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A year gone
Many other education leaders are taking a different approach in 2020 and favor reopening schools. In Europe, many open in the middle of the year. In the US, private schools, including Catholic schools, which are often under-resourced, are reopening. In conservative parts of the US, public schools are also reopening, sometimes in consultation with local unions.
Some people contracted Covid at the school, but the overall effect on the spread of the virus was almost zero. US communities where schools are closed have the same rate of Covid as communities where schools are open, whether in the US or Europe. How is that possible? In the middle of 2020, there there are many other ways for Covid to spread – in supermarkets, bars, restaurants and workplaces, as well as in homes where children out of school gather with friends.
Despite emerging data that schools are not superspreaders, many US districts remain closed until 2021, even if a vaccine is available. About half of American children miss at least a year of full-time school, according to Michael Hartney of Boston College.
And children suffer as a result.
He loses in reading, math and other subjects. The effects are worst among low-income, Black and Latino children. Depression increased, and the American Academy of Pediatrics declared a national emergency in children’s mental health. Shamik Dasgupta, a philosopher at the University of California, Berkeley, who is an advocate for reopening the school, called the closure a “moral disaster.”
The closure also left some Americans on acid in public schools. National enrollment fell by 1.3 million, or 3 percent, according to the latest federal data. The share of U.S. adults who don’t trust or don’t trust public schools rose a few percentage points, to 33 percent, according to Gallup. In last year’s election, political candidates who supported vouchers — which effectively cut public school funding — did well, as Jonathan explains in his story.
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