K-12 Schools & COVID

[pacearrow02]

I had block in HS from So-Sr year and loved it. 

Ha no.  My mother was a superintendent for years and has poisoned me against ever teaching or taking school boards seriously.   

Haha, fait enough!!  Well keep the suggestions coming, if the couple you mentioned aren’t brought up next week I’m taking full credit as them being original thought and throwing them out there at the meeting for consideration.

[pacearrow02]

Uncalled for.  No matter your opinion on the best way to move forward it should be universally accepted that these plans may not work.  If that's doom and gloom, so be it.  I've just seen way too many "plans" not work in this country regarding COVID to have any significant level of optimism.

You’re right my apologies, was said in jest but shouldn’t have said it.

I just get frustrated when boards like these have an opportunity to be a productive conversation and an opportunity to share ideas of best practices for stuff like this but far more often then not it turns into a dick measuring contest and time wasted of people telling each other why they’re wrong. 

The last 10 minutes Hard_ and I have become best buddies and as a result my kids school environment in the fall might be a little safer.  That’s a win for everybody if you ask me.

[forgetful]

Suggestion.  Move the teachers around at the bell instead of the students.  Might be hard for science labs or art class (if that still exists), but we must adjust.  Stagger entry and release from school for the day.  Masks required at all times.

For younger kids this is what has been proposed in several states. Kids never leave the classroom (except for bathroom). Lunch, classes, recess, everything done in the same classroom.

Teachers move, and food is delivered in pre-packaged formats.

[Its DJOver]

You’re right my apologies, was said in jest but shouldn’t have said it.

I just get frustrated when boards like these have an opportunity to be a productive conversation and an opportunity to share ideas of best practices for stuff like this but far more often then not it turns into a dick measuring contest and time wasted of people telling each other why they’re wrong. 

The last 10 minutes Hard_ and I have become best buddies and as a result my kids school environment in the fall might be a little safer.  That’s a win for everybody if you ask me.

No worries.  Trust me I would love a plan that is properly implemented and allows for safe learning, I just haven't seen enough success at any level really that suggests that it can be accomplished in this country.

[pacearrow02]

No worries.  Trust me I would love a plan that is properly implemented and allows for safe learning, I just haven't seen enough success at any level really that suggests that it can be accomplished in this country.

True!  If there is any level that should be able to rise above the bickering and lack of a coherent plan let’s hope it’s the local level and school districts who all have the communities best interest in mind.

[Big Papi]

The general consensus is that once you determine the number of people/kids/participants in a group, the group has to stay intact and does not mingle with other groups.  So classrooms would stay intact for the entire day/week, etc.  Youth sports and schools in Wisconsin are doing or planning to do that.

I have a soon to be 3rd grader, junior in high school and a senior in college.  All are going to do in school participation if available provided I am comfortable with the safety protocols in place.  Unfortunately, I can't curl up in the fetal position until this goes away and frankly I don't think it will for quite a while.  In the meantime, I'm comfortable enough with my kids health and COVID stats to date to allow them to go to in person school provided the schools take the necessary basic steps that are being talked about.  There is no way that our entire family can be completely isolated.  Wife and I have jobs that require us being at work.  My side business requires me to be onsite as well.  My son who graduated high school is working in a health care setting that exposes him to COVID-19 daily.  I try to be cognizant of what I touch and mask up but I am not perfect.  Neither is my wife or children.  It's all a risk that unfortunately needs to be taken by us unless any of you shmuks want to send money my way.  I think $5,000/month would be enough to have this family of 6 stay home for the foreseeable future.  PM me if you want to donate money to me or set up a gofundme account.   

[The Hippie Satan of Hyperbole]

Ah the Onion....

https://politics.theonion.com/self-loathing-gop-congressman-can-t-believe-he-s-been-r-1844340622

"As the nation falls deeper into the grip of a pandemic that has forced compromises upon his most cherished principles, a self-loathing Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) acknowledged Friday he could not believe he had been reduced to defending the necessity of public schools in a civil society."

[The Hippie Satan of Hyperbole]

The general consensus is that once you determine the number of people/kids/participants in a group, the group has to stay intact and does not mingle with other groups.  So classrooms would stay intact for the entire day/week, etc.  Youth sports and schools in Wisconsin are doing or planning to do that.

I have a soon to be 3rd grader, junior in high school and a senior in college.  All are going to do in school participation if available provided I am comfortable with the safety protocols in place.  Unfortunately, I can't curl up in the fetal position until this goes away and frankly I don't think it will for quite a while.  In the meantime, I'm comfortable enough with my kids health and COVID stats to date to allow them to go to in person school provided the schools take the necessary basic steps that are being talked about.  There is no way that our entire family can be completely isolated.  Wife and I have jobs that require us being at work.  My side business requires me to be onsite as well.  My son who graduated high school is working in a health care setting that exposes him to COVID-19 daily.  I try to be cognizant of what I touch and mask up but I am not perfect.  Neither is my wife or children.  It's all a risk that unfortunately needs to be taken by us unless any of you shmuks want to send money my way.  I think $5,000/month would be enough to have this family of 6 stay home for the foreseeable future.  PM me if you want to donate money to me or set up a gofundme account.   

