De Blasio to reopen New York elementary schools in reversal

Mayor of New York Bill de BlasioBill de BlasioMacy will still hold Thanksgiving parade amid pandemic The Hill’s Morning Report – Presented by the Embassy of the United Arab Emirates in Washington, DC – COVID-19 fears surround the Thanksgiving holiday in New York to add COVID-19 checkpoints at bridges and crossings PLUS (D) announced plans to reopen public elementary schools in New York City after closing all schools nearly two weeks ago.

The mayor detailed the city’s plans to allow elementary and pre-K students to resume in-person learning on December 7. Three days later, the city intends to welcome struggling students with in-person instruction, which de Blasio said must be “operational”.

In-person education will only be available to those students who have opted for at least some form of in-person learning this year, which represents less than 335,000 children. Under the new plan, middle and high schools would remain closed.

“Whatever happens, we want this to be the plan for the future, because now we think we know what we didn’t know this summer,” the mayor said at a press conference.

“We know that if you put a lot of emphasis on testing and continually strengthen these health and safety measures… we know we can keep our schools safe,” he added.

The country’s largest public school district will adjust its monthly to weekly testing, increase randomized testing and require all in-person participants to have consent forms to allow them to be tested or medical exemption.

The city will also get rid of its 3% test positivity threshold that triggers school closures and instead track the number of classrooms and schools that close after multiple confirmations of COVID-19 cases.

De Blasio said the city’s new “preferred model” is for schools to return to teaching five days a week, if they have “the space and the capacity” to accommodate and educate their children.

The change of plans comes after de Blasio closed schools in the city as coronavirus cases soar. The shutdown sparked backlash as several argued the city was prioritizing economic activities like eating indoors over educating New York’s children.

De Blasio has been pushing for the largest school district in the United States to reopen in-person teaching in the fall, but problems have caused him to delay back to school twice.

But there is growing evidence that elementary schools can stay safe with strict coronavirus restrictions, as New York’s public schools have had low rates of positivity throughout its eight weeks of operation. openness, the New York Times noted.