Massachusetts school districts in the red zone should continue to offer in-person instruction so long as there is no coronavirus transmission in the buildings, Education Commissioner Jeffrey Riley said, reversing course on the state’s previous guidance.
Riley said during a Joint Committee on Education hearing Tuesday that schools “are encouraged to remain open even if their community is red.”
He said such districts offering in-person or hybrid learning models should continue to remain open “until there is any evidence that there is transmission happening in a school.”
This backtracks on a previous Department of Elementary and Secondary Education guidance, released Aug. 11, that stated red-zone districts, which are communities with an average daily case rate of more than eight per 100,000, should move to remote learning.
That guidance was then updated slightly to say that districts in the red for three straight weeks should go remote.
Riley said, “We are not seeing the spread take place, clustering take place in the schools as was initially feared.”
Beth Kontos, American Federation of Teachers Massachusetts president, said it’s “disingenuous” to say there is no COVID spread in schools.
Since the start of the school year, there have been a total of 622 coronavirus cases reported in Massachusetts schools, according to DESE.
The department said there are an estimated 450,000 students in public school buildings and 75,000 staff across the state.
“We have to get sick first? That’s what it sounds like, we are waiting until more people get sick,” Kontos said.
With the new guidance from DESE, Kontos questioned why the color-coded map is even necessary.
“The goalpost keeps changing, keeps moving and that’s what we don’t appreciate, it gets to the point where this is just meaningless,” Kontos said.
The Boston Teachers Union said in a statement, “Pushing schools in high positivity zones to remain open without consideration for the safety of our highest-needs students and without resources from the state to be able to do that doesn’t help to keep anyone safely in schools.”
Riley also struck down suggestions that some districts had put forth regarding taking a week of remote learning following Thanksgiving break to mitigate any potential COVID-19 spread that may happen while gathering with family or traveling.
“We just said we did not think that was appropriate. We are trying to use the data to the greatest extent possible that we can, and we want to let the medical folks to weigh in and at this time we do not think that is the way to go,” Riley said.
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October 27, 2020 at 11:49PM
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Education commissioner reverses course, says Massachusetts schools in red should stay open - Boston Herald
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