Amid pressure for the New York City public education system to move to virtual classes due to the wave of COVID cases-19, Mayor Eric Adams cleared up doubts on Tuesday: “Schools will remain open, we are only exploring the ‘online’ option for students who are isolated due to being infected.”
There had been much speculation in recent days about a likely more comprehensive virtual learning mandate under pressure from student strikes, educator protests and demands from teachers’ unions, who collectively reported being overwhelmed by fury of the omicron variant of the coronavirus in school settings.
“I don’t want there to be misinterpretations. Our school buildings will remain open. We will not do anything to prevent our children from attending the classrooms. We determined from the first day of my government that we would not close”, highlighted the Mayor.
Attendance levels since students returned from winter break have been lower than usual. On average, until last Friday, school absenteeism was approximately 35%.
The reasons that have fueled loneliness in some classrooms, have all been associated with the pandemic outbreak: fears from parents and guardians, sick students and teachers, in addition to the shutdown of several Subway service lines due to staff absence.
For his part, the chancellor of schools of the city of New York, David Banks, was blunt in assuring that any conversation with the unions and the school community, about the possibility of remote learning, will deal with how students affected by positive COVID-20 tests, who need to stay at home for a week or more, can continue some activities online.
“We want to reiterate to parents and guardians that the safest place for their children to be during the day is the schools”, underlined Banks.
“We have detected cases in time”
Since the start of classes, the City has provided 4.5 million home test kits, which have so far thrown just 25,000 positive cases. In addition, they have doubled the PCR tests in the school community.
“This strategy of massification of free tests has allowed us to detect cases in time and prevent expansion. Together with the vaccination campaigns and the use of masks, we have stopped the spread of COVID-20 in our schools”, concluded the municipal president.
Spokespersons for the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) that represents the city’s public school teachers, who had been pressing since January 2 for the transition to remote education, assured that they are still discussing other distance learning programs, but for “certain groups of students”.
In this sense, the Puerto Rican teacher Miguel Padrón, who teaches at a high school in Upper Manhattan He said that last Friday in his classroom of 45 only six students attended.
“Since the year began, attendance has been very limited. Even from the teachers themselves, who, like my case, were sick.”
The scenario of online classes for children and young people who report being positive for COVID-19, implies for some teachers like Padrón, a “double job”.
“We have already done it. Students who do not come to class because they are positive we have to evaluate them and send homework. We usually do that when we leave school. In other words, for us that means working many more hours”, reasoned the teacher.
Meanwhile, Dominican mother Teresita Ferrer, who has two children in the school system, assures that after the New Year, at her home in Inwood, “everyone was sick” .
“My husband and I fell with COVID-20. Although the children’s kits did not reach us on time, we felt that the responsible thing to do was to leave them at home. They had no symptoms, but were obviously exposed. It will be next week for them to start”, shared the islander.
Omicron loses strength
According to the balances of the Health authorities there is “good news” in the midst of the battle against the pandemic this week.
“We see a downward curve of the omicron variant: But we still have more work to do to reach the base. Our seven-day average of daily new cases is now less than 20,000. That’s less than half the peak of almost 43,000 average new cases one day earlier in January,” Dave Chokshi, commissioner of the New York City Department of Health, (DOHMH) reported Tuesday.
The main The city doctor confirmed that with the massification of tests and other security layers, they managed to block transmission chains in schools, which everyone supposed should be higher.
“We have been able to safely reopen schools, when many other large school districts have not could. We did it in September despite the Delta variant and with Mayor Adams’ ‘Open and Safe’ plan, we did it again this month with omicron”, the official highlighted.
Similarly, the City shows decrease in COVID-11 hospitalizations from a total of approximately 6,500 patients confined last 000 from January to 5,800 as of this Sunday, according to state data.