So, how do you reopen schools? (Preschool to High School & even College)

[China]

Far-Right Group Wants to Ban Kids From Reading Books on Male Seahorses, Galileo, and MLK

 

School books about Martin Luther King Jr. are too “divisive,” claims a conservative group at the center of a Tennessee book ban battle. A story about the astronomer Galileo Galilei is “anti-church.” A picture book about seahorses is too sexy.

 

As the school year resumes, simmering fights over school books have returned to a boil. In some schools, like in Pennsylvania’s Central York School District this week, students have beaten back bans on books about racism. But elsewhere, like in Tennessee’s Williamson County School District, the battle is ongoing, bolstered by new state laws that ban the teaching of certain race-related topics. At the heart of that fight is a conservative group, led by a private-school parent, that has a sprawling list of complaints against common classroom books. Many of the books are about race, but other targets include dragons, sad little owls, and hurricanes.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[purbeast]

I could watch 24 hours 7 days a week of Jordan Klepper interviewing the dummies in this country.

[China]

Students arrested while protesting principal at Kathleen High School

 

Joan Martinez was one of the dozens of parents who came to pick their students up early from Kathleen High School.

 

“He called me and he said 'mom you have to pick me up,'” said Martinez.

 

Her son called her after several students were arrested during a protest calling for the termination of the school's principal Daraford Jones.

 

The Polk County Sheriff's Office arrested 15 students. Charges include disruption of school function, resisting officer without violence, false name to law enforcement officer, possession of weapon on campus and affray.

 

The protest, which began around 6:30 a.m., was "largely peaceful," according to Polk County Public Schools.

 

It was organized by history teacher and football coach Tomaris Hill. He said Jones has taken away all after-school activities, except for sports, and allegedly locks school doors with students waiting outside.

 

“The last straw for our students was, I guess they submitted a request for homecoming and he denied their homecoming requests, saying even though it’s a formal event they either had to wear jeans and they couldn't dance,” said Hill.

 

Hill said some teachers are also fed up but many are afraid to speak out.

 

“We have to ask permission to leave and go enjoy our lunch. We either have to eat the same school food as the students or bring our lunch from home,” Hill said.

 

He said Kathleen went downhill once Jones became principal in April.

 

“Our morale is awful, we have no school spirit,” he added.

 

ABC Action News reached out to the district for comment from Jones but they declined.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Newsom orders COVID vaccines for eligible students, the first state mandate for K-12 schools

 

California on Friday became the first state to announce a COVID-19 vaccination requirement for all public and private schoolchildren, a move affecting millions of students and once again placing the state at the forefront of strict pandemic safety measures.

The mandate would take effect for grades seven through 12, starting with the school term following the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s full approval of the vaccine for children ages 12 and older, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced. Students in kindergarten through sixth grade would be phased in after the vaccine has been approved for their age group.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[Larry]

9 hours ago, China said:

Newsom orders COVID vaccines for eligible students, the first state mandate for K-12 schools

 

California on Friday became the first state to announce a COVID-19 vaccination requirement for all public and private schoolchildren, a move affecting millions of students and once again placing the state at the forefront of strict pandemic safety measures.

The mandate would take effect for grades seven through 12, starting with the school term following the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s full approval of the vaccine for children ages 12 and older, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced. Students in kindergarten through sixth grade would be phased in after the vaccine has been approved for their age group.

 

Click on the link for the full article

Hope they include a fine for using a fake vaccination card. 

[China]

Sad that the intervention of the FBI is needed.

 

Garland calls in FBI to counter reported threats against school staffers

 

Attorney General Merrick Garland announced Monday that the FBI would take the lead on the law enforcement response to what Garland called “a disturbing spike in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff.”

 

“While spirited debate about policy matters is protected under our Constitution, that protection does not extend to threats of violence or efforts to intimidate individuals based on their views,” Garland wrote in a memo to federal prosecutors as well as FBI Director Christopher Wray. “Threats against public servants are not only illegal, they run counter to our nation’s core values.

 

“Those who dedicate their time and energy to ensuring that our children receive a proper education in a safe environment deserve to be able to do their work without fear for their safety,” the AG added.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

 

[TheGreatBuzz]

31 minutes ago, China said:

 

 

Perhaps the FBI should just drive their cars through the protesters?

