PITTSFIELD, Mass. — Two seniors, one from each of the city's high schools, were honored for their high reaching academics and community involvement at Wednesday's school committee.
Masking will be a key strategy in returning to school safely amid the continued presence of COVID-19 and its delta variant, said a pair of Duke University pediatrics professors who also stressed the importance of enforcing and adhering to mask policies.
Dr. Danny Benjamin, chair of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Developmentâs Pediatric Trials Network, compared enforcing mask-wearing in schools to giving a child medicine to treat strep throat.
âIt will do you no good if you pour it into the childâs mouth and the child promptly spits it out,â he said in a Duke University-hosted media briefing Wednesday on navigating the return to school. âI prescribed amoxicillin, but itâs not going to solve your problem, and the same thing is I think what we are going to see if school districts struggle a little bit with some increased clusters and some secondary transmission.â
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PITTSFIELD â The United Educators of Pittsfield is criticizing the School Committeeâs decision to approve a one-year commitment to a virtual academy, and with it is suspending talks over a new contract.
âAs we emerge from the crisis created by the pandemic, the School Committee is creating an unnecessary crisis in our schools by not settling a fair contract with its educators,â said UEP President Melissa Campbell in a statement. âThe biggest threat [to] the long-term future of our public schools is not the lack of a virtual academy, it is the lack of contract that will allow Pittsfield to attract and retain quality educators.â
PITTSFIELD â The School Committee has voted in favor of opening a stand-alone virtual school with capacity for over 300 students next school year, but, because of budgetary considerations, it offered only a one-year commitment to the program.
The idea of offering an all-online school program in Pittsfield dates to last summer, when districts across the state developed virtual school options for students during the coronavirus pandemic.
Pittsfield Public Schools launched the all-online Pittsfield Public Virtual Academy, which accepted students in kindergarten through 12th grade, with a focus on medically vulnerable children, led by Principal Carl Tillona.
The offering was popular, according to feedback from a group of parents whose children were enrolled in the program, School Committee member William Cameron said at a recent public meeting, and they asked school leaders to retain such a pandemic-era offering.