Reasonable.

[MU Fan in Connecticut]

Ah the Onion....

https://politics.theonion.com/self-loathing-gop-congressman-can-t-believe-he-s-been-r-1844340622

"As the nation falls deeper into the grip of a pandemic that has forced compromises upon his most cherished principles, a self-loathing Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) acknowledged Friday he could not believe he had been reduced to defending the necessity of public schools in a civil society."

The Onion rarely disappoints.

[#UnleashSean]

Lunch, classes, recess, everything done in the same classroom.

Teachers move, and food is delivered in pre-packaged formats

This may make the school is prison jokes a little to real.

[GooooMarquette]

This may make the school is prison jokes a little to real.

It certainly isn't ideal for the kids to be stuck in the same classroom all day. But if that becomes the only way to avoid all distance learning, I suspect most students and parents would get past it.

[pacearrow02]

It certainly isn't ideal for the kids to be stuck in the same classroom all day. But if that becomes the only way to avoid all distance learning, I suspect most students and parents would get past it.

100% agree!  Not ideal but hopefully it’s only for a few short months....over Xmas break pump everyone full of vaccine and this will all be a bad memory

[Big Papi]

For reference sakes, my 8 year old's school district survey results:

How comfortable are you with sending your child to school in the fall?

Elementary:
Comfortable with minimal to no concerns: 34%
Comfortable with some concerns: 30%
Somewhat: 17%
Not at all: 19%

Middle School
Comfortable with minimal to no concerns: 29%
Comfortable with some concerns: 29%
Somewhat: 22%
Not at all: 20%


High School:
Comfortable with minimal to no concerns: 34%
Comfortable with some concerns: 25%
Somewhat: 16%
Not at all: 25%

Top 3 factors that would make families feel more comfortable:
1. All sanitization supplies, including hand sanitizer, readily available
2. Classrooms and other gathering spaces frequently sanitized
3. Mandatory symptom checks required

Top 3 themes heard from the survey:
1. Availability and cost of childcare if schools are closed
2. Social distancing and other CDC guidelines such as wearing masks and washing hands will not be followed by students, especially younger students
3. Loss of effective education whether with content in a virtual environment or staff spending time to enforce CDC guidelines

[The Hippie Satan of Hyperbole]

One other thing.

If your kids are sick in any way, keep them home.  I don't care if you think it's just a cold, or they usually have allergies.  Just keep them home.

[pbiflyer]

100% agree!  Not ideal but hopefully it’s only for a few short months....over Xmas break pump everyone full of vaccine and this will all be a bad memory

What color is the sky in your world?
None of those things have a remote chance of happening. Trials aren’t far enough along and even if by some miracle, there is a vaccine that works in short order, there is no way  you can produce enough and deliver it to everyone. And that assumes it is created in the US. It comes from anywhere else and the US is at the back of the line to get it.
And by some miracle, it is mass produced, between its effective rate, which at best hope they say 80%, and the fact 40% of Americans say they won’t get it, we won’t have the immunity needed.

But there is that psychic that said it’s going to magically go away in December, so we got that going for us.

[MUDPT]

Thought this was excellent and thought out, but disagree with the conclusion right now.

https://www.vox.com/2020/7/9/21318560/covid-19-coronavirus-us-testing-children-schools-reopening-questions?fbclid=IwAR0KMeLQUi7NP2FwhkPvRdedJircnElgNngm5zwAiZtidX2MfaCp-ENvf2U

[forgetful]

Posted this in a different thread, but it makes more sense here.

There is a way to open schools and have it be possibly a good thing. It would accomplish much needed testing goals, and mitigate spread.

To do so:

Test all students at all levels every couple days. Any that test positive, you quarantine and screen family/contacts.

This can be accomplished on scale by using pooled sample testing, several large universities are developing this to roll out for their campus reopening testing plans.

Some Universities have modeled this, and found that reopening with universal testing platforms will actually lead to fewer cases amongst students, than if they don't reopen. The worst model, is reopening without a universal testing platform.

[pacearrow02]

Thought this was excellent and thought out, but disagree with the conclusion right now.

https://www.vox.com/2020/7/9/21318560/covid-19-coronavirus-us-testing-children-schools-reopening-questions?fbclid=IwAR0KMeLQUi7NP2FwhkPvRdedJircnElgNngm5zwAiZtidX2MfaCp-ENvf2U

Great article, thanks for passing along!!  While nothing is guaranteed with this thing the science and data suggests opening back up in the fall is worth the shot.

Having a readily available and flexible plan b will be important as the article states.

[pacearrow02]

What color is the sky in your world?
None of those things have a remote chance of happening. Trials aren’t far enough along and even if by some miracle, there is a vaccine that works in short order, there is no way  you can produce enough and deliver it to everyone. And that assumes it is created in the US. It comes from anywhere else and the US is at the back of the line to get it.
And by some miracle, it is mass produced, between its effective rate, which at best hope they say 80%, and the fact 40% of Americans say they won’t get it, we won’t have the immunity needed.

But there is that psychic that said it’s going to magically go away in December, so we got that going for us.

