After a summer full of uncertainty and fear about how schools around the world would function in a pandemic, a consensus has emerged in more and more districts: teaching in person with young children is safer than with older ones and is especially important for their development.
On Sunday, New York City, home to the nation’s largest school system, became the best-known example of this trend when Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that only preschoolers, elementary schools, and some schools for children with complex disabilities would reopen next week after all of the classrooms the city were briefly closed in November. There are currently no plans to return middle and high school students to the city’s school buildings.
It was an abrupt U-turn for the mayor, who had promised for months to welcome all of the city’s 1.1 million children – from 3-year-olds to high school graduates – back to their classrooms this fall.
But the decision put New York in line with other cities in America and around the world that have reopened classrooms first, and often exclusively, to young children, and in some cases kept them open even as those cities faced second waves of the virus.
In-person learning is essential for young children, who often need intense parental supervision to get them signed up for the day, say education experts. And mounting evidence has shown that elementary schools are unlikely to fuel the transmission as long as the districts take tight security measures. The evidence for middle and high schools is more mixed.
“In younger children, we see this pleasant confluence of two facts: Science tells us younger children are less likely to get the virus and apparently less likely to transmit it,” said Elliot Haspel, author of Crawling Behind: America’s Child, and Nursing Crisis how to fix them. “
He added, “And younger children are the ones in need of personal education and interactions the most.”
Districts like Chicago, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles plan to bring young children back first when they eventually reopen classrooms.
In Rhode Island, Governor Gina Raimondo, a strong advocate of keeping schools open, recently urged colleges to move to distance learning after Thanksgiving, and gave districts an opportunity to reduce the number of in-person students. She said there were “no scraps of data to suggest schools are the main disseminators,” but she said that high schools have been more problematic than elementary and middle schools because students are more mobile.
This model of giving priority to younger students was introduced in Europe, where many countries kept elementary schools open, although most other parts of public life closed during the continent’s second wave.
Italy has kept its elementary schools open, but has left middle and high schools only removed, and while all schools in Germany are open, discussions about possible closings have mainly focused on high schools.
In America, more and more districts have begun to prioritize personal learning for elementary school students.
In urban counties, which generally reopened more slowly than rural and suburban counties, this meant making plans to bring the youngest students back first. In parts of the Midwest where school districts have been more aggressive in reopening and where cases have soared, public health officials have stressed that elementary schools remain open even though they have closed high schools and in some cases middle schools.
“The data is becoming increasingly convincing that transmission in daycare and elementary schools is very limited,” said Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Research and Policy on Infectious Diseases at the University of Minnesota and member of President-elect Joseph R. The Coronavirus Task Biden Jr.’s Force recently conducted an interview.
“I keep telling people:” Stop talking about children – talk about children under 10, “he added.” We see a very different epidemiology in this group than, for example, in school children. “
The data are far from perfect, but several studies have shown that children under the age of 10 transmit the virus less efficiently than older children or adults.
A study published in the journal Pediatrics interviewed 57,000 childcare workers in the United States and found that those who continued to work during the first three months of the pandemic did not get sick more often than those whose programs were closed.
This evidence has allowed experts to focus on pressing concerns about how young children are actually learning during the pandemic. Mr. Haspel and others have raised urgent concerns about the ability of children to learn to read on an iPad or laptop screen.
When teachers try to teach reading from a distance, “really tie one leg to the other and try to race,” he said, partly because young children often need lessons in small groups or individuals.
Every aspect of distance learning, from signing up to completing assignments, requires basic knowledge. It is for this reason that so many parents and carers have had to sacrifice their jobs or take their children to day care in order for the children to receive full-time assistance with completing tasks online.
Ample evidence has shown that students who do not read third grade have a very difficult time catching up with their peers who drop out of high school and are more likely to drop out.
Crucially, reopening elementary schools – while middle and high schools remain closed – has become the preferred option for influential teachers’ unions whose leaders have advocated delaying reopening plans in some cities due to a lack of federal funding, inadequate security measures, and a school spillage Concerns of ordinary educators about return to the classroom.
However, Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, the country’s second-largest teachers union, said New York’s plan to bring back elementary school students with strict safety protocols could be a national model.
“What we learned is that unlike adults, elementary school students actually follow the rules and were really good at wearing their masks and keeping physical distance and are really thankful that they have a school,” she said . “The fact that young children follow the rules and need personal education pedagogically is good news.”
When New York announced its new reopening plan, Ms. Weingarten offered her clear approval, and a supportive statement from the United Federation of Teachers, the New York teachers’ union, quickly followed.
When asked why his administration is focused on young children, Mr de Blasio said on Sunday: “I feel for all of our parents who are facing so many challenges how important it is for them to have their younger children in school how important that at this age is both educational and social. “
Some New York schools are reopening despite rising cases. However, other districts, including Chicago, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia, have pledged to reopen schools, starting with young children, only when – or when – virus cases stabilize.
Officials in Las Vegas and the surrounding suburbs had hoped to resume face-to-face learning in November. Then came a sharp spike in cases, forcing the district to postpone its plan until at least February.
But the headmaster, Jesus Jara, said he intended to bring back as many students as possible, also because of the disastrous effects of distance learning on children’s mental health: there have been 12 student suicides in the district this school year. Said Dr. Jara.
Young children will resume personal lessons first when the classrooms reopen.
“That was our biggest concern that our babies were at home for so long without personal guidance,” said Dr. Jara.
Some counties have prioritized the youngest children from the start.
In Massachusetts, the Cambridge Public School District has brought preschool-age and preschool-age children back to first grade, along with some students of all grades who are disabled or learning English.
Some districts, which opened to all grade levels earlier in the fall – and where cases have spiked – have decided to move high schools and in some cases middle schools to distance learning, but keep elementary schools open.
On November 15, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, issued an emergency order that stopped indoor service in bars and restaurants, closed casinos and cinemas, stopped most organized sports, and forced high schools and colleges to move to distance learning.
But the state kept elementary and middle schools open, saying that younger students needed in-person learning the most and that there were fewer outbreaks associated with elementary and middle schools than with high schools and colleges.
And in Johnson County, Kansas, a suburb of Kansas City, where cases are rising, the school districts have moved middle and high school to distance learning while creating in-person classes for elementary schools.
In some parts of the country, politicians and education officials have resisted calls to close high schools, despite the virus streaking their communities in the fall. President Trump has continued to insist that schools remain open, despite school principals across the country saying they need more federal incentive dollars to reopen safely.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a Republican, was one of the most vocal supporters of the school reopening. On Monday, he said officials trying to shut down schools were related to “today’s earth residents.”
The report was written by Jennifer Medina in Los Angeles, Neil MacFarquhar in New York, Melissa Eddy in Berlin and Raphael Minder in Barcelona.
Comments are closed.