Quote:Parents, cities and teachers in many places continue to wrangle over how to reopen their schools safely. Meanwhile, teachers and administrators whose buildings have been open for many months have come to some hard-earned conclusions about how to make it all work.
Some of what they learned is consistent with what many scientists have been touting—that masking, ventilation, distancing and regular testing when possible are effective ways to reduce transmission of Covid-19 in schools. Other once-lauded tactics, such as daily temperature checks and deep cleaning of surfaces, have become lower priorities.
They also have learned that teachers, not their students, are likely the primary transmitters of the virus in grade schools, that children are likely most at risk of infection during lunch time, and that tools such as portable air cleaners and carbon-dioxide monitors can help.
Some findings run counter to conventional wisdom. Hybrid learning, for example, where students split time between the classroom and home, may actually be riskier in some cases than full-time in-person classes because children are potentially exposed to more people. And it is likely fine for students to be 3 feet apart from each other instead of 6 feet, something the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention noted when it changed its guidelines on Friday.
“We were watching how outbreaks were happening around the country and world,” said Gary Krahn, the principal at La Jolla Country Day School in La Jolla, Calif., which has been open since early fall. Over time, “we were able to gain enough information to make informed decisions.”
(Wall Street Journal)
Mountain-high though the difficulties appear, terrible and gloomy though all things seem, they are but Mâyâ.
Fear not — it is banished. Crush it, and it vanishes. Stamp upon it, and it dies.
Vivekananda
Fear not — it is banished. Crush it, and it vanishes. Stamp upon it, and it dies.
Vivekananda
