School Options, Fall 2020: What Are Your Options (and Decisions)?
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Here’s a question for moms of school kids: What’s happening in your district (and county, and state)? If you have options, what are you choosing (and using which factors)? How is your employer supporting you (or not) during this crazy time period?
(Readers, of course, have had a ton of threadjacks on this — here are a few good ones on point, including a thread on preparing for virtual learning).
There are no right answers here — I love this doctor’s guidance that whatever choice you make is the right one. That said, here’s some of what I’ve heard from friends…
Remote School
- Lots of people are dealing with remote school as their only option — and as schedules are starting to come in, kindergarteners are supposed to be sitting in front of the computer for up to six hours (with parental guidance, of course!).
- Another friend of mine is disappointed that her school (as of August!) has no real plan for online schooling beyond outsourcing it to a third party.
- If you have a child with an IEP, are those special needs being met via remote school? I’ve heard from some mom friends that they’ve had to sign waivers agreeing that speech/OT/PT can’t be provided virtually.
Hybrid Options
- The hybrid model — ah, the hybrid model — where some kids are in school some days. Where are the kids the rest of the days? Who is supervising them?
- Of course, in some counties/states, even the hybrid model will go out the window if health markers change…
{related: here’s the CDC checklists for the various back-to-school options}
In-School Options
I don’t have any friends in areas where schools are starting up as if a pandemic isn’t happening — but things aren’t going well, with lots of school closures as kids test positive for COVID-19 and entire classrooms have to quarantine (see, e.g., North Carolina, Georgia, or Mississippi).
Home Schooling
I mean, I guess it’s always an option?
Pandemic Pods
I’m hearing more and more about these, including how they’re not great for racial equity (one great op-ed called them “the latest in segregation“), but some suburban parents are getting kids together in very small groups and hiring teachers/tutors (or having parents teach subjects to the “pod”)
Ladies, what are your school options right now for your kids? What are the complications of each? How is your employer (and your partner’s employer) supporting those options? (Do you feel like as a working mother you’re getting different messaging than working fathers?)
Stock photo via Stencil.
That’s total BS that schools/districts won’t give speech therapy virtually. I realize that the efficacy could vary depending on what is needed and the age of the child, but my kiddo has been in speech therapy via Zoom since March and has made quite a bit of progress.
Hybrid for us is AM/PM. Half the kids go AM, half go PM. It is easier for childcare (for us AM people) and the kids stay in the same routine. I like it much better but the teachers are still exposed to 20 kids a day (AM 10 kids, PM 10 kids). I have no doubt we will get shut down sometime in October but at least my kids will have met their teachers before we all go remote.
We actually have an in-person private option but are almost certain we will not take it. We had a long discussion with an administrator and the precautions are not enough for us given our household’s risk level, even though cases in our area are good and we think it could be a good option for other families. We are keenly aware of the trade-offs we are taking. We will get details on the public remote options soon, with the deadline for choosing homeschool coming shortly after that. We will be looking to see if the public remote option is (1) flexible enough and realistic for me and DH to both continue working (me, with reduced hours) and (2) offers virtual socialization opportunities. If the remote option fails those criteria, we will be choosing homeschooling. At this point, I view both options as “homeschooling” it just will depend on whether we have any support from the district, or whether we will need to DIY our own academic and socialization support. We will re-assess in a year, but we consider it an option to have kiddo repeat a grade (starting a grade level in 2021 that they should have started in 2020, possibly at a new school). Child’s closest friend is in the grade behind them anyway, and their current birthday has left them as one of the younger kids in class. Homeschooling will focus as much on emotional wellness (given that we are all having a tough time) as much as core academics. This has all been very hard, as homeschooling is not something that would have ever been something we considered pre-Covid.
This post strikes me as very one-sided and I’m disappointed by it. It dismisses schools that are planning to open with the comment that “things aren’t going very well” and pods as “not great for racial equity.” I’d expect this site to be more inclusive. Plenty of commenters have indicated they are exploring either private school or pods.
Our public schools are opening full-time in-person but not “as if a pandemic isn’t happening.” They have tons of new precautions in place from universal mask requirements to more outside time to smaller class sizes to single direction hallways. Whether or not that will be enough no one knows for sure, but I really appreciate that they’re trying instead of just giving up like so much of the country. Isolated positive cases are inevitable, the point of masks and all the other precautions are to prevent one infected person from infecting many others, so I don’t necessarily see a kid testing positive on the first day of school as the disaster that some people think it is.
On a related note, has anyone’s employer announced a policy for employees whose kids are doing virtual school or are excluded from school or day care due to symptoms? Our “no working from home while caring for children” policy is so far only waived through Labor Day, even though most school districts are starting the year virtual-only. I have a lot of staff with kids in day care and elementary school who are stressing out. If even half of them quit or go on long-term unpaid leave I am going to be up a creek without a paddle.
