New Video: “Kids in CRISIS as liberals shutter schools again”

[HuffsAhoy 7,433]

1 minute ago, POP2 said:

I hate to say this, but you must come from a pretty privileged school district. My brother works for a fairly poor district and this was NOT the case at all. A large majority of the students fell behind and student scores plummeted. 

That tells me the district didn't do their part in ensuring success. I live and work in a rural school district and they were able to pull together resources and make it work. Was it easy? Hell no. But what we were able to accomplish last year was nothing short of remarkable. Our virtual school had 5,000 students grades K-12 and over 300 teachers; it was created from scratch in 30 days. I'm sorry his district failed the kids, but that's no mark against virtual learning. 

[SharkmanthaC 115,045]

2 minutes ago, Gagaloo911 said:

That's all fine and dandy, and props to all of you for doing that and all that you could to keep your students on track. Unfortunately, an anecdote here and there doesn't disprove the science and data out there showing just how far behind children on the whole have fallen since the pandemic started, and poor children most of all.

Proficiency in math and reading, for example, are two cases in point, which have dropped dramatically as illustrated in the video with the data to back it up.

Does the data show where those students would have been if they were in school? We can catch children up academically. It’s what we do as educators. 

[POP2 4,206]

1 minute ago, HuffsAhoy said:

That tells me the district didn't do their part in ensuring success. I live and work in a rural school district and they were able to pull together resources and make it work. Was it easy? Hell no. But what we were able to accomplish last year was nothing short of remarkable. Our virtual school had 5,000 students grades K-12 and over 300 teachers; it was created from scratch in 30 days. I'm sorry his district failed the kids, but that's no mark against virtual learning. 

It’s a very poor district, many students don’t have access to Wi-Fi at home. But yes, blame the school district. Your district is the anomaly and NOT the norm. 

[SharkmanthaC 115,045]

2 minutes ago, POP2 said:

It’s a very poor district, many students don’t have access to Wi-Fi at home. But yes, blame the school district. Your district is the anomaly and NOT the norm. 

No his school district is the norm. I work at a poor title 1 school. We have our WiFi boxes to families. And I get it parents work, but parents were still able to help their kids in the evenings etc. That’s called being a parent and it sucks because we are in a pandemic right now. I know that poor kids are in the worst situation right now because of the pandemic and for some kids the safest place is school. That being the case, we should be doing everything we can to keep schools safe from Covid and that isn’t happening. So many districts are optional masks now and kids are coming to school sick because the CDC says we shouldn’t screen at entry anymore. If you want to keep kids in person then we need a lot more safety measures for that to happen. 

[HuffsAhoy 7,433]

Just now, POP2 said:

It’s a very poor district, many students don’t have access to Wi-Fi at home. But yes, blame the school district. 

That isn't an excuse when the government gave out billions in COVID funds for schools across the nation last year. The money my district received went into, among other things, purchasing thousands of wifi hotspots that families who "check-out" for the semester or school year. The funds also went toward waiving school fees for those who applied, free meals were given out daily at many locations, the list goes on and on. This year, they've even been able to provide teachers extra pay an if they join the learning loss programs after school. Again, that district is failing the students. 

[DontDoubtDavid 1,196]

As a teacher, having gone through COVID through the last two years, it's been really rough on teachers and students. I'm feeling the effects of having gone virtual and am really worried about the long term effects, especially in math. Last year was just a depressing year, and you could tell the kids were miserable. It's really nice seeing the school come back to life this year and seeing kids be kids again. I don't think locking down is necessary, as long as we wear our masks and be careful, it'll be fine. Very few kids have been quarantined this school year, and those who get it have very mild to no symptoms. My district has done a good job in slowing down the spread with the mask mandates and quarantine protocols, so it's not necessary.

[ceminay 1,122]

Remote school is not school. Almost every western European country has kept school open even during their longest lockdowns when vaccines weren’t available, most countries don’t even mask kids under the age of 6 or even 12, whereas 3 year olds have to wear masks in the US.

