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Yesterday we discussed the ‘schools must never close’ diehards who dominate much of the current COVID policy debate. I wanted to give you an update on the situation in the New York City public schools because I think it illustrates some Omicron-specific dynamics which haven’t really become part of that discussion. I don’t know precisely how far New York City and DC and other parts of the Northeast are ahead of the rest of the country right now. Maybe it’s like this everywhere. If not, likely it soon will be. But I know it’s like this here and in much of the Northeast. I’m going to reference some personal experiences but only to illustrate things I know are widespread if not universal throughout the city and region.
Yesterday attendance at my older son’s New York City public high school was 30%. In the city as a whole attendance was at 44%. Some measure of that may have been the snowfall on Thursday night. But not much. There wasn’t that much snow. What you currently have is a lot of students home with COVID, more who are quarantined and still more whose parents are keeping them home from school to avoid getting COVID. At the same time, many teachers and staff are out with COVID. In many schools the teachers who are still standing have temporarily set aside or modified the curriculum. Because if only a small minority of the students are in class it’s more disruptive to teach them and let everyone else fall behind than simply to wait. There are many reports of classes watching movies or simply amusing themselves because the teacher and half the class isn’t there.
Earlier in the week and before break as well (winter break in the New York City public schools is one week) it was clear that most of the function of the schools was a mix of administering COVID tests, scheduling durations of COVID quarantines and sending kids home with COVID. One image I remember was a class, as it was described to me later, in which the principal, herself coming down with COVID, was handing out two COVID tests to each students to administer at home over the next two evenings after classmates had come down with COVID. Everything I’ve seen over recent weeks has been principals, teachers and staff being incredibly conscientious and diligent under the most trying of circumstances. But increasingly the circumstances themselves seem absurd.
Through most of the last two years we’ve viewed the schools question either as a question of health safety for students, staff and teachers or efforts to ‘stop the spread’. Those remain critical issues, though vaccines have lowered the stakes for most involved. But there’s a separate issue which is that these schools aren’t really ‘open’ in any meaningful sense. They’re remaining open largely on principle and spending their time managing the COVID outbreak. What we’re seeing is not so much education or instruction as what we might call COVID perseverance theater, a political commitment to remain open at all times under all circumstances.
As I noted last week a lot of that is based on demands from comfortable knowledge workers who’ve spent the pandemic working from home and largely insulated from the worst ravages of the pandemic. But it is also clearly based on popular resistance to school closures because what began as a short-term emergency measure in the spring of 2020 lasted in many districts for more than a year. I don’t suggest any easy answers to the current situation. But I think it is important to make clear what schools being open under those circumstances actually means. It may be fine for the great majority of students and vaccinated teachers and staff – in terms of illnesses generally being mild. But it’s not actually instruction. That just doesn’t happen under these circumstances.
Everything we’ve learned about Omicron suggests that this current tidal wave will ebb in the next two to three weeks. So it’s not like this is some new normal. If it were the decisions would be much more complicated and merciless. But it’s not. Or at least we have every reason to believe that. So we’re powering through the outbreak. But let’s not call it school.
