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NYC’s 1 Million Kids Confront Covid Spike in School Return

Parents, teachers and officials have pushed back against the mayor’s decision to reopen schools without testing or remote options.

NYC’s 1 Million Kids Confront Covid Spike in School Return
Students wait in line to enter a New York City public high school in New York. (Photographer: Angus Mordant/Bloomberg)

New York City Mayor Eric Adams tried to reassure parents of 1 million public school students that it was safe to return to classes on Monday after the winter break despite a surge in Covid cases, staffing shortages and no testing requirement to come back. 

“Our city and school system must open,” Adams said Monday on Bloomberg Television’s “Balance of Power with David Westin.” “We cannot lose more years of education for our children.”

As U.S. and state officials resist mandating shutdowns, schools across New Jersey and in Atlanta and Detroit have gone remote temporarily, while Washington, D.C. has mandated proof of negative test to return to school. New York City has done neither.

One in three Covid tests came back positive over the last seven days, according to city data as of Dec. 31. The seven-day Covid positivity rate surpassed 45% in some areas of the Bronx, while hospitalizations have more than tripled since mid-December to 492.

‘New Phase’

Many Manhattan private schools require proof of negative coronavirus tests for returning students. The Spence School asked for a PCR or antigen rapid test within 48 hours of the start of school on Tuesday. Head of School Bodie Brizendine told parents Monday that she tested positive, but that “we are full force ahead for Spence’s return to academic life while I work from a distance.” She said Spence would ramp up in-school testing to a twice-weekly schedule of all students and employees in January. 

The Collegiate School asked for everyone to take an at-home rapid test on Monday morning before returning to school, a weekly requirement in addition to twice-weekly PCR pool testing. Collegiate is also using a “test-to-stay protocol” so that students exposed can take a rapid test at home, each day, and if negative and symptom free, can return to school, according to a Dec. 30 letter from Head of School David Lourie. It’s also shortening lunch to minimize time students aren’t wearing masks. 

“We will be navigating this new phase of the pandemic as it likely develops into an endemic that we will need to manage for the foreseeable future,” Lourie said in the letter. “It will require more robust mitigation measures.”

Horace Mann School in the Bronx is offering rapid testing on campus before a Tuesday return, for those “experiencing difficulty” finding a test. “HM was able to purchase a substantial number of rapid tests,” Head of School Thomas Kelley wrote to parents on Dec. 29.

Staff Shortages

In New Jersey, 30% of the state’s schools are closed due to Covid-related concerns, including Newark, the largest district, according to the Health Department. Governor Phil Murphy said he has no plans to shut all of the schools down. 

In Chicago, the teachers union will vote on whether to return to remote learning as of Wednesday amid the Covid surge, according to a spokeswoman for the Chicago Teachers Union. The union, which went on strike in 2019 and also pushed to delay the reopening after winter break a year ago, wants the Chicago Public Schools to add more mitigations to curb the spread in classrooms that reopened on Monday for about 330,000 students.

A Chicago Public Schools spokesperson said it was aware of possible union actions, “including refusal to report to work which CPS is deeply concerned could place the health and safety of members of our community, particularly our students, at increased risk.” 

The district plans to “double down” on strategies including vaccination and testing, which hit a snag last weekend when tens of thousands of mail-in Covid tests belonging to students overwhelmed deliver boxes and led to invalid results.

In Vermont, the state distributed 87,000 rapid tests to school families and asked them to allow students to return only if Covid-free. In the large Boston suburb of Brookline, the superintendent emailed families Sunday night saying there would be no school Monday: “At this time, we simply do not have the staffing capacity to operate all schools safely,” the message read.

While several other Massachusetts towns canceled or delayed classes on Monday, Governor Charlie Baker on Monday said “the vast majority of school districts and schools in Massachusetts are opening today, which I think is incredibly important.” Massachusetts is not requiring testing for students to return to school, but more than 2,000 schools have been regularly testing students. 

In New York City, some parents, teachers and union officials have pushed back against the mayor’s decision to reopen public schools without testing or remote options. 

“We advised the new mayor that it would be safest to allow our school system to go remote temporarily until we could get a handle on the staffing challenges that each school is about to face as we return,” Michael Mulgrew, president of the United Federation of Teachers, said in a letter to teacher union members on Sunday. “However, he feels strongly that schools need to remain open.” 

Mulgrew said on Monday that the union is concerned about staffing and will monitor shortages. “The safety issue right now is staffing,” he said during a press conference, declining to quantify how many people are out sick. 

Adams said that he’s been speaking to the union multiple times a day over the last week about what happens if significant numbers of teachers test positive and schools lack enough staff to remain open.

“I am confident that we’re going to find the manpower” to keep schools open, Adams said in an interview on Pix11. Adams said there are enough substitute teachers available to fill classrooms if teachers are out sick. 

1.5 Million Tests

Adams said the city distributed more than 1.5 million test kits to the largest U.S. school system. If a student tests positive for Covid-19, city schools have enough test kits to send one home with the other exposed children in the classroom, Adams said. Regardless of exposure, kids who test negative will be able to go back to class. All school staff will get two at-home rapid tests each week in January. 

“Covid is not following some plan. It’s giving us new variants. It’s doing new things. We’ve got to shift to adjust to it,” Adams said outside of a Bronx elementary school he visited with Schools Chancellor David Banks on Monday.

Banks also announced a Department of Education Covid command center on Monday to allow principals and district leadership to address and escalate issues and ensure adequate staffing.

“There is less Covid in our schools than in the community,” Banks said at the press conference.

Although Adams has mayoral control of city schools and supports mandatory testing, he said the authority to mandate tests rests with New York Governor Kathy Hochul, who is encouraging testing in schools, but not requiring it. 

Adams said his legal team is exploring the city’s options for mandatory testing, but that the city needs to make sure it has enough test kits and that the action is carried out in coordination with the state.

“I believe in mandated testing,” Adams said. “We want to do it right.”

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