Originally published at: Watch: School board mocked parents before realizing their online meeting was public | Boing Boing
…
6 Likes
I’m not sure why people are up in arms about the ‘babysitter’ remarks. That has been the exact sentiment expressed almost constantly by the parents of school-aged kids I work with. As far as I’m concerned, they don’t make enough effort to hide it. “Your kids are climbing the walls, I get it already.”
Are people ashamed that they want their kids to go to school? Are they ashamed because they don’t want to be seen as a parent who wants their kids back in school? Or are they only ashamed because someone else noticed the blatantly obvious, and mocked them for it?
Or maybe, just maybe, everyone attending that meeting was an asshole?
30 Likes
Sadly, a lot of parents and other groups do see teachers as ‘babysitters’; that’s yet another failing of our society.
37 Likes
I had to check where this place is, because California, and I realize I’d driven through this area several times going to and from from SF. Yep. When you can’t afford to live near San Francisco but you can’t imagine actually living in Sacramento, you too can live right where all the agricultural runoff meets the Bay. And when the wind blows right, you can enjoy the odors of the refineries in Richmond too.
8 Likes
Self inflicted wounds such as these come easy to School Boards.
P.S. Elections coming right up!
15 Likes
Probably with great relief. I feel nothing but sympathy for teachers and school boards.
14 Likes
That’s the least offensive thing in that whole exchange. It’s the driving force behind the push to get back to in-person school before it is safe to do so.
19 Likes
Safe according to who? Surely there are many parents who are simply impatient to get their kids back in school and would be pushing to do so regardless of how safe it is for students or teachers. But data does exist now, and many, many experts do believe that it’s relatively safe to open schools before 100% of teachers are vaccinated, so it’s not unreasonable to have that conversation. (Respectfully, of course.). Also, considering that this is in California, it’s possible for many schools to have instruction outdoors most of the time.
2 Likes
“Oh wait, we aren’t uh… Uh-oh! Nuh-uh!”
7 Likes
I am not up on California, but in my state a quorum is to be open to the public unless it’s an executive meeting, and they have really strict rules on that.
How do they not know this kind of thing? Then again, the biggest craziest fights I’ve ever seen with ruling boards have been school districts.
3 Likes
From before the new variants were widely distributed. Said new variants are both more infectious and hit kids harder. With all due respect to the CDC and Dr. Fauci, it’s too soon.
18 Likes
I concur.
13 Likes
Yeah well you should have heard what the parents said about THEM
Eschaton
Tuesday, February 16, 2021
The Schools Discourse
Every week or so we get a study or an epidemiologist saying something like, “Schools can open safely if they use masks properly, have social distancing, and proper ventilation.” A bunch of elite journalists who are sick and tired of their kids being at home hit the retweet button as hard and fast as they can, often along with the suggestion that this is all about helping poor kids, and by poor they mean “minority,” a population they’re always very very concerned with.
I don’t actually have opinions about how to deal with the school situation, I just know that the discussion, repeated weekly for almost a year now, is always incredibly dishonest. You can’t expect little kids to use masks properly. Schools are not designed for social distancing (they are overcrowded). They don’t have windows that open. The SCIENCE about kids/teens being or not being carriers/vulnerable isn’t straightforward. Even if you can have acceptable class sizes, you can’t maintain those if teachers get sick.
I get it. It’s hard having your kids at home.
One of the things that bugs me is that after a year of, “Of course any science we have now is extremely early and has to be used cautiously.” (which is wise) we’ve jumped to “Some studies suggest that maybe kids are slightly less likely to transmit the virus therefore schools must open RIGHT NOW you stupid libs why don’t you understand SCIENCE!?”
18 Likes
I’m kind of sick it always being “won’t somebody think of the children!?” except when it comes to children, and more, in the middle of an out of control pandemic.
17 Likes
Not unreasonable for whom? Teachers should not be forced to take on that level of risk as part of their jobs. Medical professionals are still making new discoveries about this virus and variants, and the issue goes beyond vaccinating teachers. Children are in the community, as was pointed out in the coronavirus topic below:
Maybe there’s a compromise to be made among parents who believe the risk is low. They can set up a rotation to act as teacher’s aides in the classroom, while the teachers guide instruction remotely. I’m sure they won’t have any trouble finding enough concerned parents willing to put the children’s needs first. Those parents who sign up would be vaccinated first, of course. This would be a temporary solution that would run through the spring, as a pilot program. If there are no outbreaks, they could revisit having the teachers return.
19 Likes
By the end of March the new variant will overtake the “old” Covid in the US.
Regarding technology to cut off comments, that is actually the fairest way to handle it with a consistent limitation. You can also submit comments in writing. A three minute cap makes it one minute longer than a great many public meetings allow in California.
6 Likes
Of course they do. School is a six hour chunk of their working day that they do not have to worry about childcare. The closure of schools means that families who aren’t in a position to stay home are being forced to leave their kids at home alone for long stretches of the day. This is clearly having the biggest negative impact on poor people.
This issue is not that there are anti-science parents on one side and teachers worried about safety on the other, but rather that there are poor people with very little options on one side and teachers worried about their safety on the other. Lose-lose. The negative impacts of COVID shouldn’t just fall on people who have to work outside of their homes because of economics. I don’t think that opening the schools is necessarily the solution but I certainly understand why.
Rich republicans don’t care. The private schools are open.
12 Likes
A-fucking-men. Universal schooling is an economic necessity for a vast number of Americans. They cannot make ends meet if they need to devote those six hours a day to child care. And of course this burden falls disproportionately on women. School opening is a matter of survival.
It should not be this way. But it is this way.
4 Likes
Ok, it’s certainly possible you’re right that it’s too soon, but if the CDC, the nation’s most prominent infectious disease expert, and published epidemiologists who have been closely monitoring the disease are not the right people to make the call, who in your judgement would be the right person or entity to make the call? I think it’s a fair question.
A lot of us rightly criticized the Trump administration and GOP for substituting their own gut-feel judgment and ignoring the advice of scientists and disease experts. We should would all do well to avoid relying solely on our own gut feelings or assuming we know better than the experts now that the shoe is on the other foot.
4 Likes
