Back to School?

I have a lot to say because the world is in a weird place right now. Virtual school was an impossible situation for everyone. Parents were asked to work from home and manage being both their students’ parents and teachers. Teachers with school age children were asked to teach others’ kids from home while again being both their students’ parents and teachers. All teachers were asked to completely overhaul how they do things but maintain a learning environment with high expectations without any of the normal supports they have. All parents were asked to literally do everything, on top of the everything they were already doing. I know because I am both a parent and a teacher.

Unfortunately, unless some magic happens, there is no reason we should go back to campuses in the fall. The short reason? If one young person dies because of Covid-19, isn’t that one young person too many?

Here’s the long reason, from the perspective of someone with almost 15 years of experience in a public high school. It’s harder for me to speak to lower level schools because I’ve never worked in one. For the sake of this argument, my school has 1200 students, and I am going to low-ball any estimates I make.

Students in most high schools go to four classes each day with around 25 students in each class, depending on their schedule. They might also have a gym class where multiple classes are in the gym at the same time, probably with more like 100 students. Band, Art, Spanish, and ROTC classes all generally have more than 35 students. But the low-ball estimate is that one infected student would come in contact with 100 other students just in their classes.

Every morning, students start arriving at school as early as 7 am. By 7:30, halls, classrooms, the library, and our common area lobbies are filled with students hanging out in close quarters. There is generally one teacher on duty for every 40-50 students. I’d be willing to bet that 75% of our student population are in the halls prior to classes starting at 8 am. In my area specifically, the library, we generally have 125 students in our space from 7:30-8 every day. And three times each day, every single student is in the hallway at the same time to change classes. It is possible that they have to travel the entire length of the school during that time. For students who don’t have a long way to go to their next class, common area lobbies generally have 40-50 students hanging out during that time. There is no way to estimate how many students one infected student would come in contact with during this time. I’ll say 50 because that’s how many are in lobbies.

The cafeteria creates a whole other issue. We have four lunches of 300 students each. One infected student will come in contact with people in line picking up food, has to touch the pad to enter their student ID number, and sits in the same old cafeteria tables with the round stools that you remember from your time. There is very little space between the seats. Last year, there was only a few minutes between lunches, definitely not enough time to disinfect every single thing. If the infected student is in first lunch, what will they leave behind them for the students in later lunches? Again, I don’t think there is a way to estimate how many students one infected student would come in contact with during this time. I’ll say 25.

None of this includes the bathrooms. None of it takes into account the movement of students during classes, those who visit the library or student services or the main office. None of this includes the more than 125 people that we have working in the building at any given time. Classes can have more than one teacher. Cafeteria workers, janitors, and counselors come into contact with students constantly. We have exceptional children assistants who work very closely with several students. For those, I’ll add another 25 people one infected student would come into contact with for an even 200 people now potentially infected.

All it would take is for half of that low-ball estimate, 200, to actually be infected and then half of that half, 50 students, to show back up to school the next day for that number to skyrocket. One infects 50, 50 would infect literally every single person in the building.

None of this takes into account what happens then, when those students carry everything back home with them.

Yes, there are safety measures that could be put in place. We can check temperatures on the way in. We can limit the number of students in bathrooms at once and we can require masks. My question for two of those things is very simply, who will do them? The teachers who are busy planning and executing their classes, grading papers, going to constant meetings, whose literal job is to educate the future generations? The counselors who are managing the social and emotional needs of a caseload of 300 students, as well as advising them on choices for the future? The janitors who were busy constantly cleaning and sanitizing every surface before this was even a problem, but who are also our landscapers, keyholders, and go-to for almost anything? Whose job will it be, on top of their actual job, to stand outside the bathrooms all day and count students?

As to wearing masks, none of this takes into account the politicization of masks. Schools are generally a microcosm of the world around them, and the school I work at serves both left and right wing students, some of whom are extremely outspoken and have no problem voicing their opinions about their ideological differences. I imagine the same would be true with masks since that is what is happening in our community. We’d be putting students into a risky situation not just for their lives, but for fights between those who cannot voice their opinions without escalating to violence. And none of this takes into account those students who will openly disobey and disregard simply because they’ve been told they have to do something. Many teenagers don’t generally like being told what to do. Are we to simply suspend students who will not? Isn’t that undermining the whole point of re-opening the schools, which is educating the students in person? If we send them home, how is that different than virtual school?

None of this takes into account the question of who will be paying for the additional supplies. Where will the masks the students are required to wear come from? With whose money are the teachers to get the disinfecting wipes they use to wipe down 25 desks in the four minutes between classes during which they also have to go to the bathroom and are required to stand on duty in the hallways?

None of this brings up the question of liability, of how many of our students can’t afford to get sick because they do not have healthcare, of the lingering effects of the disease if it does not kill you.

But most simply, wouldn’t the death of one student because of Covid-19 be one too many? Imagine the trauma of the family and, almost as importantly, the students at that school. Imagine the blame and the guilt.

I struggled with working from home at the same time Jason was and while trying to parent two 3.5 year olds. They have stared at screens for way too long and there has been a lot of yelling. But I will gladly take that option again rather than sit in a building wondering whether one of us is unknowingly going to cause someone to die and who it will be.

And while we’re on the subject, if you followed all these statistics and probabilities and agree that face-to-face learning is not worth the life of one young person per school building, then you also understand Black Lives Matter. 1 in every 1000 black men will be killed by a police officer. We’re facing down two health crises in this country, not one. Be better humans, wear your damn masks, and always, always stand up against oppression.