers and parents like you will drive any decent ones out of the system. We need more funding for schools and more services for our kids. Channel your energy into that. Otherwise, you are just a worthless blowhard.

I’m touched you’re so worked up. Maybe next time you will do the right thing and advocate for schools to stay open knowing now how awful your emotionally driven, factless opinions got us to where we are. Be the change.

DP. The evidence wasn’t there. The people pushing to open no matter what in summer 2020 were irrational. “Emotionally driven, factless opinions” describe it perfectly.

Tell that to all the schools that opened in Fall 2020. If you didn't want to see the evidence, that's on you. But it was there. But you can't rewrite history to suit yourself.

They opened without evidence.

Yep, so much of the type of hindsight is 20-20 BS on this thread is a waste of time. This virus kept changing and continues to do so. It's what they do. To say they "knew" anything in Fall of 2020 is ridiculous. I actually do think schools should have reopened in person much earlier than they did in this area, but to pretend we had certainties? BS.

“Knew” in this context means “knew” to a reasonable degree of confidence. I would think that anyone who is old enough to be a parent is old enough to have discovered that there are no certainties in life.

You “knew” without substantial data to back it up. Other people were looking for actual data and/or CDC guidelines. Faulting people for being rational is ridiculous.

What are you talking about? Point to the data showing young children dying or getting seriously ill en masse at ANY point during the pandemic. You can’t, because that wasn’t happening, ever.

The ABSENCE of such cases was all the “substantial data” needed to determine that the priority should have been to keep life as normal as possible for the kids, who were not in danger, and to instead focus on keeping the elderly and other vulnerable members of society as isolated as possible for their own protection.

In late summer 2020, we did not have substantial data demonstrating that it was safe. There was IIRC just one study of a small daycare centers.

You responded to my post but you did not address the point. The absence of data showing children becoming seriously ill WAS the data.

You seem to think it’s reasonable to demand a study to prove that continuing to engage in an historically safe behavior will continue to be safe. In actuality, it is reasonable to assume a behavior that has been safe in the past will continue to be safe unless there is new evidence indicating harm. There was no such evidence to justify keeping the schools closed. At no point was Covid killing kids.

That’s not how science works…

Jesus Christ. It’s exactly how one is supposed to apply the scientific method. Generate a hypothesis (covid is gonna kill us all!), make observations (covid is killing old people and people with underlying immune, respiratory, and heart conditions), interpret results (there is a very clear and direct exponential trend of severity of outcomes from covid infection as a function of age), draw conclusions (this virus is dangerous to old people but not to kids), and in this case, suggest/implement policy (keep the schools open).

So I suppose you are correct in that “that’s not how science works” because we have an entire generation of people who don’t understand how to correctly utilize the scientific method making decisions because SCIENCE.

We did not studies on how it affected kids - particularly those crammed into tight spaces en masse - at that point. No observation. No data.

This is tiresome. Do you need a study before you walk out your front door in the morning?

No, but I’m not responsible for the health of millions of people.

In countries with universal healthcare and therefore where policymakers are actually "responsible for the health of millions of people" .... they did everything possible to OPEN schools in September 2020.

So are you pushing for universal healthcare here?

In principle I would, in practice I see the disaster in universal education in this country because so many prioritize politics over sound policy.

Fire anyone who was responsible for stealing years of education from millions of children. That should be step number 1 in fixing this.

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

What do you want their replacements to do?

And then what? Who will backfill those positions?

PLENTY OF BETTER QUALIFIED PEOPLE OUT THERE -- YOU HIRE THEM.

And then what?

THEY FOCUS ON THEIR JOB: EDUCATING CHILDREN.

You do not understand the hiring market for teachers.

You do not understand that we are not talking about teachers but about administrators.

They are going to get the kids caught up? LOL

Having the lunatics running the asylum is not the best recipe for anything.

Fix that first.

In your mind, the people who were following the CDC guidelines were the “lunatics”?

Well, we knew then and we know now that the CDC got a lot of things wrong. So people who blindly followed along and still want to believe the CDC is infallible, might have a screw loose.