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> It was to protect staff & their families, and generally reduce community spread. There is no evidence that school closures had any positive impact on communi

> It was to protect staff & their families, and generally reduce community spread. There is no evidence that school closures had any positive impact on community spread, FWIW. Hell, even for Influenza, which kids are much less resistant to than they are for COVID, studies have often found that school closures are counterproductive due to actually ending up with an increased number and diversity of contacts/events. > but I don't think we'd have been able to keep fully in-person school running last year anyway. But why do you think this? Are you aware that many parts of the world have returned to fully in-person school for several months or longer at this point? That here in deep blue parts of the US we are unique in our rabid devotion to denying children in-person school? > The ones that went in-person suffered badly, in some cases worse than fully-online cohorts. [Citation Needed] > The only way to fix it would have been a policy of having teachers & students who very likely were COVID-exposed but not actively ill-feeling come in until it was proven that they were COVID-positive—but that policy would also have increased spread, so I wouldn't guarantee that'd actually improve the situation of having too many staff out for quarantine. First of all I actually reject the premise that avoiding spread is necessarily a good thing. Indeed it only prolongs the epidemic stage and as the rise of variants like Delta have shown, even rushing out vaccines in an unprecedented amount of time hasn't actually allowed people to avoid the virus. I should also mention that for teachers who are quarantining (which remember is also a result of policy, you're not talking about teachers being unable to teach due to being sick, but rather being forbidden from in-person teaching because they or someone they know hit a positive on a PCR test), they could still teach remotely to a class of in-person kids (yes you might need some other adult to oversee things, but I'd wager even without such supervision you'd still have far better results than the unmitigated disaster that "distance" learning has been) The kids who have survived distance learning have done well in spite of it, not because of it. They have access to tutors and learning pods and actually have a quiet space at home to do work, and actually have parents that give a shit. Not everyone has those resources. But yeah I really want to hammer home the point that, the only possible way in which we wouldn't have "been able to keep fully in-person school running last year" is purely itself an artifact of absurd COVID quarantine policies, and has nothing to do with an actual lack of staff nor an actual crippling health problem preventing people from being able to work.

handrous 5y ago
> > but I don't think we'd have been able to keep fully in-person school running last year anyway. > But why do you think this? Are you aware that many parts of the world have returned to fully in-person school for several months or longer at this point? That here in deep blue parts of the US we are unique in our rabid devotion to denying children in-person school? Because they're—US schools in my city—barely managing this year, due to staffing/substitute shortages? I'm not in a deep blue part of the US, incidentally. > > The ones that went in-person suffered badly, in some cases worse than fully-online cohorts. > [Citation Needed] I have insight into districts that accidentally ran experiments for this, by running in-person and fully online programs concurrently. I can't share the numbers (they were in internal documents, with only some presented at school board meetings, which I certainly didn't save links to). Look at education & public policy journals in the coming years, should be some "fun" results (spoiler: everything was extremely bad, not just online learning) > First of all I actually reject the premise that avoiding spread is necessarily a good thing. .... ok. > [quarantining teachers] could still teach remotely to a class of in-person kids (yes you might need some other adult to oversee things, but I'd wager even without such supervision you'd still have far better results than the unmitigated disaster that "distance" learning has been) The amount of planning and support you need to make this work, on short-ish notice, under the constraints and in the environment schools were operating in, makes it unrealistic. Overall, you're severely underestimating the disruption this has all had on in-person schooling, and the stress it's added for staff. You're overestimating how much extra work and (perceived, if you like) risk teachers were willing to take on, before they'd have simply quit. > But yeah I really want to hammer home the point that, the only possible way in which we wouldn't have "been able to keep fully in-person school running last year" is purely itself an artifact of absurd COVID quarantine policies, and has nothing to do with an actual lack of staff nor an actual crippling health problem preventing people from being able to work. I 100% guarantee you there'd have been a significant loss of staff at schools in our area if you announced a policy that all staff & students were to come in unless actually too ill to attend. You'd have had serious problems with sick-outs among the rest. Again: schools would have been crippled due to staffing reasons. You may disagree with what those people chose to do in response to that policy, but it's what they would have done. Source: I know a shitload of teachers in my area, and all of the ones who could afford to walk away from their job, spent most of last year right on the cusp of doing so, and they were absolutely serious about it. That kind of policy would have pushed every single one over the edge, instantly. Again, I'm not even in a "deep blue" area (rather more red than blue, in fact). I assume that effect would have been even worse in "blue" areas. Your plan would not have worked, for staffing reasons. In-person school this year is barely working... for staffing reasons. That's just a fact, source: go talk to any public school teachers or administrators and ask them how the substitute supply situation is going, and how school attendance is going (80-85%ish daily attendance rates are common this year). Get ready for some stories. Attempting it last year would have gone even worse.

handrous 5y ago

> > but I don't think we'd have been able to keep fully in-person school running last year anyway. > But why do you think this? Are you aware that many parts of the world have returned to fully in-person school for several months or longer at this point? That here in deep blue parts of the US we are unique in our rabid devotion to denying children in-person school? Because they're—US schools in my city—barely managing this year, due to staffing/substitute shortages? I'm not in a deep blue part of the US, incidentally. > > The ones that went in-person suffered badly, in some cases worse than fully-online cohorts. > [Citation Needed] I have insight into districts that accidentally ran experiments for this, by running in-person and fully online programs concurrently. I can't share the numbers (they were in internal documents, with only some presented at school board meetings, which I certainly didn't save links to). Look at education & public policy journals in the coming years, should be some "fun" results (spoiler: everything was extremely bad, not just online learning) > First of all I actually reject the premise that avoiding spread is necessarily a good thing. .... ok. > [quarantining teachers] could still teach remotely to a class of in-person kids (yes you might need some other adult to oversee things, but I'd wager even without such supervision you'd still have far better results than the unmitigated disaster that "distance" learning has been) The amount of planning and support you need to make this work, on short-ish notice, under the constraints and in the environment schools were operating in, makes it unrealistic. Overall, you're severely underestimating the disruption this has all had on in-person schooling, and the stress it's added for staff. You're overestimating how much extra work and (perceived, if you like) risk teachers were willing to take on, before they'd have simply quit. > But yeah I really want to hammer home the point that, the only possible way in which we wouldn't have "been able to keep fully in-person school running last year" is purely itself an artifact of absurd COVID quarantine policies, and has nothing to do with an actual lack of staff nor an actual crippling health problem preventing people from being able to work. I 100% guarantee you there'd have been a significant loss of staff at schools in our area if you announced a policy that all staff & students were to come in unless actually too ill to attend. You'd have had serious problems with sick-outs among the rest. Again: schools would have been crippled due to staffing reasons. You may disagree with what those people chose to do in response to that policy, but it's what they would have done. Source: I know a shitload of teachers in my area, and all of the ones who could afford to walk away from their job, spent most of last year right on the cusp of doing so, and they were absolutely serious about it. That kind of policy would have pushed every single one over the edge, instantly. Again, I'm not even in a "deep blue" area (rather more red than blue, in fact). I assume that effect would have been even worse in "blue" areas. Your plan would not have worked, for staffing reasons. In-person school this year is barely working... for staffing reasons. That's just a fact, source: go talk to any public school teachers or administrators and ask them how the substitute supply situation is going, and how school attendance is going (80-85%ish daily attendance rates are common this year). Get ready for some stories. Attempting it last year would have gone even worse.