The school year is picking up where it left off: with students and teachers working from home because of the Coronavirus. While schools were remote-teaching and learning during the second half of the year, this year will look to be a mix of remote learning and in-person learning.
Teachers, parents, and students alike are worried about the chances of catching the virus. Cities and towns will be doing everything they can to make sure those chances are minimal.
Despite that, teachers in towns like Andover, Massachusetts are not prepared to walk into enclosed atmospheres just yet and have stated plans to work outside buildings and use laptops at a professional development day scheduled for today, according to a story. The teachers union is concerned for the safety of the teachers, going so far as to oppose the towns decision to incorporate hybrid-learning at the present time.
The school committee expects the teachers to work in-person and hopes the union will not engage in an, "illegal work stoppage." The expectations of the school committee are unreasonable. The teachers will be in an enclosed space with the students. All it will take is just one student carrying the virus into a classroom and infecting the class. These students will take the virus home, to their neighborhoods.
Massachusetts as a whole has been doing what needs to be done to stem COVID-19. The school committee forcing the teachers to work in the schools and the classrooms is not the way to move forward. Shannon Scully, the chairperson of the school committee, should work with the teachers union and show that the school committee truly cares about the safety of the teachers and students instead of speaking from a bully pulpit and threatening to make a bad public health scenario worse.
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