Los Angeles is trying to figure out how to reopen its schools, safely but with no assurance about how they will pay for the changes.
Sixteen students to a class. One-way hallways. Students lunch at their desks. Children could get one ball to play with — alone. Masks are required. A staggered school day brings on new schedules to juggle.
These campus scenarios could play out based on new Los Angeles County school reopening guidelines released Wednesday. This planning document will affect 2 million students and their families as educators undertake a challenge forced on them by the coronavirus crisis: fundamentally redesigning the traditional school day.
The safe reopening of schools in California and throughout the nation compels the reimagining — or abandoning — of long-held traditions and goals of the American school day, where play time, socialization and hands-on support have long been essential to the learning equation in everything from science labs and team sports to recess and group work.
The Los Angeles County Office of Education guidelines offer an early top-to-bottom glimpse at the massive and costly changes that will be required to reboot campuses serving students from preschool through 12th grade, critical to reopening California. The 45-page framework was developed through the work of county staffers, outside advisors and representatives from 23 county school systems, each of which must develop its own reopening plan….
When campuses closed in mid-March, school systems scrambled to develop a new style of education on the fly — one that relied on “distance learning.” Administrators quickly handed out computers and internet hot spots. Teachers trained on Zoom and other online platforms. Parents oversaw learning at home, even as they faced economic hardship.
Despite these Herculean efforts, school leaders and teachers report uneven student engagement and impediments to learning at home, underscoring the importance of an academically robust return to campus — even as the governor’s proposed budget envisions a cut for schools of about 10%.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Good lord. This is a total dystopian nightmare. And it will not be “safe.”
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It is interesting and heartening to me that we disagreed so vehemently just a month ago and now you have leap-frogged me to even more extreme views than I espoused then. Extreme in a good sense. This is a great example of how our understanding of the consequences of this pandemic changes weekly, daily, even hourly. I think we are in full agreement now. What I considered “safe” a month ago has now proven to be overly optimistic and naive. This will be with us for much longer than even the most cautious of us thought it would be a month ago.
What we need to do now is fight the McConnells of the world. We need drastic measures to address both the medical and economic realities of this pandemic. That means paying people to stay home. Paying for smaller class sizes and more teachers at better pay. The money is there. The pain and tragedy is real. The uncertainty will be with us longer than we want to believe. Unfortunately, consensus and political will is not even close to what we need right now. What will we say about 100,000 deaths six months from now? How many more will there be?
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And how about N95 masks for every staff member & every kid? How about manufacturing them so that they suit kids? They protect the wearer as well as others. It absolutely fries me that these devices are PC-donatable from construction workers et al to healthcare workers but unavailable to regular folks/ workers?! Where’s the Defense Production Act when you need it? The hoi polloi have nothing but homemade cloth masks which protect others maybe 60% & themselves nada. Not helpful given the large # of MAGA/ hair up their **s who choose nada!!
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Beth, you pose the right questions. Please see video I posted at the bottom of the About page for confirmation.
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We need Systems Control Engineers and Classroom Teachers working TOGETHER on this one.
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Trump could care less about the impact of opening schools on others. His goal is to get the schools open in the fall so the economy can rally before the election. Teachers, parents and children will be caught in the middle regardless of how schools reopen.
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That’s an interesting perspective. Trump on on one side, pushing Sept/Oct school re openings as babysitters for biz reopenings, in hopes of spurring pre-election economic surge– vs real-life response from teacher/staff/parents fearing covid-19 infection… not to mention real-life “meh” response of biz customers figuring risk/benefits of IRL transactions [leaning toward longer hair/ facial hair/ doorstep-delivered goods]…I suspect only rural regions will low-covid stats will follow him there, & perhaps only tepidly, as most of his core are over 65 so pehaps mkre cautious…
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this is lame. kids go to school with so many different viruses. if you sick stay home. my kid will not be returning to school wit a mask no recess and to eat alone. they are trying to indoctrinate our kids to thinking this is a new normal. (NWO) no way. parents really think about the mental health of your kids and what they will experience with this if it goes through. kids breathing in their own breath can harm their little lungs. most masks don’t fit their little faces to even make it work properly. and the extra added stress for the teachers and staff will be unbelievable. this is not America they have kids in china wearing masks in school hmmmmmmmmmmmm
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Chris, your child will not be asked to wear a mask to protect himself but to protect others.
Do you wear a mask? Are you allowed into stores without one?
