Close to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States, in a community full of resident health professionals, the school system in Decatur, Georgia, did not lack expert opinion on the possibility of resuming face-to-face classes in the midst of the AIDS pandemic. coronavirus.
Dozens of public health professionals and doctors from Atlanta’s affluent and politically liberal suburb have assessed what is best for their children’s schools.
An emergency physician said that the initial reopening plans for more than 5,000 students in the district were not safe enough. A pediatrician who did epidemiology work for the CDC defended the postponement. Others, including a leader in the CDC’s COVID-19 vaccine efforts, argued that the district could safely bring students back to classrooms – and that failing to do so would impair their development and mental health.
“The challenge for me has been trying to weigh all these things that are told by experts and non-experts to try to make the best possible decision,” said Superintendent David Dude. “And that’s what I, and I’m sure other superintendents, have been fighting for.”
Each side argued that data and science supported their view in a debate over the reopening of schools that sometimes turned into a vitriol. The division at Decatur illustrates the challenges that American schools – many in communities without so much knowledge – faced when evaluating what is safe.
Health officials say there is growing evidence that children are not primarily responsible for dissemination in the community and that transmission is relatively low in schools if wearing masks, social distance and contact tracking are in place. The CDC says that for schools to open safely, they and the surrounding communities must adopt preventive measures.
Without specific instructions for reopening federal and state leaders, school administrators had to become amateur epidemiologists, Dude said.
When he first consulted privately with the CDC and other professionals – who he said would not speak publicly at that point in the process because the response to the pandemic had been politicized – people accused him of not being transparent. When he launched the reopening plans in the fall, some parents and teachers questioned whether it was safe and what virus metrics were used. When he hit the brakes when he reopened, other parents got angry, complaining about the abrupt change or how the virtual school was not sustainable.
Tiffany Tesfamichael, a single mother who stretched her budget to move to Decatur because of the reputable schools, was upset that her fledgling daughter had to struggle with distance learning, while neighbors citing concerns about the spread of the virus protested the openness schools, but not against opening businesses.
“Why aren’t they here with signs protesting against restaurants if they really mean it?” she said.
The guy ended up asking a giant committee of volunteers – many with relevant experience, although it was not necessary – to make recommendations, including parameters for reopening and protocols to limit the spread of the virus in class.
So he decided on a new plan for January: students from seven primary schools could return, remaining in groups of 15 or less and attending only in the morning, to avoid the logistical nightmare of an unmasked lunch crowd. Older students were remote because it was very difficult to organize them into small groups.
Some CDC officials and other health professionals objected to this part, arguing in a letter to a community news website that face-to-face and safe learning was feasible for older students using different cohort precautions and that decision makers were misinterpreting the evidence about the transmission of the virus in schools. A doctor at the hospital who treated patients with COVID-19 responded with her own letter, warning that reopening as cases increased would be irresponsible.
The experts’ insights prompted mother Kerry Ludlam to reconsider her own position.
“I think letters like this are so powerful because you think you feel one way and then you read a letter with all these experts. … and you’re like, ‘Well, their opinion is different from mine. Have I been wrong all along? ‘”Said Ludlam.
She remained inclined to keep high school students in distance learning, in part because an autoimmune disorder increases their vulnerability. But she said that learning more about other families’ circumstances and academic challenges convinced her that parents should at least have the face-to-face learning option.
Without it, some families have moved to private schools or other suburbs offering face-to-face classes. Republican Governor Brian Kemp took a largely voluntary precautionary approach, even after a sudden increase in cases in the summer, and urged schools to reopen.
Near Decatur, neighbors shied away from the topic in polite conversation while tensions increased during school board meetings and on social media.
Some commentators have pushed the debate to its sharpest and rawest limits, suggesting that proponents of resuming face-to-face classes agreed with the lives of gambling teachers in a desperate search for normalcy, or that perhaps people who encourage continuous remote learning could not see beyond their privileges to understand how much other families were struggling.
In a Facebook group for district parents, the attacks got so bad that some users complained that their posts were shared with their employers by others who were trying to disparage them.
“I remember the analogy that if you put black and red ants in a jar, they get along until you shake the jar and put it back on the table, and then the ants … go after each other to death, without ever considering who rocked their world, ”Susan Camp, one of the group’s administrators, told the Associated Press.
She did not feel that the district’s reopening plans were safe or fair, especially for the most vulnerable students, but the increasing incivility bothered her as well.
Ludlam worries about the conversations that are yet to come.
Behind their keyboards and screens, “people just let it fly – forgetting that, at some point, the world will return to normal and we’ll see each other at school or by the pool or, you know, the supermarket and have time to stand still and talk, ”said Ludlam. “And we will have to face the things that we say to each other and the things that we accuse each other.”
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Associated Press medical writer Lindsey Tanner contributed to this report. Follow Franko on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/kantele10.