After nearly a year of remote learning, DC Public Schools is welcoming students back to campus on Tuesday. About 9,000 students and 1,800 teachers are expected to return to school buildings. It was a gut-wrenching decision for many families who weighed whether to send children back.
Reopening schools has been a source of great stress and conflict from the start, when unions representing teachers, principals, and nurses first accused the mayor’s team of excluding them from decision-making around safety measures. Strife between school officials and teachers continued into the start of in-person instruction on Tuesday.
While DC Public Schools eventually reached an agreement with the Washington Teachers’ Union over reopening schools in December, the teachers’ union has accused school leaders of breaching it. An independent arbitrator ultimately cleared DC Public Schools to reopen schools this week, in response to a formal complaint issued by the union.