Back to School Across America

🏫 A deeper dive… The consensus from policymakers, disease experts, and superintendents appears to be that kids belong in the classroom, not learning remotely.

• "I still believe very firmly and very passionately, not only as an educator but as a parent, that our students belong in the classroom and that we can do it safely," Education Secretary Miguel Cardona told CBS' Face the Nation on Sunday.
• NIAID director Anthony Fauci echoed that sentiment on ABC News' This Week, pointing to high vaccination rates among teachers, growing rates among students, and plans for increased testing.

✋ Yes, but: Pediatric hospitalizations are hitting record levels across the country, per CDC data, and some districts are concerned that kids' return to the classroom could further strain the system.

• More than 2,100 schools are expected to be closed or fully remote for part of this week, according to school tracking website Burbio, which follows a total of 5,000 US districts.
• Many school systems, including DC, Baltimore, Los Angeles, and Seattle, extended their winter break by a day or two to allow time for all students and/or teachers to be tested before returning to classrooms.
• In Chicago, teachers have threatened to stop working in-person starting today after a botched at-home testing plan led to a backlog of unprocessed student tests.

👁 Looking ahead… Early data still indicates omicron may not cause much severe illness. But hospitalization rates often lag behind cases – which have spiked to a record 1M over the past 24 hours in the US – so the next few weeks may prove even trickier for schools to manage.