[China]

 

[China]

Ducey's school mask madness may cost Arizona $100 million in federal funding

 

Gov. Doug Ducey just experienced another setback in his ongoing plan to ignore public health experts, ignore public opinion and cater to those on the far right who see masks as quite possibly the end of the world as we know it.

 

Last week, a Maricopa County Superior Court judge tossed out a state law, signed by Ducey, that barred schools from requiring that everyone wear masks beginning Sept. 29.

 

Now, the U.S. Treasury Department is warning Ducey that he can’t use federal COVID-19 relief funds to reward school districts or parents who ignore Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines that recommend masks inside schools.

 

“We are concerned that two recently created Arizona grant programs undermine evidence-based efforts to stop the spread of COVID-19,” Deputy Treasury Secretary Adewale O. Adeyem wrote, in a letter to Ducey on Tuesday.

 

In other words, you can’t use federal money designed to combat a public health emergency to take action that’ll actually worsen that public health emergency.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Once again the children have more sense and decency than some of the adults:

 

Ohio student, 10, confronts anti-maskers at board meeting: 'Please be quiet. It's inappropriate'

 

The youngest person who spoke in favor of masks at Wednesday night's school board meeting in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, decided she wasn't going to let anti-maskers steal her thunder.

 

Before 10-year-old Kaylan Park stepped up to the microphone at the contentious meeting, she had watched other pro-mask speakers get interrupted by heckles and boos from people who oppose the district's mask mandate. A couple of those opponents ended up walking out of the meeting in anger.

 

Critics were protesting the district's decision earlier this month to extend its mask mandate until at least Oct. 29 to protect students and staff against COVID-19.

 

But Kaylan, a fifth-grader, didn't let the tense environment intimidate her.

 

"It is super weird to be here because adults don't think that their children should wear masks," Kaylan said when it was her turn to speak. "…A lot of you guys are adults. You guys should be able to know that masks save lives."

 

When some audience members voiced disagreement, Kaylan responded: "Can I please speak? Let me speak before you guys go off."

 

Her demand was met with applause.

 

But some audience members continued talking, which prompted Kaylan to say emphatically: "Please be quiet…It's inappropriate that you guys can't stay quiet."

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Parents sue Wisconsin schools after their children catch covid: ‘Recklessly exposing the public’

 

When Shannon Jensen and Gina Kildahl sent their children back to their Wisconsin schools during the last school year, everyone had to wear masks. But when school resumed this fall, that was not the case — even as health experts warned that masks were necessary to keep a new highly contagious coronavirus variant from sweeping through classrooms.

 

Jensen and Kildahl both sent their sons to their elementary schools in masks anyway. Jensen’s son attends Rose Glen Elementary School in Waukesha, outside Milwaukee. Kildahl’s son goes to school about 200 miles away at Fall Creek Elementary, between Green Bay and Minneapolis.

 

Just weeks into the new school year, both boys tested positive for the coronavirus. Lawsuits filed this month in two Wisconsin federal courts blame what they describe as the schools’ lax policies on masks, quarantining and contact tracing.

 

Both the boards of education for the School District of Waukesha and the School District of Fall Creek had voted to end many of the coronavirus mitigation policies that had been in place last year, according to the two lawsuits. That included getting rid of universal mask requirements.

 

The moves defied strategies recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, the lawsuits add. Jensen’s lawsuit was filed in a federal court in eastern Wisconsin on Oct. 6. Kildahl’s lawsuit was filed on Monday in Wisconsin’s western district court.

 

Because classes were held without adequate safety measures, Jensen’s lawsuit alleges, coronavirus cases spread within the district’s schools. The school district and its board are “knowingly, needlessly, unreasonably, and recklessly exposing the public to Covid-19 … endangering public health,” her lawsuit adds.

 

Click on the link for the full article

 

[China]

School Masks Are Now a “Satanic Ritual,” According to Parents Suing a Local School District

 

The Bucks County school mask mandate fight has been playing out in angry school board meetings and community Facebook groups as well as in the court system, where one particular case that recently made its way to federal court does a good job of painting the picture.

 

Bucks County parents Sharon Harris, Jamie Walker, Timothy Tressler and Christopher Doebler are suing the Central Bucks School District on behalf of themselves and their children. (They have eight altogether.)

