“Local control” is a fancy way of saying ‘the lowest level of government with the Reactionary program.’
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“Dear Teachers, thank you for being a front-line soldier for America. We know that some of you will sacrifice your life to reopen the schools, but remember it is important for our economy. Unfortunately, we can’t afford to give you and your students sufficient PPE, so be sure to buy enough with your own funds (as you already do for pencils and other supplies). And of course, if the unfortunate happens, we’ll be sure to remember you every year on Memorial Day. Meanwhile, good luck and God be with you.”
P.S. Given the lowered state tax receipts, we have to institute a 50% cut in pay. Rest assure your fellow citizens appreciate your sacrifice.
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Depending on the district, I expect that the re-opening guidelines will vary from “no masks required or even recommended” to “mask up everyone”. The enforcement will be spotty, at best. Teachers have been providing hundreds of dollars of supplies for their classrooms due to budget cuts. I expect that they will also be expected to provide face masks and sanitizer.
This has the potential to be a disaster. For the past few decades, teachers have had to do the best they can with inadequate support and increasing demands. This might be the demand that breaks things. It would be understatement to call it “the final straw” because the demands from this will be more like construction beams.
We’re also seeing news features about school openings that note that “in case of a spike in cases, districts will return to distance learning”. Since cases are much higher than they were in March when districts sent everyone home, I hate to think of what kind of spike it will require. One thing I know for sure is that the meeting to decide if it is safe for students and teachers to meet face to face will happen over Zoom. There’s no way the admin will risk being in a room with lots of people.
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Wondering if all those involved (DeSantis, Corcoran, Devos, and Trump) could be personally sued in the event of someone’s child dying because of this.
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I’m glad they decided that playing with peoples kids lives was the way to go. I’m growing more and more confident every day that not a single elected GOP is going to win a race this year.
I also read that local health officials can over rule this odd decision. I hope they do what’s right.
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Don’t be too confidant about school administrators being concerned about Covid safety. Admin can be Covidiots too.
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As a part-time teacher and having observed my kids doing distance learning this spring, I am skeptical. Unless you have schools and districts big enough to spread that workload evenly over an integer number of teachers, even the optimistic versions of that plan will require more staff and other resources than schools currently have. At the very least, you’re going to need one set of teachers to do the in-person (with distancing, it is to be hoped) and another set to do the direct remote learning. But good luck.
I think that the part of the order allowing individual districts to make their own decisions isn’t about autonomy but rather about deflecting blame. If a school district decides to go remote, any complaints to the state can be answered by “We told them to open in person, but they ignored us”, and if a district decides to go in person and infects all of its staff and students and parents, it will be “We told them to assess the risks and go remote if they thought it wasn’t safe.”
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The second sentence begins with “Absent these directives,” referring to directives coming from “the Florida Department of Health, local departments of health, Executive Order 20-149 and subsequent executive orders.” IANAL, but those words don’t sound like, “just kidding about the directives, do what you want.”
But, I think (IANAL, recall) you are right that there is substantial room for local variation. It seems to me that the order is requiring school boards and governing boards to offer full-time in-person instruction, but does not require that all individual schools be open for such instruction.
There is some sense to that. If kids are home all day, parents who want to or need to work outside of the home would find it difficult.
In Sweden, one of the justifications used for keeping the schools open was that healthcare workers and other essential workers would be put in a tough position if their young children were home all day.
I think, too, that the risk is not as great as most of us fear. The experience in Sweden, Germany, and some other places that reopened schools or kept them open was that it didn’t seem to lead to much covid transmission. That certainly seemed to be the case in the two schools our children were in.
As we learn more about the virus, we need to get very smart about targeting the activities that present the worst risk-to-benefit ratios. For some reason, covid does not seem to take advantage of the remarkable germ-sharing behaviors of children.
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Sorry this is long. I’m in Arizona, not FL, but our schools are facing big unknowns. I attended the planning session at the school where I taught for 20 yearss, and a virtual board meeting about delaying the start of school.
Parents would have a choice of regular face-to-face, a temporary “brick-to-click” for students to be associated with a teacher/classroom but do lessons at home as needed, or a full time remote learning program. Some of the planned modifications included staggered start times, lunches in the classroom, disinfecting at the end of every period, plexiglass dividers at lab tables (I taught middle school science). But no reduction in class size so there would still be students seated together. Extra disinfecting, sanitizer in classrooms. Masks went from being recommended to required after the county mandate. Face shields provided for teachers.
After weeks of soul-searching, I turned in my resignation last week. I would have taught one more year and retired in 2021, but the anxiety about the risks, the necessary changes to all of my 30 years of teaching, plus trying to implement a new curriculum for science that relies on collaboration and investigations- it was too much. I do not envy my fellow teachers facing the return to the classroom.
It’s not just about the kids, it’s also about all of the adults and the vulnerable people who will be at greater risk as we put so many people in small places.
And yet, how do families cope with the need for child care and education for their children, when they need be able to work to support themselves? How do they weigh the risks of sending kids back to school knowing they may become vectors for Covid or become sick and need care? There are no satisfactory answers
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Well, I guess if you WONDERED if the Florida GOP would play with the lives of your children, here’s your answer. A resounding YES!!!
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Get rid of Trump NOW and I guarantee that–free from the distractions which tie up 60% of our time–a Manhattan Project (Govt./Private Sector/University)-level effort rivaling what we can do and have done would go a long way to resolving our problem.
The entire problem is Trump and that which keeps him in Power.
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I interpret the second sentence differently.
“Absent these directives, the day-to-day decision to open or close a school must always rest locally…” to me means the local authority can close a school due to weather, fire, loss of electricity, damage to the building, etc., but the decision to close for health concerns rests with the state and the FL Dep’t of Health.
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What are they offering for the teachers?
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Please remember these are the same people who have no problem putting children in cages. The only point of reopening the schools like this is a failure of humanity.
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I have a feeling the alligators are just biding their time.
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So the children are going to teach too? I know you don’t mean that, but the schools are full of teachers, administrators, support staff – many of whom are in high-risk groups. What is being done to protect them?
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My sister-in-law taught second and third grade in one of the poorest areas in Cleveland. She has dealt with many, many issues for her kids. She’s retired now, but she is also child onset diabetic and a cancer survivor. Teachers like her should not be put in the position to have to decide whether to guard their health or teach their kids. It would be absolute hell for her to make the decision.
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Pointless without the teachers’ cooperation.
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I learned long ago that logic and careful parsing of legal text is not a reliable way to understand what that text means to prosecutors and judges. I still try to apply logic and parsing, but accept that it may be in vain.
Your comment wasn’t enough for me to understand why “in the absence of” doesn’t do what I think it should, but I will accept that it means what you say it does.
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