By Peter Sullivan - 01/28/21 06:00 AM EST
The Biden administration is coming under pressure from Republicans to support the reopening of schools after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published new research that says that schools can operate safely despite COVID-19.
The CDC researchers on Tuesday wrote that there is “little evidence” of widespread coronavirus transmission in schools when proper precautions are followed.
Teachers unions in several places across the country, however, are resisting the push to return to in-person instruction, arguing it is not safe.
ADVERTISEMENT
Experts stress that the picture is nuanced, and schools should not be thrown open without care and precautions. But they say repeated evidence from around the country shows that schools can open safely under the right conditions.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. Albuquerque Public Schools will not offer the alternative calendar next school year.
Late last year, staff from the handful of elementary schools in the district that have an earlier start day, with intersessions in the fall and spring, pushed for the schedule. And the board said it would revisit the issue.
But after being presented with costs, and student academic and transfer data, the board made the call to maintain its initial decision to put most schools on a traditional calendar, which starts classes for the 2021-22 school year on Aug. 11, 2021, and ends them on May 25, 2022. Some schools will use an extended school year that adds days in the classroom.
Acutely aware of the militancy among educators, the corporate media and political establishment are engaged in a frenzied propaganda campaign to vilify teachers and distort science.
President Biden's goal of reopening schools in the first 100 days of his administration is running into stiff opposition from one of the Democratic Party's most powerful allies: teachers unions.