 

The allegations made by Walker, Tressler and Doebler are fairly run-of-the-mill when it comes to anti-masking grievances. They range from masks leading to “anxiety,” “depression” and “discomfort” to masks being a violation of their rights under the U.S. Constitution to masks causing “nervous tics.” There are, of course, the “philosophical objections.”

 

But Harris really turns it up a notch — or 12.

 

Harris starts by saying that her son (as opposed to she herself) believes that “masks are being used as a control mechanism over the population.” And she asserts that the entire Harris family — she has two other kids in the system, for whom masking has apparently led to the aforementioned anxiety — has a religious objection to masking in schools, because, the lawsuit says, Harris believes masks somehow interfere with her family’s ability to “spread the word of God.”

 

The Harris family adds that the children feel “tortured” in the “prison-like atmosphere” at school. Finally, Harris says her family believes that masking is a “Satanic ritual.”

 

To fact-check this claim that wearing masks or instituting mask mandates is a Satanic ritual, we reached out to the Reverend Raul Antony, spokesperson for the official Church of Satan. “No, simply ‘wearing a mask’ is not a Satanic ritual, and anyone that genuinely thinks otherwise is a blithering idiot,” Antony informed Philly Mag on Thursday.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Some Parent Groups Proposing Monday ‘Sit-Outs’ At Schools To Protest Against Vaccine Mandates

 

Grassroots organizers and parent groups have been circulating flyers calling for parents in the Los Angeles Unified School District, as well as other districts, to keep their children home from school Monday as a way to protest vaccine mandates.

 

With officials across the southland working hard to keep COVID-19 out of schools, deadlines are approaching for teachers and staff to get vaccinated in some districts, including LAUSD.

 

LAUSD district employees are required to have their first COVID-19 vaccine dose by Monday. Many employees have done just that, which comes as a relief to some parents.

 

“It shows that they are really committed to their profession and to protecting students,” said Rachel Wagner, the parent of an LAUSD student.

 

On Friday, LAUSD reported that 97% of its teachers have gotten at least one dose, as well as 95% of administrators and 95% of supervisors, like cafeteria managers or administrative assistants.

 

Workers who do not comply with the vaccine mandate will not be able to return to work Monday.

 

California was the first state to mandate vaccines for all eligible school children and some parents are pushing back with the proposed “sit-out” Monday.

 

“There are definitely parents who are pulling their kids out of school all across California, across the country, too,” said Angela McArdle, the chair of the Libertarian Party of Los Angeles County.

 

Click on the link for the full article

 

I fail to see the problem.  They don't want to get their kids vaccinated and wear a mask, so they protest by keeping their kids out of school?  Sounds like a win.  You don't want those potential disease vectors in school.

 

 

[China]

Imagine paying money to send your kid to a school run by people this stupid:

 

A Florida school says students who get vaxxed must stay home for 30 days due to unfounded claim that they'll infect others

 

A private school in Miami, Florida, is requiring students who get vaccinated to quarantine at home for 30 days after each dose. 

 

"Because of the potential impact on other students and our school community, vaccinated students will need to stay at home for 30 days post-vaccination for each dose and booster they receive and may return to school after 30 days as long as the student is healthy and symptom-free," a letter sent out to parents of students at the Centner Academy says, according to local news outlet WSVN. 

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

School board elections will be an early test of what issues motivate voters

 

School board meetings in Centerville, Ohio, used to draw just a handful of people. But that began to change last spring in this Dayton suburb when dozens showed up to a late April meeting, angry about school mask requirements.

 

That frustration has driven a slate of parents to contest this fall's school board elections in Centerville, where polarizing national issues have transformed what's typically a sleepy race.

 

It's something that's happening across the country. School boards have become the latest political battlefield, with fights over masks and COVID-19 vaccines, and with conservative parents concerned about diversity curriculum. These races are being watched by Republicans, who lost a lot of ground in the suburbs over the past eight years, and are hoping education could be a winning issue for them in congressional races in 2022 and the next presidential race as well.

 

In Centerville, there's a slate of school board candidates who oppose mask mandates

In Centerville, at that school board meeting in April — a meeting that was quickly adjourned after it devolved into a shouting match — the crowd cheered as Lysa Kosins spoke about her health concerns about wearing masks.

 

Kosins said she had pulled her two children out of the school district because she didn't want them to have to wear masks. "They complain to me every day about how they don't want to wear it," Kosins said. "They don't want to go to school."