Kids in those countries and their teachers have been doing fine. The US needs to stop seeing this as a culture war and realize it’s a huge problem. Schools are completely essential and cannot close when everything else is open.

The flu is a bigger threat to kids, putting their education and important developmental years on hold with no end in sight is dangerous and they will never forgive us in the future. The US needs to shake itself back together and realize how destructive this is to futures generations, especially low income students who rely on real school to excel. The gap between high and low income will just become worse.

 

[POP2 4,206]

1 minute ago, HuffsAhoy said:

That isn't an excuse when the government gave out billions in COVID funds for schools across the nation last year. The money my district received went into, among other things, purchasing thousands of wifi hotspots that families who "check-out" for the semester or school year. The funds also went toward waiving school fees for those who applied, free meals were given out daily at many locations, the list goes on and on. This year, they've even been able to provide teachers extra pay an if they join the learning loss programs after school. Again, that district is failing the students. 

Well, he works for an inner city school. Unfortunately when your school is majority black, the red state doesn’t care much about them. Sending kids back to school disproportionately affects black and brown students… but lefties aren’t ready for that conversation. Again, this is not an anomaly. Inner city schools around the country maybe struggled endlessly with virtual learning. 

[HuffsAhoy 7,433]

10 minutes ago, Gagaloo911 said:

Proficiency in math and reading, for example, are two cases in point, which have dropped dramatically as illustrated in the video with the data to back it up.

Math and reading proficiency has been plummeting in the US for decades, thanks in part to REPUBLICANS cutting education funds. If anything, this pandemic has shown us the ugly underpinning of our education system. Cuts here and cuts there for the last decade have finally exploded into a  fiasco that could have been avoided had our governments been properly funding schools all along. 

[PartySick 172,529]

9 minutes ago, HuffsAhoy said:

As a high school teacher who taught virtually from March 2020-May 2021, I can say without a doubt that virtual learning is a legitimate way to educate children. I had nothing but positive experiences getting students engaged, tracking their progress with the material, and I feel confident that my students did not "fall behind" in their learning. We met daily for one hour and I offered tutoring for 90 minutes after our lunch hour. This right wing fan-fiction that remote learning is a vacation for educators is nothing but a insulting lie used to spread propaganda.

My colleagues and I worked our asses off planning and teaching lessons to keep our kids from sinking into the abyss. Do some students benefit more virtually? Absolutely. Do some struggle virtually? Also absolutely. While I will agree that some social-emotional learning has been impacted by virtual learning the last two years, it's nothing that cannot be overcome and worked through. At the end of the day, it all falls onto the parents. If your school is moving to remote learning for a period of time, it's YOUR job to ensure your children are logging in and participating daily. I can only do so much as a teacher. 

 

1 minute ago, SamanthaC said:

1. No need to be rude.

2. Students should be in person as long as it is safe.

I have worked in a school for the past 15 years. I would much rather have kids in person. Our district just went masks optional so I’m expecting to see our cases sky rocket. It has been super difficult to deal with staffing shortages and lack of subs. This isn’t a situation like other workplaces where if someone is out it’s fine. We need adults to supervise children and we have been told we can’t combine classes to limit exposure. But no one is going to care about a child’s social/emotional health if they are dead. And to echo what @HuffsAhoy has said, a school can only do so much. Parents need to step up but let’s hold the teachers responsible for raising children. Parents were able to pick up hot meals from schools during shut downs and received extra money for food as well. Saying schools need to be open for meals isn’t a strong enough argument. I want kids to be in person as much as possible, but I really think this needs to be evaluated at a local level depending on the cases. 
 

This year will see a mass exodus of educators because of the lack of respect they are receiving during a pandemic. 