Have you ingested Clorox as the president suggested? Are you taking hydroxycloroquine?
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All of the countries in Southeast Asia including China and Japan are collective cultures where the whole is more important than the individual. An individual that threatens the whole will be stopped! If the government doesn’t stop the destructive individuals that threaten the safety and harmony of the majority some of the majority will stop them.
Since those governments do not want to risk a rebellion or riots like we are seeing in the U.S. now, then the government will stop the dangerous individuals that threaten the safety and health of the majority.
That is why we will see the kids in those countries wearing masks just like the adults.
But the U.S. is a culture based on individualism where the “freedom” of the individual is more important than the whole. What flawed with that concept is that each individual defines what that “freedom” means to them even when their definition might be illegal and/or dangerous to all of the other individuals who think freedom is keeping their families safe and healthy.
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First of all, this article actually uses the tainted word ‘reimagine’. Makes one wonder how that happened. Which billionaires are bending the ear of the reporters? Second, the corrupt L.A. County Office of Education is influencing the reimagining. They’re the ones who insisted during the teachers strike that there was no money in future budgets to lower class size. False. Dishonest. They were pushing for budget austerity and so-called blended learning well before 2020. LACOE is no friend of Angelinos involved in school. The safety measures they’re discussing will not keep people safe, but will produce tons of data for tech companies. We need people in the lead, not leaders filled with greed. Disaster opportunism is disgusting.
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Considering that Reed Hastings is influencing Superintendent Greedy Investment Banker’s formation of online summer “school” this year (his name was on Beutner’s list of donors during Monday’s superintendent’s message), my money is on Hastings being the one influencing the Times through Beutner. Or Broad. Maybe Eli Broad.
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The LA Times has excellent education reporters, esp Howard Blume.
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I didn’t mean to insinuate that Howard Blume is misrepresenting any facts. I meant that Blume is getting his information from LACOE and Beutner, not reliable sources in my opinion. I would like to hear more from UTLA, Scott Schmerelson, and Jackie Goldberg, and less from LACOE and Superintendent Greed.
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Blume was championing charter schools at the LA Weekly a decade ago. His biases become apparent if you read his work carefully.
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I’m surprised that Howard Blume was promoting charters. Whenever I am in LA, he invites me onto his radio show on a progressive network and let’s me vent about charters without any argument from him. I’ve always found him to be unbiased in his reporting.
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One positive is “16 students per classroom”, max. That’s how it should be in normal times.
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It’s not 16 students per class; it’s 16 students per classroom. With 32 or more students per class, half of them stay home at any given time. Class is flipped. Could be 48 students per class with one third at a time attending school. Could be 54 students per class with one quarter rotating through classrooms at a time.
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oh. my. Lord. A nightmare.
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The scripted “blended learning” intervention classes I’ve taught in the past had the classes divided into thirds, with one third of students meeting with the teacher at a time, one third reading independently, and one third answering multiple choice questions online. So I would guess 48 students per class. That’s a realistic number, after the teacher layoffs on the horizon. What’s horrible is how difficult it will be to get class size back down to 32 if we go to 48 for more than a few days.
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Even 16 doesn’t really allow for distancing. Needs to be more like 12. Harder to enforce as ages go lower.
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It’s up at Oped https://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/How-Los-Angeles-Plans-to-R-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Diane-Ravitch_Education_Educational-Facilities_Public-Education-200527-333.html#comment764879
with 2 comment leading to other blogs here that show how the pandemic is opening opportunities for the destruction of public ed.
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They need to add hazmat suits for teachers but not for administrators. That was the office managers would stay in the office.
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Sounds like prison. This is a way to absolutely destroy public schools, because who is going to send their students to a school like this?
Not to mention burning out the teachers. As was mentioned above, “class sizes” will mean that we really have double or triple (or more) the number of students per class, meaning that we have to teach live students all day and do the online “learning” with the other students all night.
16 hour days with no extra pay–or even pay reductions.
This is the destruction of education.
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It really does sound like an absolute hellscape, and if schools reopen on this model, I would think there will be a big shift to homeschooling in households that have the means to do it.
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You’re right on the $ as far as youngest students are concerned [I teach PreK]. Many PreK parents are in that window of life– assuming offspring are fairly closely-spaced age-wise– where they’ve already had to work around having one parent homebound, whether working remotely or not. If it were me as the at-home parent, I’d have already learned from these 2 pandemic months that any ed I can manage at home is more kid-friendly than the prospect of multiply-masked hourly hand-washing/ surface-sanitizing
restricted-to-their-classroom, no-sharing-crayons/ balls/ toys et al scifi dystopia “reopened schools.”