 

Heather Schultz, another parent, spoke next, ending her remarks with a warning. "If you continue to ignore the families speaking out against this and other related topics," she said, "the people who elected you will replace you with people who support our ideals and goals, because we are no longer asleep at the wheel."

 

Kosins and Schultz are now running for the board. A third candidate, Dawn McGuire, is also part of their slate, running under the slogan "Parents' voices matter," which aims to replace three current board members and effectively take control of the five-member panel. Their campaign signs say "Conservatives for Board of Education," though in Centerville, the school board is a nonpartisan election.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[Springfield]

I need to vent and I think this is the proper thread.

 

Are you all watching the narrative that’s being painted for the gubernatorial race in VA? It’s schools. Specifically, it’s over a parents choice to choose what their children are taught in school. Naturally, as this is the biggest race of November, it’s really just a litmus test for the nation.

 

Parents absolutely, unequivocally and under no circumstances, are qualified to decide what their children are taught in school. It’s abhorrent that republicans are picking this fight and they’re obviously doing to try and win over middle aged mothers, the same ones who abandoned over Trump. They’re courting the same voters whose bodies they’d like control over.
 

Like, I’m seriously pissed over this whole thing, maybe because I think it might be a devious enough tactic for it to win Youngkin the governor’s mansion. Mostly I’m pissed because I’m a parent with kids in public school. I’m offended that Republicans think I even want a say in what my children are taught in school. No. I live in Fairfax county and an affluent neighborhood because I trust that my children will get an adequate education. If I wanted something different then I’d send my kids to private school or home school them.

 

**** these people.

[China]

 

[China]

Angry protesters picket school board over school sports vaccination policy

 

About a dozen anti-vaccination protestors gathered outside the main office of the Upper Grand District School Board Tuesday evening to voice their opposition to the school boards vaccination policy regarding varsity school athletics.

 

The protestors blocked the entrance to the parking lot and gathered to plan their next move unaware that the school board meeting was already underway.

 

“This is public property,” Oliver told the group. “They have no right to deny us being here because we pay for it through our taxes. We can go inside. There is nothing they can do. They can call police and the police can say you’ve got to leave.”

 

The offices were closed to the public due to pandemic restrictions, but Oliver and others attempted to get in. It was then that they realized the meeting, which was being held via Zoom, had started at 6:30 as scheduled, nearly half an hour before the protestors arrived.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

California school board president curses at parent speaking against mask mandates

 

A California school board president cursed at a parent who expressed concerns over mask and vaccine mandates during a meeting Tuesday.

 

Lauren Roupoli, along with other parents at the Los Alamitos Unified School District, addressed the board with her thoughts on mask and vaccine mandates.

 

She told the board she is against the California mask mandate for students and will be against a vaccine mandate, and asked the board not to support them.

 

Eventually, Board President Marlys Davidson told Roupoli her time was up, according to public video of the meeting, and called up the next parent. Roupoli concluded, and Davidson mumbled under her breath "f--- you," which was picked up by her mic.

 

Attendees of the meeting, who had been applauding Roupoli moments before, fell into a stunned silence, along with the board.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Anti-masker New York realtor is fired after filming himself chasing young children and accusing their parents of abusing them for forcing them to wear masks

 

A New York realtor was fired a day after he posted video of himself chasing young children down the street as they left school and  telling them they had been abused because they were being forced to wear masks by teachers and parents.

 

Curtis Goldstein, who also goes by the name Curtis Orwell, worked for R New York Real Estate and posted the footage in which he yelled at the youngsters through a bullhorn on Thursday.

On Friday, R New York CEO Stefani Berkin confirmed that Goldstein had been fired from the real estate firm in an Instagram post. 

'The company does not support bullying or harassment of any kind as it is not aligned with our values,' Berkin wrote. 

 

'We have made the decision to terminate Curtis Goldstein immediately,' she added. 'He is no longer affiliated with the company.' 

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Texas schools can again set face mask rules after federal judge overrules Abbott's ban

 

The judge said the governor's order impedes children with disabilities from the benefits of public schools’ programs, services and activities, in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act

A federal judge ruled Wednesday that Gov. Greg Abbott’s executive order prohibiting mask mandates in schools violates the Americans with Disabilities Act — freeing local officials to again create their own rules.

