School must go on: learning in the midst of a global pandemic
By: Courtney Kennedy
Tags: Covid 19, High School, College, Education, Going Back To School

Students, parents and teachers have all made their best efforts to manage schooling with COVID-19. Teachers have continuously cleaned the high-contact surfaces in their rooms between classes. Students of all ages have stepped up in helping out with their younger siblings’ schooling while parents are working. Parents have been doing what they can to aid in the schooling for their children and keep them safe.

Returning to school in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic has raised concerns. In many cases, schools have switched to online instruction. New measures such as extra cleaning have been implemented to keep students, teachers and families safe.

“I had no problem with going back to in-person classes. I saw it as, at some point we have to get back to school,” said Dana Hightower, a Miramar High School teacher. “Can’t stay in the house; can’t have this living in a bubble. As long as there were precautions taken, we would be fine. I am not happy with this online environment.”

Photo by Rubén Rodriguez on Unsplash

With COVID-19 affecting areas differently, the various counties of South Florida have had to prepare differently. Some are sending surveys, asking what the parents and students feel is safer to do moving forward.

“Even though we are back, this is not the teacher’s choice. The students and parents filled out a survey, and they were asked if they were going to send their kids physically back to school or did they want to continue e-learning,” said Hightower. “Twelve percent of our student population came back to the classroom, the other 88 percent are online.”

As more people start attending in-person classes, other social distancing guidelines become more important to follow closely. The risk of contracting COVID-19 increases as more people are in close proximity with other students and staff members of the school.

“There’s going to be other students who don’t wear masks. It’s just kind of scary knowing that someone not following the rules per se could mess it all up for somebody or somebody’s family,” said Sofia Ramirez, a Junior third year Biology Major at Florida International University in Miami.

As schools begin to reopen, there is uncertainty on many fronts, and questions loom. Are the schools safe enough? How will the school districts be able to protect everyone under their roofs? Will the students catch COVID-19? After recovering from COVID-19, can someone catch the virus again?

“Truth be told, all three of my kids tested positive for COVID-19 in the summer, I think that definitely influenced my decision in allowing them to go back to in-person classes,” said Aurora Rodriguez, Corporate Paralegal and a mother of three. “But I’m still very wary and cautious and I remind them to wear their masks, wash their hands and follow all the school rules and procedures.”

At home there have been a lot of adjustments for all parties to make, especially for younger children who do not completely understand what is happening in the world. As families work together to keep things running as smoothly as possible, technological advancements and subsequent technical difficulties require constant adjustments.

“My job is demanding, I need to make myself available to an entire team instead of working with one or two dedicated individuals. It’s a fast-paced environment with multiple moving parts at all times and I need to be ready to jump into any project or assignment at any given moment,” said Rodriguez. “But, having the kids doing school at home was very disruptive. They needed things printed, or they didn’t understand the assignment and they kept coming to me (and my husband) for help.”

Going back to school was a very different experience for teachers depending on their principals and the school administration. Some teachers were left on their own to figure out how to get essential supplies and comply with cleaning requirements. Others had their administration supply everything for them in a much more inclusive, uniform fashion.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

“My principal is awesome, she was doing things that maybe the district wasn’t doing. The district had their standard protocols, my principal went above and beyond,” commented Hightower. “We had these huge industrial sized hand sanitizers in each of our classrooms. Then we had one of the dispensers that you could fill accordingly, and she gave us wipes.”

Interruptions from online-schooled young children add even more to parents and siblings plates. Since the kids aren’t in schools being looked after by teachers, parents and siblings have to divide their attention between their own work and monitoring the young children.

“While they were completely virtual, they had a lot of down time. That would allow them to get a snack or use the restroom, but sometimes it was very long periods of doing nothing,” explained Rodriguez.

The teachers told Rodriguez this method of teaching was “due to the fact that not all the kids worked at the same pace. However, the downtime made it that much more difficult to redirect them and ensure they were getting back online to finish the remaining classes.”

Teaching teenagers has its own challenges when it comes to online schooling, or e-learning. The students will turn their cameras on, and do things that should not be done in front of the class and especially not in front of their teacher.

“I personally don’t think it’s a good idea in high school to have their cameras on, high schoolers just do weird stuff,” commented Hightower. “One of my students had his camera on at home, and he was changing his shirt. They don’t think and as an adult woman with a child changing his shirt on camera, it’s not cool, we don’t need to see all that.”

Another one of the many complications with starting off the school year online is students ability to focus and stay motivated. Since students aren’t leaving the house for school, and others in their household are also working or doing school online, many students have to do their schoolwork in their bedroom.

“Since the Zoom components of classes started, I feel like it’s a lot harder to stay motivated. Especially when your home setting is the same as your school setting, you don’t have the same concentration as you do with a professor,” explained Ramirez. “You’re not putting into practice anything you’re learning.”

Students with other younger siblings have to jump in to help out at times with schooling. It is not the most convenient for anyone, and everyone is trying to adapt to this new world of schooling amidst a global pandemic.

“I have two younger siblings who are also in school, so being anywhere else other than my room is really inconvenient,” commented Ramirez. “I am basically shut in my room for about eight or nine hours a day, which obviously affects your mental health.”

Ramirez explains that as the oldest sibling, she has to take on more responsibility with her brothers. “Both of my brothers have different curriculums and are in different grades, which is really, really difficult because I am trying to do the job of two people who are qualified to do this.”

Students in college with majors that require more hands-on lab type work have more of a challenge with online learning. They are not getting the hands-on experience needed to be able to practice and retain the information, like doctors, scientists and other professionals.

Photo by Trnava University on Unsplash

“I’m a STEM major, so in biology classes and math classes, they make us do a lot of breakout rooms for worksheets and stuff. It’s kind of an awkward interaction just because you’re depending on someone’s internet or mic to be able to hear them,” commented Ramirez. “Sometimes you have two people talking at the same time and they don’t realize it, group work lost its meaning when we went to online schooling, because it’s really not as effective.”

Teachers who have resumed some in-person classes have had to take extra precautions for themselves and their students. Teachers have had to clean more than they ever have, especially when they have multiple different classes of students to take care of. Anything a student borrows or uses the teacher has to wipe down.

“This is so weird, I do more cleaning at school than I do in my own home. When the students leave, we have these chemicals and an old rag. I spray their desks and wipe them down, as well as the door and handle,” said Hightower. “At night when we all leave, they come in and they use a machine to spray the atmosphere to clean the air. The district said to do it every two days, my principal has our crew come in every night.”

The district has set their standards and it is up to the principals to do what they feel they need to keep their schools healthy and safe. Some schools have utilized contact tracing efforts on the students. Hightower explained “We have had isolated cases where faculty has had symptoms, went and tested positive. They can’t come back to work, quarantine for the two weeks and get tested again before coming back and we do tracing.”’

Photo by Glen Carrie on Unsplash

“Just the other day, the principal put out an email saying unfortunately we have had a faculty member and a student test positive for Covid-19. Luckily, they were able to do the tracing and figure out that the student was not really all over the whole school, probably in an isolated area,” explained Hightower. “They were able to see where they went and clean up, adjust and resanitize the areas. They recognized HIPPA, so they didn’t put the student or faculty members’ names out there, while being transparent, and informing that someone had it.”

It makes all the difference that teachers and schools will be doing contact tracing through attendance. The school systems are able to take all the precautions necessary to keep everyone as safe as possible during this global pandemic. With everyone doing their part, it can aid in minimizing the spread of COVID-19 as much as possible.