Last I heard from Fauci in an interview is they anticipate having 10s of millions of available doses for what he believes will be an effective vaccine by the end of the year.

He’s been wrong on just about everything else so far so this might just get added to the list but 🤞he’s right!!

Also tonight was a beautiful Wisconsin summer sunset and the sky was all sorts of pink, orange and with shades of blue to answer your question.

Enjoyed it while sipping on a lakefront IPA at a beer garden with friends while the kids ran around catching lightning bugs and horsing around on the playground equipment. 

It was pretty easy to forget about everything tonight, thankful for that! 

[forgetful]

Thought this was excellent and thought out, but disagree with the conclusion right now.

https://www.vox.com/2020/7/9/21318560/covid-19-coronavirus-us-testing-children-schools-reopening-questions?fbclid=IwAR0KMeLQUi7NP2FwhkPvRdedJircnElgNngm5zwAiZtidX2MfaCp-ENvf2U

Seems to me the author leaves out a lot of important information. The data showing that kids "don't get this" is based on data from the early phase of COVID, where really only those showing up at hospitals were being tested. Kids weren't hospitalized as much.

More recent data shows hot spots of infection driven by:

Day Cares
Day Camps

and people under 30.

A more reasonable rationale based on recent current data from hotspots (including Israeli schools), indicates that the SARS-CoV2 spreads rapidly and efficiently amongst the young, who then with a time delay spread it to older demographics that do not fair as well. We also see long-term lung scarring and damage to organs even in the young and asymptomatic.

The more recent underlying data says that letting this spread through schools/daycares is a terrible idea.

As I note above, reopening schools though can be a vector to mitigate spread. But only in the context of universal testing in schools and rigorous quarantine and contact tracing.

[MUDPT]

Seems to me the author leaves out a lot of important information. The data showing that kids "don't get this" is based on data from the early phase of COVID, where really only those showing up at hospitals were being tested. Kids weren't hospitalized as much.

More recent data shows hot spots of infection driven by:

Day Cares
Day Camps

and people under 30.

A more reasonable rationale based on recent current data from hotspots (including Israeli schools), indicates that the SARS-CoV2 spreads rapidly and efficiently amongst the young, who then with a time delay spread it to older demographics that do not fair as well. We also see long-term lung scarring and damage to organs even in the young and asymptomatic.

The more recent underlying data says that letting this spread through schools/daycares is a terrible idea.

As I note above, reopening schools though can be a vector to mitigate spread. But only in the context of universal testing in schools and rigorous quarantine and contact tracing.

Do you see research for this?  I've seen the anecdotal evidence in a daycare in Oregon and a summer camp in Kansas?, but nothing beyond that.  Here's an article dated June 16 on some of the children data: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-0962-9

[The Hippie Satan of Hyperbole]

Last I heard from Fauci in an interview is they anticipate having 10s of millions of available doses for what he believes will be an effective vaccine by the end of the year.

He’s been wrong on just about everything else so far so this might just get added to the list but 🤞he’s right!!

Also tonight was a beautiful Wisconsin summer sunset and the sky was all sorts of pink, orange and with shades of blue to answer your question.

Enjoyed it while sipping on a lakefront IPA at a beer garden with friends while the kids ran around catching lightning bugs and horsing around on the playground equipment. 

It was pretty easy to forget about everything tonight, thankful for that! 

I don't understand the notion that Fauci has "been wrong on just about everything."  He was wrong early on the masking issue when the nature of transmission wasn't as well known as it is now, but he has actually been pretty darn accurate about the consequences if we don't handle this right.

He certainly has been WAY more accurate than the President has.

[The Hippie Satan of Hyperbole]

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/07/school-openings-across-globe-suggest-ways-keep-coronavirus-bay-despite-outbreaks

Insightful article. 

It shows that schools can work with small groups, distancing and masking.  And that small children don't contribute to spread as much as older children.

BUT, this is the kicker:

"But opening safely, experts agree, isn’t just about the adjustments a school makes. It’s also about how much virus is circulating in the community, which affects the likelihood that students and staff will bring COVID-19 into their classrooms."

IOW, it doesn't matter how much work schools do, if it is spreading in the community, someone will bring it into the school.

[pacearrow02]

I don't understand the notion that Fauci has "been wrong on just about everything."  He was wrong early on the masking issue when the nature of transmission wasn't as well known as it is now, but he has actually been pretty darn accurate about the consequences if we don't handle this right.

He certainly has been WAY more accurate than the President has.

Even before the mask thing in late January he was quoted in an interviewing saying there is no reason to believe this version of coronavirus poses a serious risk to Americans.

Yes the President has been wrong as well.  Not sure why Trump gets looped back into absolutely everything but yes he too can be a moron.

[The Hippie Satan of Hyperbole]

Even before the mask thing in late January he was quoted in an interviewing saying there is no reason to believe this version of coronavirus poses a serious risk to Americans.

Yes the President has been wrong as well.  Not sure why Trump gets looped back into absolutely everything but yes he too can be a moron.

I mean...that was late January when much wasn't really known.

This idea that people who have been wrong can never be right is really odd.