In the middle of July, the San Juan River — measured in the middle of downtown — was running at around 30 cubic feet per second (CFS). In a normal year, the flow in mid-July is around 200 CFS, falling to around 150 CFS by the end of the month. Here at the Daily Post, we were starting to receive press releases talking about “climate change” and “extreme drought.”
Over the past week, Mother Nature has changed her attitude around thunderstorms, and the San Juan is now flowing at around 150 CFS. Same as any normal year.
Funny how things can change, sometimes quickly. Sometimes, not so quickly.
A month ago, the Denver Public Schools were making plans to allow teachers and students back into the classroom on August 24. That has changed. DPS will now offer only ‘distance learning’ as the school year starts.
The plan now is to start the year with online classes, only, from August 24 until at least September 8, and then see how things progress.
As we noted back in Part Two of this editorial series, Denver families will still have the option of choosing a totally remote model even after school buildings reopen. The district plans to release more details this week about what that online option would look like.
Closer to home, about 20 vehicles packed with educators drove through downtown Durango on Monday afternoon calling for schools to remain closed until no cases of COVID-19 have been confirmed for 14 days in the counties where school districts are located.
From the Durango Herald, July 27:
“We don’t want school personnel to be guinea pigs. There are stricter mandates to open restaurants right now than there are schools,” said Tracy Campbell, who organized Monday afternoon’s car parade.
Campbell, who spent 35 years in the educational system as a band director and a music and French teacher, estimated about 60 people participated in the car parade…
Campbell told Herald reporter Patrick Armijo that proposed ‘hybrid models’ — where some students spend some days in school and some days at home using remote and online learning tools — make little sense because it is “impossible” to enforce social distancing in schools
“I don’t know if you’ve been around middle-schoolers and teenagers – social distancing is not their forte,” she said.
The car parade Monday was part of a nationwide action called “Refuse to Return,” which aims to draw attention to the dangers of opening in-person learning in schools…
Here in Pagosa Springs, our independently-run public charter school — Pagosa Peak Open School (PPOS) — is not currently planning to offer a ‘hybrid’ option for its K-7 grade students and families. Families will be able to choose ‘distance learning’ via their home internet service, or else full-week, in-person classroom instruction in rooms accommodating perhaps 10-15 students.
Should COVID infections arrive at the school, the affected students will switch to distance learning. Even though some public health officials are assuming that it’s “inevitable” that school will experience outbreaks — if they open their classroom doors — I’m thinking that prediction might not apply to Pagosa Springs. As of this morning, San Juan Basin Public Health is confirming 34 cases of coronavirus infection among Archuleta County residents. Although that number is considerably higher than two months ago, when 8 cases were reported, it still amounts to a per capita infection rate only 0.2 percent.
Statistically speaking, we would see no cases at all among the 110 students at PPOS.
But things are, of course, changing by the day.
Here’s PPOS School Director Angela Crossland:
“I think what it comes down to is, ‘What is best for our community.’ And in our [recent] parent survey, we had over 70 percent of our families wanting full-time, in-person learning. Very few of them asked for a distance learning option.
“But we want to make sure we’re respecting everybody’s choices, and — recognizing that it’s a fluid situation; it seems to be changing all the time — to be able to provide them with a quality education, and options within that, that the families feel comfortable with. As a school. we would like to maximize our in-person instruction as much as possible and provide that for any family that is comfortable with that…
“We contract with a school nurse, who will review all of our health protocols and guidelines. In addition, we will have a health aide who will be onsite — that will be our office manager Jeanelle — and she will be able to contact the nurse at any time, if she needs guidance. The state has issued guidance related to symptom checks and the need for a ‘quarantine room’ that’s separate from the normal health operations of the school…
“We’re looking at having several layers of protection in place, based on the health guidelines, that will minimize contact between students, and minimize possible transmission. So, we are going to do the ‘cohort model’…”
From the Chalkbeat Colorado website, July 27:
Cohorts are groups of students and staff within a school building who interact mostly only with each other. The goal is to limit the number of people anyone is exposed to. As schools try to create smaller cohorts, they may have to get creative with new schedules and alternating days.
“It really is one of the most important tools we have,” said Therese Pilonetti, the institutions unit manager for the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.
But health officials have left many details of how to create these groups, and how to keep them separate, up to each school district. And teachers and parents have a lot of questions about the logistics of using cohorts to keep students and staff safe whenever in-person classes resume.
“Whenever in-person classes resume” — at PPOS — appears to be September 8.
Nationally, the picture seems less certain. The group of educators who organized Monday’s nationwide ‘Refuse to Return’ events have posted an online petition that had collected about 87,000 signatures as of this morning. Their official stance:
“We are educators, administrators, school support staff, students, parents, guardians, and concerned individuals. We refuse to return to campus this fall until our counties report no new cases of COVID-19 for at least 14 consecutive days. Let it be known that this is not simply a petition, but a statement of intent, a pledge not to return until it is safe.”
Some health officials estimate it will be at least a year before some counties will be ‘COVID-free’ for a 14-day period.