We are still waiting to hear if our church preschool will open in person. If it does, kiddo will go. If it doesn’t, we may either look for another preschool (a few are open in this area, we just love ours so we are waiting them out) or try to set up regular playdates with her classmates from last year’s class to get some socialization. She’s also supposed to be getting speech therapy through the public schools, and we have no idea what that will look like given schools are all remote (no end date specified). Hopefully in the next month we will hear about what modifications they need to make to her IEP to account for virtual learning, and something’s better than nothing.
If she were in K or older, I would be either putting her in a private school that is committed to in person classes (with reasonable precautions) or going reduced time at work and homeschooling. I have zero confidence in virtual learning for young children, no matter how well done, and I do not expect our county to do it very well given the disaster that was spring and the lack of planning I’ve heard about from teachers for the fall.
Our tiny (<100 students), lovely private school is planning to be open full-time in person. The school has a great outdoor space they will utilize heavily until Thanksgiving. We are starting a week early and will not have school between Thanksgiving and New Years.
In-person school is absolutely what's best for at least one child. We're going to keep another child home, who would have otherwise started preschool this year.
If our kids' school can't be open in-person for some reason, we will not be doing the online option and will switch to homeschooling, which is what we did in March and through the summer. We're in touch with some neighbor families who go to the same school and will do a homeschool co-op/pod.
Singapore Math for math, the Good and the Beautiful language arts curriculum, and a Charlotte Mason-style morning basket with composer studies, picture studies and nature studies. I have those curricula already but am trying to order more copies (all backordered) to be prepared for additional students to switch if needed. Preschooler will be doing Preschool Math at Home, some Montessori-style literacy activities and the sensory activities from The Homegrown Preschooler.
We have always and will always use private schools, and our pod is no more racist or classist than our school and neighborhood is – and to the extent that our school/neighborhood is racist + a product of structural racism, which, certainly, yes, I am not going to fix it in one school year by refusing to put my kids in a coop/pod – I don't know why decades of structural racism in schools is now the laid at the feet of "suburban parents" (aka overburdened moms) trying to figure out *something* for their kids.
Things are still pretty up-in-the-air for us. The only thing that is certain is we won’t be in public school. Their virtual plan does not work for us at all.
First, we’re waiting to see how the p1ssing contest between the county executive and the governor w/r/t private schools plays out, and then whether the private school we enrolled in will actually open if allowed. If it’s open, my kids (K and 2) will definitely go in person. I’m comfortable with the school’s health safety measures, we have no risk factors in our immediate family.
If private school won’t open, and their virtual plan doesn’t seem reasonable, we may switch to home schooling. DH could potentially take a leave of absence from work to facilitate, but right now he is only in the office half time and we’re pretty confident we can fit the curriculum in between his off time and me strategically scheduling some schooling breaks. My office remains full remote and my employer is being fairly family-friendly so far. My company’s main US office locations are in areas where public schools are already committed to virtual learning, so we’re all in the same boat.
There may be a privately-run “learning center’ in the public elementary school building. If we home school, we will probably send the kids to the aftercare portion of that, and/or see if our summer babysitter can stay on part time. I’m uncomfortable with pandemic pods or shared babysitting not because of equity issues, but because I don’t want to mix money with friends.
My private school is opening on schedule, but they’ve taken a laundry list of precautions that aren’t available to a lot of schools. High school will be online only for now, middle and elementary kids have the option of in-person or online. My daughter will be starting kindergarten, and we’ll be sending her. The school has upgraded its HVAC system, has installed temperature sensors at the entries, rented tents and set up outdoor classrooms, encourages teachers to keep the windows open, has hired extra cleaning staff, made masks mandatory, and a long list of other changes. They have broken up the classes into cohorts to minimize contact, much like the daycares did. My daughter has been going to daycare since June and I’ve felt comfortable with the precautions they have been taking. While young children certainly can get sick and pass on the virus, they do so at much lower rates than older children or adults, which is also adding to my comfort level. If my daughter were in middle school, I would consider the online option.
The online option is synchronous to what is being taught in class, which sounds horrific for Kindergarten. If a child does get sick, even if its just a run of the mill cold and we have to keep them home, they can attend the online class and not be counted absent.
Our city’s public schools have decided to delay the start of school until after Labor Day, and then they will be online only until October. The delay is so the district can distribute more Chromebooks, set up hotspots, and train teachers.
Missed this yesterday, I guess. Here in Chicago, CPS announced that it was walking back from its hybrid model and going all remote until November 8. They were supposed to announce what remote learning would look like today, but now they need “a few more days.”
My kiddo is entering kindergarten and is currently at a daycare/preschool that offers kindergarten. Small school, small classes, been very happy with precautions, and our community spread is not high. Kiddo will stay there and the hope is the daycare can facilitate whatever remote learning looks like. (We were very lucky to get kiddo a spot in a magnet program and do not want to lose the spot by not enrolling kiddo – plus, schools depend on enrollment for funding.) I anticipate that there will be little live interaction for kindergarten as no one wants them in front of a screen for hours.
But as I keep saying to my parents friends – there are no good options.