 

The order comes after a monthslong legal dispute between parents, a disability rights organization and Texas officials over whether the state was violating the 1990 law, known as the ADA, by not allowing school districts to require masks. U.S. District Judge Lee Yeakel barred Attorney General Ken Paxton from enforcing Abbott’s order.

 

“The spread of COVID-19 poses an even greater risk for children with special health needs,” Yeakel said. “Children with certain underlying conditions who contract COVID-19 are more likely to experience severe acute biological effects and to require admission to a hospital and the hospital’s intensive-care unit.”

 

The judge said the governor's order impedes children with disabilities from the benefits of public schools’ programs, services and activities to which they are entitled.

 

The advocacy group, Disability Rights Texas, filed the federal lawsuit on behalf of several Texan families in late August against Abbott, Paxton and Texas Education Agency Commissioner Mike Morath.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

A COVID strategy backfires at schools

 

Hundreds of school districts and universities around the country rushed to invest in new electronic air cleaning systems in the last two years to help alleviate COVID concerns. But in many cases, those investments turned out to be doing more harm than good.

 

Why it matters: In some cases, the efforts to keep kids and teachers safe in schools may not be as effective as claimed. In other cases, the air cleaning systems could be exposing them to the harmful toxins ozone and formaldehyde, experts warn.

 

Driving the news: 40% of school districts of more than 1,000 districts in the U.S. have used federal money to update their HVAC system and air filtration systems, which were outdated long before the pandemic, new data out this week from school tracker database Burbio shows.

 

School districts and universities have spent as much as $100 million on this technology — often for electronic air cleaning systems that have misleading, company-funded studies that boast 99.99% efficacy, said Marwa Zaatari, mechanical engineer and a board member of the U.S. Green Building Council.

"If you start to dig into the company tests and all the cheating is happening. 99.99% doesn’t mean anything if you're testing in a shoebox," she said, alluding to the company Global Plasma Solutions.

That company is the defendant in a class-action lawsuit over its marketing, with allegations it relied on test results from an air chamber the size of a shoebox to make efficacy claims. The company did not respond to requests for comment.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Parents are scrambling after schools suddenly cancel class over staffing and burnout

 

Two weeks' notice: Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools in North Carolina voted on Oct. 28 to close schools on Nov. 12 for a "day of kindness, community and connection."

 

Five days' notice: On the evening of Wednesday, Nov. 17, Ann Arbor Public Schools in Michigan announced that schools would be closed the following Monday and Tuesday, extending Thanksgiving break for a full week. The district cited rising COVID-19 cases and staff shortages.

 

Three and even two days' notice: On Tuesday and Wednesday, Nov. 9 and 10, three different districts in Washington state — in Seattle, Bellevue and Kent — announced schools would be closed that same Friday, the day after Veterans Day, due to staff shortages.

 

Schools and districts around the country have been canceling classes on short notice. The cancellations aren't directly for COVID-19 quarantines; instead schools are citing staff shortages, staff fatigue, mental health and sometimes even student fights.

 

Burbio, an organization that tracks school district websites, says these closures are an accelerating trend in the month of November, affecting 858 districts and 8,692 individual schools so far. At least 20 districts have added days to their Thanksgiving break this week, as happened in Ann Arbor, according to a report by CNN.

 

Click on the link for the full article

 

Edited November 23, 2021 by China

[China]

711 infected across 93 new coronavirus outbreaks at Michigan schools

 

Michigan health officials identified 93 new COVID-19 outbreaks linked to schools last week, which resulted in the infection of 711 students and staff.

 

Additionally, the state health department’s latest weekly outbreaks report, updated Tuesday, Nov. 30, noted 534 ongoing outbreaks from previous reports, which have resulted in the infection of 6,931 students and staff. Those outbreaks include at least one additional case over the past 28 days.

 

An outbreak is defined by the state health department as three or more cases with a link by place and time indicating a shared exposure outside of a household. Schools continue to be the most common setting for reported COVID-19 outbreaks, as less than 50% of students are vaccinated and only 222 school districts have a mask policy, compared to 311 districts that do not.

 

The CDC recommends a layered approach to prevention strategies, including promoting vaccinations, correctly wearing masks, allowing for physical distancing and promoting screening and testing for illness.

 

Click on the link for the full article