Teachers Are Fighting Back Against Bipartisan Push to Reopen Schools
Students wait to enter the school at Freedom Preparatory Academy on February 10, 2021, in Provo, Utah.
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On Christmas Day, Georgia Elementary School teacher Patrick Key died of complications due to coronavirus. A few days later, the district confirmed the deaths of two more educators: Dana Johnson, an elementary school teacher, and Cynthia Lindsey, a paraprofessional. Three teachers died in less than a month.
This is the price of reopening schools.
Across the country, there are still many regions with consistently high infection and death rates. Even with schools closed, over one in three people in Los Angeles has gotten the virus. And now there is an all out onslaught against teachers unions in order to force through unsafe plans to get teachers and students back in the classroom. Itâs coming from the top, with the Biden administration placing school reopenings at the top of its
Updated at 5:30 p.m. ET
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released on Friday its much-anticipated, updated guidance to help school leaders decide how to safely bring students back into classrooms, or keep them there.
Rather than a political push to reopen schools, the update is a measured, data-driven effort to expand on old recommendations and advise school leaders on how to layer the most effective safety precautions: masking, physical distancing, hand-washing and respiratory etiquette, ventilation and building cleaning, and contact tracing.
For politicians, parents and school leaders looking for a clear green light to reopen schools, this is not it.
CDC Says Schools Can Safely Reopen, But Will They?
Feb. 12, 2021 – The CDC on Friday released long-awaited guidance for how public K-12 schools in the United States should reopen, and advice on what to do to stay that way.
The 35-page document makes clear the Biden administration’s position: “It is critical for schools to open as safely and as soon as possible, and remain open, to achieve the benefits of in-person learning and key support services,” the document’s executive summary says.
The agency says that it’s been shown that schools can reopen safely if they follow strict mitigation strategies,” whether or not teachers and staff have received the COVID-19 vaccine. But, the agency also urges states and local communities to prioritize educators for vaccines as soon as supplies allow it.