Our public school person is going back in person next week, with lots of precautions. It’s not a perfect plan but the district has clearly given everything a lot of thought and consideration. I have been very cautious throughout this pandemic and feel surprisingly OK about going back to school. Families can choose a live, in-person virtual option. 20% of the district is reportedly taking that option. If things get worse (it’s a college town, so possible), I will not be surprised if all of us end up doing virtual learning this fall. It’s going to be a sh!tshow for our family if that happens.
I am not interested in faciliating homeschooling or forming a pod. That would add to my stress, not decrease it. I am not a qualified teacher; I do not want to be fully responsible for my kids’ education. Both of those options also would require one or both of us to move to a part-time role.
And, I agree that the criticism of pods needs to stop. I see that they’re problematic from an equity standpoint but parents are grasping at straws for solutions. Which are definitely not coming from our state or federal leadership, so there’s that.
We are leaving our school district and open enrolling our older kids (4th and 2nd grade) In a virtual charter school. Both options given by our district sound equally terrible for our family, for different reasons.
Option 1 is in-person, all day. In theory, this is what we hoped for. But the “precautions“ are extreme and inflexible, especially for kids like our oldest with special needs. The original plan was masks required, but only when social distancing isn’t possible and only indoors. It didn’t include gym class and there were going to be frequent, long stretches of time where kids would be spaced out and able to breathe. Thanks to a new mandate by our governor, masks have to be worn at all times indoors with no breaks, no exceptions at school. Even while participating in indoor gym class. The only “break” is while eating a prepackaged lunch in a plexiglass cubicle. The governor’s order has specific exemptions for people with medical and mental health conditions. The district worked with our local healthcare to basically reject any request for even short, safe breaks, no matter how legitimate and well documented the conditions. One of our kids has ADHD, anxiety and has been having panic attacks when wearing a mask for more than a few minutes at a time. She’s doing therapy, which is sporadic at best due to providers reducing hours, but that isn’t a quick fix. Her pedi’s solution was to prescribe antidepressants (she’s not even 10) that could severely interact with her adhd meds and the major side effect for kids is suicidal ideation. No way. If every day is going to be met with panic and anxiety, there’s no way that environment is healthy long-term. The amount of actual learning she’s doing is suspect. Our younger daughter wanted to be with her friends in school, but when she learned most of them were homeschooling and the bestie that isn’t is in another class, she was sold on staying home. They aren’t going to be able to interact with any other classes within their grade and will even be separated at recess.
Our district’s other option is a synchronous learning model. Nothing will be recorded. The kids have to be online from 9am – 4 pm, and “follow along” while classmates are in gym, at recess, at lunch. Any disconnection is an absence. We’d have to basically run an entire school day from home. There’s no way I could get them both on board with that all day to manage it independently, while caring for our younger kids (4, 1 and another due this fall). Any closure in the face-to-face option gets everyone kicked to the synchronous model. I just can’t do it.
We looked into our local private school and loved their flexibility and commitment to “normal school” with reasonable precautions, but there’s the threat they could be shut down by the state or county health department. It would be a big stretch on our budget to make it happen, and my husband isn’t on board with paying for education this year if it is likely we’ll end up doing a decent portion of it at home, on our own.
We’re hoping to send our 4 year old to preschool at our church. We love it there and he had such a great start to the year last year. We’re currently enrolled in the district 4k option at the same preschool but are weighing moving him to one of the private-pay classes. Again, same debate with the husband about paying for school. They completely shut down last spring even though they operate on a childcare license and 60% of the classes could have stayed open. We hope they develop a plan to stay open like all the other childcare centers in town did, but that isn’t finalized yet. There’s always the threat the district could shut down these community partner 4k sites even when the sites themselves have no or very low cases, based on the overall “risk level” in our county and other school buildings. The metrics our district is using are convoluted. I did complex litigation until I decided to stay home when our 4th was born last year, and their various scenarios make my head spin. It is hard to make sense of it. Add that our state has documented problems with reporting accurate data by DHS’s own admission, and it feels problematic. There are 30,000+ documented negative cases not included in official data due to “backlog” but everything is based on the percent positive rate. It doesn’t feel trustworthy.
I wanted to do traditional homeschool and we have a lot of friends doing the same. But being solely responsible for curriculum and instruction while caring for 2 younger kids and expecting another felt overwhelming. So, the virtual public charter school was our best option. It is a hybrid textbook/recorded lesson program and they have live one-on-ones with their teacher at least once a week. They’d work with our daughter’s 504 plan and complete the IEP our district failed to do if necessary. Special education services are available. We also like that is a work at your own pace kind of program. Some kids finish in April, others stretch it out to August. We’re building in socializing with other homeschool families and neighbors and keeping the kids enrolled in their various activities. I’m excited for the flexibility of homeschool without being solely responsible for instruction and curriculum.
There are no great options this year. It feels like a choice between bad, worse and terrible. Good luck to all, and way to go in making the best decision possible for your family.
My kiddo is leaving a Jewish Community Center preschool+care for private preK and I noticed our JCC is offering a daily drop off for older kids where the JCC will make the kids actually do their remote learning. If I had older kids, I’d seriously look into it.