I honestly can't imagine how y'all feel   I'm pissed off almost daily with people being irresponsible or nasty and I only have my own health, my grandma, and my staff (all of whom are vaccinated and masked) to worry about. Imagine putting a class (or several classes) of children on top of that

[Gagaloo911 12,959]

4 minutes ago, SamanthaC said:

1. No need to be rude.

2. Students should be in person as long as it is safe.

I have worked in a school for the past 15 years. I would much rather have kids in person. Our district just went masks optional so I’m expecting to see our cases sky rocket. It has been super difficult to deal with staffing shortages and lack of subs. This isn’t a situation like other workplaces where if someone is out it’s fine. We need adults to supervise children and we have been told we can’t combine classes to limit exposure. But no one is going to care about a child’s social/emotional health if they are dead. And to echo what @HuffsAhoy has said, a school can only do so much. Parents need to step up but let’s hold the teachers responsible for raising children. Parents were able to pick up hot meals from schools during shut downs and received extra money for food as well. Saying schools need to be open for meals isn’t a strong enough argument. I want kids to be in person as much as possible, but I really think this needs to be evaluated at a local level depending on the cases. 
 

This year will see a mass exodus of educators because of the lack of respect they are receiving during a pandemic. 

I was merely pointing out the reality that that point was addressed in the video, not being rude.

Also, children just aren't dying from COVID like adults, only in the most extreme cases and when they have significant underlying health conditions if they are. Are we shutting down schools because of the flu or other illnesses, which see far more deaths in children? 

Also, the hot meals point was literally one example, not the entire argument for why to keep schools open lol

It's obviously not all on the teachers, and parents aren't making it so. And the government needs to be doing much more to fund and support educators and school districts. But shutting down schools really isn't helping safety when children just aren't being affected by COVID like it's made out to be, and is in fact hurting them more than anything. The science and data are there to show it.

[POP2 4,206]

4 minutes ago, SamanthaC said:

No his school district is the norm. I work at a poor title 1 school. We have our WiFi boxes to families. And I get it parents work, but parents were still able to help their kids in the evenings etc. That’s called being a parent and it sucks because we are in a pandemic right now. I know that poor kids are in the worst situation right now because of the pandemic and for some kids the safest place is school. That being the case, we should be doing everything we can to keep schools safe from Covid and that isn’t happening. So many districts are optional masks now and kids are coming to school sick because the CDC says we shouldn’t screen at entry anymore. If you want to keep kids in person then we need a lot more safety measures for that to happen. 

Again, you must come from a fairly privileged district. My brother works for an inner city school in a red state. No funding. 

[SharkmanthaC 115,045]

2 minutes ago, ceminay said:

Remote school is not school. Almost every western European country has kept school open even during their longest lockdowns when vaccines weren’t available, most countries don’t even mask kids under the age of 6 or even 12, whereas 3 year olds have to wear masks in the US.

Kids in those countries and their teachers have been doing fine. The US needs to stop seeing this as a culture war and realize it’s a huge problem. Schools are completely essential and cannot close when everything else is open.

The flu is a bigger threat to kids, putting their education and important developmental years on hold with no end in sight is dangerous and they will never forgive us in the future. The US needs to shake itself back together and realize how destructive this is to futures generations, especially low income students who rely on real school to excel. The gap between high and low income will just become worse.

 

I’m sorry but these new variants have really hit kids hard. The flu is not worse. I don’t know how those places kept it at bay but we have had many students catch Covid. We had a teacher die in our district as well. 

[HuffsAhoy 7,433]

1 minute ago, PartySick said:

 

I honestly can't imagine how y'all feel   I'm pissed off almost daily with people being irresponsible or nasty and I only have my own health, my grandma, and my staff (all of whom are vaccinated and masked) to worry about. Imagine putting a class (or several classes) of children on top of that

All of this verbal abuse and questioning of my intelligence/experience for $38,000 a year  

[HuffsAhoy 7,433]

5 minutes ago, ceminay said:

Remote school is not school.

Funny, since online learning has literally been a thing for just about the last two decades.