{"id":119019,"date":"2020-11-24T03:45:12","date_gmt":"2020-11-24T00:45:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/nycs-school-closing-makes-zero-sense\/"},"modified":"2020-11-24T03:45:12","modified_gmt":"2020-11-24T00:45:12","slug":"nycs-school-closing-makes-zero-sense","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/nycs-school-closing-makes-zero-sense\/","title":{"rendered":"#NYC\u2019s school closing makes zero sense"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#NYC\u2019s school closing makes zero sense<\/strong>”
\n<\/p>\n

\n Zero point two percent: That\u2019s the rate at which people in the city\u2019s public-school system have tested positive for the coronavirus. That\u2019s two in every thousand tests \u2014 and it includes quite a few students and school staff who are all-remote, meaning they didn\u2019t get the bug at school.<\/p>\n

All the science<\/a> shows in-person schooling is not at all a significant COVID-19 spreader for kids or adults, especially through 6th grade or so. High-risk teachers can easily get exempted from having to come in. Meanwhile, kids through at least 3rd grade have far more trouble getting any benefit from remote classes \u2014 and a parent or other adult has to practically sit with them the whole time. On top of that, online \u201clearning\u201d is even tougher for lower-income families.<\/p>\n

Yet Mayor de Blasio has closed all his schools simply because (by the city\u2019s measure, not the state\u2019s), Gotham hit a seven-day rolling average positive rate above 3 percent. Restaurants and bars, gyms and barbershops all remain open; closing the schools first makes no sense at all.<\/p>\n

Which is why private and Catholic school buildings, outside de Blasio\u2019s direct control, remain open.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, New Yorkers are busy mingling at secret sex parties and raves in Queens, Brooklyn and The Bronx, as well as a massive maskless ultra-Orthodox wedding. Not to mention the not-at-all-secret protests, with a total lack of social<\/a> distancing that the politicians barely wave a finger at. Yet all that misbehavior has barely gotten the Big App<\/a>le to the 3 percent positive rate that de Blasio cited as cause to shut down all his schools.<\/p>\n

Heck, United Federation of Teachers boss Mike Mulgrew \u2014 who actually insisted on the 3 percent rule back when he was agreeing to let any schools reopen in September \u2014 wrote his members Sunday<\/a> in support of reopening schools in neighborhoods with low positivity rates. \u201cWe are going to ask the mayor to consider a regional approach,\u201d he claims. \u201cWe don\u2019t think the whole system has to go remote if large areas of the city have kept transmission rates low.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gov. Cuomo likewise called for a school-by-school approach, before going along with de Blasio\u2019s total shutdown.<\/p>\n

If Mulgrew isn\u2019t just playing game<\/a>s, he should unilaterally OK most school reopenings next week. Indeed, de Blasio should announce it and dare the union chief to do yet another 180.<\/p>\n

This \u201cone size fits all\u201d standard is beyond senseless. The mayor has no excuse for sticking to it.\n <\/p><\/div>\n