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Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

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Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#161

Post by AlexandrB »

engineer_22 wrote: post #11

It's too late to put the genie back in the bottle. Whether we like it or not we're going with the Sweden Model. I've got school age kids myself, and I understand the risk. This is going to be a situation that could become hard to manage but our society's economy is constructed in such a way that relies on daytime programming for children and teens outside of their home. The teachers are going to have to help bear the…

You sound resigned to your fate. When did Americans become accustomed to accepting utter incompetence that costs hundreds of thousands of lives from their leadership? Is the political process down there completely broken?

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#162

Post by xnyan »

Thinking about having a kid. There's no way I would ever have a kid in my current US state. Not saying anyone has done it well vs rest of the world, but there are clearly states (and counties/cities) that have done a much better job at protecting human life than others.

As someone who has lived in the US South for most of my childhood and adult life, I truly don't think it's responsible to have children here if you have another choice. I know a lot of people don't, but I do and I'm out of here.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#163

Post by rpiguy »

gremlinsinc wrote: post #140
collegecamp293 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are the odds of a nurse and doctor with full PPE dying from COVID?

Over 800 healthcare workers have died since this began. https://khn.org/news/lost-on-the-frontline-health-care-worke... It takes time and effort to create new ventilators, masks, ppe's, etc... but it takes like 20-30 years to create a new doctor or nurse, they're in limited supply - the more we lose the harder this virus will be to defeat long-term. Likewise the hit to public schools if we lose janitorial, bussing, t…

This is ridiculous fear mongering.

There are 5.1 million people working in hospitals.

https://datausa.io/profile/naics/hospitals

800/5100000 = .00016

They are therefore three times less likely to die from Covid than the general population.

Schools across Europe have opened. Children rarely spread the disease. Doctors recommend schools open.

Twenty times as many children died of the flu last year than from COVID.

Death rates are not surging in proportion to cases.

The CFR of this disease does not meet the threshold for a pandemic, nor does it merit the level of fear engendered by the press.

It is utterly ridiculous.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#164

Post by vmchale »

collegecamp293 wrote: post #70
3pt14159 wrote: post #3

This is exactly why all the people that said "choosing to protect life is also choosing to protect the economy" were right. It sucks, but people with savings can choose to quit over having to risk their lives. So if there is an appreciable risk (and associated hazard, which, for many of our older educators there is) then that is what is going to happen and you still get the disruptions to the economy.

Why are nurses and grocery workers working then? How are they less at risk than teachers?

I have 0 confidence that public schools have the same care w.r.t. ventilation and plumbing that hospitals do.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#165

Post by Florin_Andrei »

Kapura wrote: post #13

My mother is an elementary school teacher, and I don't want her to go back to school this year. The federal government is worse than useless, and the state government is feckless and unwilling to make the tough calls to protect people's lives. She's been a teacher for ~15 years and still makes less than $30k a year teaching. She loves helping the kids, but her life isn't worth it.

> The federal government is worse than useless

It's the government that the collective beliefs and cultural assumptions of this country have built. Maybe there's a cause-effect link in there, somewhere, you would think?

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#166

Post by CJefferson »

sl1ck731 wrote: post #14
_ea1k wrote: post #6

I feel like there is too much emphasis on these and not enough on the ones that earnestly want to go back to work. There should be a balance here, as we really do need a lot of students to have access to schools in the fall. Remote learning doesn't work for everyone and leaves a lot of people behind. The overall consequences of another lost semester may be far worse than the consequences of reopening.

I would prefer every student to be held back 1 semester from graduating high school than 1 more dead (if that were a possibility, but you get the point). I don't even understand how its possible to prefer sending kids back over one semester. Of course I think the bigger issue is its just parents that want kids out of the house for a multitude of reasons including getting back to their own work.

You would hold back every kid 1 semester to save 1 child?

How about 10 semesters to save 10 children? 100 semesters to save 100 children?

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#167

Post by andi999 »

tomohawk wrote: post #121
hprotagonist wrote: post #25

My 65 year old parent, an educator in a sunbelt state, told their superintendent that if the distict came back for in person classes too early, they would walk on the spot. they'll be online-only for at least the fall.

Based on what? This risk of an adult being infected by a child is almost zero. https://www.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/blog/hunting-down-covi... The flu is also deadly for 65 year olds. Will your parent refuse to work during flu season when the risk of getting infected from a child is much, much higher than with covid?

Risk of flu can be mitigated by applying a vaccine.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#168

Post by [deleted] »

_ea1k wrote: post #6

I feel like there is too much emphasis on these and not enough on the ones that earnestly want to go back to work. There should be a balance here, as we really do need a lot of students to have access to schools in the fall. Remote learning doesn't work for everyone and leaves a lot of people behind. The overall consequences of another lost semester may be far worse than the consequences of reopening.

[deleted]

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#169

Post by cryptoz »

rpiguy wrote: post #163
gremlinsinc wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Over 800 healthcare workers have died since this began. https://khn.org/news/lost-on-the-frontline-health-care-worke... It takes time and effort to create new ventilators, masks, ppe's, etc... but it takes like 20-30 years to create a new doctor or nurse, they're in limited supply - the more we lose the harder this virus will be to defeat long-term. Likewise the hit to public schools if we lose janitorial, bussing, t…

This is ridiculous fear mongering. There are 5.1 million people working in hospitals. https://datausa.io/profile/naics/hospitals 800/5100000 = .00016 They are therefore three times less likely to die from Covid than the general population. Schools across Europe have opened. Children rarely spread the disease. Doctors recommend schools open. Twenty times as many children died of the flu last year than from COVID. Deat…

> There are 5.1 million people working in hospitals.

The person you are replying to is talking about frontline healthcare workers. But you ignored that and ran your math to include everyone who works in a hospital, and then you go on to ridicule the OP based on your incorrect math.

> They are therefore three times less likely to die from Covid than the general population.

This is based on your incorrect math and I'm quite sure is the incorrect conclusion.

> Schools across Europe have opened.

This isn't Europe, though, it's America. The situation is different here.

> Twenty times as many children died of the flu last year than from COVID.

I'm not sure how to interpret this, but COVID did not start to spread until November/December last year and obviously the numbers were small to start. What do you mean to imply with this stat?

> The CFR of this disease does not meet the threshold for a pandemic

The definition of a pandemic has nothing to do with CFR.

> nor does it merit the level of fear engendered by the press.

I haven't seen any fear-mongering from respected press. Most of the fear mongering I see about COVID is from Fox or similar telling us that the masks are something to be afraid of, due to government overreach or something.

But the normal press mostly just reports the facts. If those facts create fear in you, then I'm sorry, but it's not the press causing that fear.

> It is utterly ridiculous.

Please stop.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#170

Post by xnyan »

cheerlessbog wrote: post #31
Kapura wrote: post #13

My mother is an elementary school teacher, and I don't want her to go back to school this year. The federal government is worse than useless, and the state government is feckless and unwilling to make the tough calls to protect people's lives. She's been a teacher for ~15 years and still makes less than $30k a year teaching. She loves helping the kids, but her life isn't worth it.

Where does she work that pays $30k for an experienced teacher? Teacher pay sucks

While there certainty are places that pay starting teachers more, unless you work for the upper crust of K-12 the pay is quite bad compared to basically any other other job that requires a four-year degree plus certification and/or (usually and) a license.
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