If I were that parent, I’d be clamoring for the degree of universal testing/ contact tracing that would allow me to set up a safe nbhd playgroup for my kids.
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There will be very little teaching to do, in my opinion. I have 200 students this year. When I give a writing assignment, I read 200 essays or reports. If I have 400, 500, 600 students in future years, even if I only see them once every three days or one third of every day, I will never be able to read their work. All I will be able to do is assign online, machine graded multiple choice questions to be done at home or with the babysitters the district is considering hiring to replace the laid off teachers, and move the scores over from one website to another. All students will lose the ability to communicate in writing beyond learning how to trick AI computer programs into giving high scores. I will just be there in my classroom for IT support and to make threats of punishment for students who don’t answer enough multiple choice questions to satisfy their quotas. A dystopian nightmare is coming true. So-called blended learning is the end of learning, not just teaching.
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Reading this makes me realize that those regions blessed w/ample yr-round sunshine & warmth will be better able to reopen schools safely.
Up here in the NE we may wanna reconsider some of the ludicrous, overprotective practices that keep young kids inside at the drop of the weather hat. I am a visiting teacher at PreK’s & am always nonplussed by nanny-state practices that keep kids indoors e.g. for any temps under 30degF, & any wetness.
When I was little in upstate-NY [’50’s], winter playground was just as much fun (if not more) than fall/ spring, & we came to school prepped w/warm & impermeable gear designed to allow play in nearly all weather.
In today’s sillily indulgent PreK’s it is my observation that kids lose out educationally every day that it’s cold or wet. They are a mess! Can’t concentrate, full of sillies. Cuz they couldn’t get outside. All the gym-room trikes etc activity doesn’t remotely compensate. [I’m guessing this phenomenon extends to older kids: you tell me].
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In Finland, children play outdoors regardless of the weather.
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Folks, join your union. If we have strong unions, we can refuse to go back into the classroom until it is safe. Putting 16 students in a room with me is not safe. What makes people think that they will stay seated, not share items, and wear a face mask? People who make policies are not in the classroom.
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If safety is what is required, there will be no school in the 2020-21 school year. We should plan for that.
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The shortest time period it ever in medical history took to create a vaccine was for mumps — four years. It usually takes decades. We have to learn to live with this.
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That’s the question, though, right? How to live with this? What would you propose?
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That is THE question. Take it one week at a time. There are many historical events exemplifying the dangers of planning ahead based on unknowns. The best plan is flexible. Who knows what the future holds? Not Bill Gates!
We don’t know how much the virus will spread or dissipate over the summer, or over the course of years. Let’s say hypothetically, the population stays infected at the same level as today for years, I cannot predict how people would react, but I am willing to venture a guess that eventually, people would weigh the risks versus rewards of teaching, of getting a haircut, an education, a romantic date; and just like we take risks every time we get in a car and drive on the freeway, just like we take risks every time we let children play freely outdoors, just like we take risks doing just about everything in the real, offline world, people will go back to brick and mortar school with no restrictions because it’s worth it. It’s worth it.
No, we are likely never going to be safe in school. The question is: Is school worth risks? I say yes it is. And I say letting Zuckerberg, Hastings, Gates, and Jobs plan an online future for us is more dangerous than going back to school under any circumstances. In summation, tell Gates to shut the heck up and wait for the future to unfold. It might just be alright. You never know.
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LCT, That is THE question is correct. But you are projecting a future where a vaccine is not available for much longer than 18 mos, & where all social activity even after that will be conducted under the cloud of potential future pandemics (which are likely, given what we know so far).
I found a great deal of hope from the 4-26 NYT Mag article “How to Stop the Next Pandemic.” Science is much further along on this Q than might be imagined from our [US] experience of a sudden stop to normal life that was seemingly unpredicted, & met as tho unknown/ unprecedented by our [& Italy’s, & UK’s, & Italy’s & Iran’s & Spain’s et al’s] pathetic govtl responses.
In fact much is already understood, & much misery could have been prevented, had scientific research been globally funded. We have failed thus far because we have not heeded alarm bells from global research scientists, & have fallen back on capitalist profit-motivated biz models that disfavor investment in research where outcome will result in periodic vaccines [that bizmodel’s profit lies iin lifelong distribution of drugs to the chronically ill.]
