As the school year nears, teachers worry about plans to keep them safe
With only weeks before schools reopen, Long Island teachers are increasingly worried about the lack of details on how schools plan to keep them safe from COVID-19, said educators who participated in a Newsday Live webinar Thursday.
"They've been giving little bits of guidance and it's not really clear," Ronald Verderber, a Jericho music teacher and president of the local teachers union, said during the webinar on teachers' concerns. "Before I walk through the door, I want to know what protocols are in place for my safe return to schools. I don't think there's any school leader who has the answer."
With most school districts on Long Island looking to provide at least some in-person instruction, the two teachers taking part in the webinar, who also head their district teacher unions, said they wondered whether returning is safe.
Cordelia Anthony, a Farmingdale science teacher and head of the teachers union there, said she believes the majority of teachers lack the confidence that they will be safe from the virus.
"My district is doing the best job it can," Anthony said. "But will the best be good enough?"
New York school districts were required to submit their plans for reopening to the state by July 31, and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo announced last week that the state's infection rates were low enough to allow in-person instruction in schools.
Responsibilities within the school nurse's office will probably change, said Dr. Christina Johns, senior medical adviser for PM Pediatrics, which has several offices on Long Island. COVID-19 can manifest in so many ways, from a cough to stomach pain, she said.
"At the beginning we will have to be very cautious," Johns said. Also, she expects less tolerance from school nurses for those students who simply want to "hang out for a half-hour" in the nurse's office.
Michael Hynes, superintendent for the Port Washington school district, said he has also seen the anxiety about returning to the brick-and-mortar world of education. He said his district has provided plans for social distancing, mask-wearing and hand-washing, but he anticipates that schools will have to adjust on the fly.
"Everybody is on edge right now. … To say we have all the answers would be a very untrue statement," Hynes said. "Can we reopen? I think we can, but the question becomes when we do, what are we learning and adjusting and modifying as we go forward."
"We need to think outside the box," Hynes added. "The box is gone."
Craig Schneider is a Long Island native and Stony Brook University alumnus. He joined Newsday as a general assignment reporter in January 2018 after 20 years at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