Hopefully, this deep global recession will help the economists refigure their algorithms & get a clue that there’s $ to be made by global investment in pandemic research!
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I’m sorry, I feel I’ve been saturating the discussion with my comments but I must say I don’t mean to make predictions. Predictions are usually wrong, especially mine. — I predict my predictions are wrong. — I only mean to say there’s never before been a vaccine developed in less than four years. I only mean to say that plans to deal with the present are going to wind up being plans to deal with the future. And I only mean to say that a future of “blended learning” is something to be avoided. Some way. Any way.
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Trump will force a vaccine to be released before it is ready, before the election so he can brag that he saved the country. Then people will rush to be inoculated thinking they are safe, but they will not be safe. If Trump times this right, the inoculations will start a week or so before the election so the results will not be revealed until after the election.
Trump will flood the media with how great he is and how he saved civilization and humanity because of “his” vaccine.
People believing Trump will vote for him as Trump wants them too giving him a better chance of re-election. After the election when people that were vaccinated keep dying, he will blame someone else claiming sabotage and lead a witch hunt against Hillary, Biden, or Obama or all three demanding investigations.
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Ha!!!! Fewer, not less. Call me David Coleman!
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LCT, I get you that blended learning sucks, but that we can’t predict the future – which is looking bleak for IRL classes – at best, we’re looking at PT IRL classes starting, maybe Jan 2021 – & maybe those, for months, will be all about getting used to social distancing/ masks/ hand-washing/ sanitizing… so, just about re-establishing relationships in a new reality, w/ little time to delve into curriculum. Perhaps the most we can hope for is incentivizing at-home learning!
I continue to think that what we have to focus on now is improving delivery of remote tech [bandwidth & devices] to all kids, & quality of ed product we deliver remotely..
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As of April 23rd, three children in Los Angeles Country had been hospitalized for Corona-19. One died…a 17 year old that had severe respiratory problems before ever catching Corona-19 from his father. The other two were released a few days after being admitted.
To put that into perspective, a total of eight children died of influenza/pneumonia in Los Angeels County back in 2016.
93% of the (current) 2200+ fatalities in LA County have been elderly people with severe medical conditions; more than half occured in nursing home-type facilities. The number of deaths in LA County has also been increasing at a very linear rate for the last two months, without abatement. Everyone needs to stop pretending that this entire situation is a deadly risk to children and address the real issue…
elderly people with severe health conditions need to be sheltered from exposure.
A vaccine is 1-2 years away, at best. Should we alter the functioning of our entire society, or should people who are at severe risk simply be isolated?
I prefer the latter approach.
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First of all, your stats are only about LA County. So you in LA County can decide what’s appropriate, don’t try to extrapolate nationally.
Second, your stats are only about kids & elders during school closure. Plenty of data shows asymptomatic kids are vectors endangering the 25-65yo cohort [teachers/ staff] ; some of them will die.
Third, alarming stats show some kids wks after covid-19 infection die from inflammatory complications; too recent to gauge how rare.
So where do you get off suggesting schools should just reopen & staff risk their lives– would you? & if reopening schools is necessary to “the functioning of our whole society,” would you maybe place it higher on the scale of what you’re willing to support w/tax dollars?
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I care not what approach people take in other parts of the country.
I find your statement about children being vectors and of dying from inflammatory complications to be completely disingenuous, as kids have purposefully not been tested throughout this entire ordeal. Also, not a single child has died of Kawasaki-like symptoms…indeed, the number of youths that have died nationally is miniscule.
It is likely that more kids have had Corona-19 than adults, yet there has been no push to actually gauge the rate of infection amongst younger people. That is idiocy and incompetence on the part of those in charge, as it puts us in a position of not knowing how to address the issue…a position that becomes more difficult as we get closer and closer to the new school year. In fact, when California’s governor ordered that old autopsy cases be screened back to December for Corona-19 the response by the state’s coroners was to hem and haw. It has been a month and not a single case has been analyzed to determine whether this thing went through the school population back in January and February, which is likely what happened [genetic studies have now shown that Corona-19 actually sprang up in November.] You and I cannot say one way or another because our leaders refuse to do anything other than play a waiting game.
This has become a political issue, a hot potato that is certain to ruin political careers; thus no action on all fronts. And you, like our worthless politicians, offer zero solutions. What do you propose? What is your approach?
One possibility would to be to simply open; I do not advocate that. Things may be done to allow for a fairly normal opening come August: mass antibody testing [that should have started back in April]; mass education on handwashing and hygiene; enforced hygiene; morning temperature checks for kids and teachers; disinfection of surfaces throughout the school day; isolation of symptomatic people; staggering the school day; isolation and accomodation of immuno-compromised children…
In the end, those of us that are teachers will have to suck it up and either return to work or go on leave until a vaccine is developed.
A handful will die, but you do not shut down half of a state [15 million in Callifornia] to prevent a handful from catching a disease in the school environment that could just as easily have been picked up walking into a supermarket or by eating take-out. That has been the approach so far, and it is lunacy.
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Even if schools reopen in the fall, TEACHING will be different. This is something that hasn’t really been talked about. I’ve been thinking about HOW I would actually teach in an environment with some of the suggested “safety” procedures in place. For example, let’s say that students must be at least 6 feet apart in classrooms. Ok. That means NO group or pair work. Crumple up the Danielson rubric and throw that out the window. I teach French. How are the students going to get together and talk to one another? They’re NOT. They are NOT going to be wandering around the room. They will be glued in their seats. I’m not going to be teaching any sort of communicative activities except ones they can do from their seats. Second, for middle schoolers, I won’t be having them do poster projects unless they have their own materials (markers, etc) AND bring them to class. Good luck getting everyone to bring their stuff. Third, I’m not going to collect a lot of papers and grade them. The best way I can think of is to have students complete work on the computer and submit it to me while I sit at my desk. I’m not going to circulate around the class and give feedback on what they are working on. That’s a BIG part of my teaching. How will science teachers have students do labs 6 feet apart? The next suggestion I’ve heard is to have teachers move to other classrooms while the students stay in one room. Just with the scheduling, it’s seems to me that will be really hard. I teach 5-6 preps (that means DIFFERENT classes). I have posters in my room that I refer to all the time so students can learn. If I have to move between rooms, I won’t be putting up posters and using them in my teaching. So that aspect of my teaching is GONE. Will the science teachers move all their stuff from room to room? Will the art teachers move their things? Crazy. What if I move to a room that has no equipment for me to show movies or videos or use technology? Well, that part of my curriculum goes out the window and I have to find something else to teach. Throw out the idea that teachers will be evaluated on use of technology. If teachers are moving around the building, where do they go when they have no class? The faculty room that has NO windows or ventilation??? I would probably go out to the parking lot and sit in my car. So, the idea that teachers are going to roll back into school and it will be business as use in terms of TEACHING and RELATING to students is nuts. Some other questions….How do we do a fire drill? Even if classes rotate, dozens or hundreds of people could be in hallways at once. What about lockdown drills? Will we all be huddled in a corner against a wall as usual?
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Great questions.
I’m a “visiting” teacher so I’m SOL (won’t be at PreK’s again until pandemic over) – but just to point out that the poster thing is doable: for 20 yrs I’ve been rolling all stuff, incl stand & posters, from school to school & room to room, in a lightweight ToysRUs wagon… That doesn’t work for labs, tho.
But a couple of those are deal-breakers: fire drills & shooter drills.
And you didn’t even mention the one that is on my mind as a world-lang teacher: how do they watch my mouth to view pronunciation if I’m behind a mask??
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Right. Good question about how students will learn without being able to see my mouth for pronunciation and comprehension. I’ll have to have a pretty big cart for 5-6 different classes! Lots of questions to be answered. In the end, I suspect I’ll be more concerned about protecting my health and that of others and teaching will take a back seat.
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I think we need to look at what other nations are doing to successfully reopen schools. Denmark started with lower grade where China started with upper grades. From my understanding, neither has experienced Covid transmission from school. Looking to hold classes outside should be in a plan. Huge Issue is to safely reopen we need more $$ at a time where CA is looking to cut billions from school budget.
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There is more to Finland and China reopening their schools that just reopening their schools.
First, both Finland and China reacted fairly fast slow the spread of the virus.
Second, I do not know about Finland, but I do know that in China the children will be wearing masks and the schools will have a good supply of fresh masks on hand at all times.
In the U.S. it was every state for itself and some states, probably all GOP controlled states, did nothing. When schools reopen in the U.S., it will be up to teachers to have new masks on hand and they will have to pay for the masks just like teachers buy a lot of supplies for their classrooms out of their meager pay.
It also doesn’t help that the U.S. had Donald Trump as its so-called leader encouraging people to resist and ignore safety requirements designed to help slow the spread of the virus.
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