Yarmouth School District made the right choice in approving a full-time return of students
The Yarmouth School Department will finally be able to give seniors some sense of normalcy their last month of school.
by Sumner Rugh
May 5, 2021
Without a doubt, the year 2020 will go down in the books. It will forever be remembered as a year of uncertainty, ups, downs, hardships, and successes. Moving into the year 2021, the world has been presented with the same uncertainty as 2020 but with brighter days on the horizon. Vaccinations have rolled out the door, schools are open, and people now realize their chances of dying from COVID-19 are much lower than initially expected. With this in mind, it only makes sense that we are bringing kids back to school full time, the way school is intended to be.
While schools have opened up to accomodate students again, the majority of them have only opened their doors to half of the student body. The idea behind creating two cohorts is to minimize and contain the spread of COVID-19. But children growing up rely on the social contact schools provide. With online learning as the new normal, young children don’t really know what it is like to participate in school 5 days a week. Children not only benefit academically from being back to school full time, but they also benefit from the social encounters they have.
In a recent study done by the American Academy of Pediatrics, we learn that in a study of 90,000 students and staff members, there were “no cases of in-school child-to-adult” transmission. In a foreign study taken overseas in Sweden done by the Karolinska Institute with over one million participants (students and staff) there were zero deaths from COVID-19. Both of these sources were brought to us in an article from the University of Minnesota touching on the low risk of students being in school full time.
While there is still risk, it is important to see the risk within perspective. In recent days, the Yarmouth School Board has decided the risk is worth the reward. After doing their research on COVID-19, they have decided to send students in the district back to school 4 days a week with Wednesday continuing as a remote day. The model, up until this point, has included a hybrid schedule of half the student body attending remotely while the other half remains in person with a small number of students opting to be “fully remote.” Many students have been on the fence about going back to school full time, as the COVID-19 virus still continues to linger.
While this is a real risk for many older people with underlying illnesses, it is less than unlikely for someone of high school age with no underlying issues to become fatally sick. According to the Center for Disease Control, from the ages of 0-17, in both the male and female bracket there have been 277 deaths due to COVID-19 and 41,811 deaths “from all causes”. While COVID-19 is the only thing talked about today, you don’t hear that in this same timeframe, same age bracket and same demographic of boys and girls, there have been 703 deaths involving pneumonia. To put this into perspective, 0.007% of deaths in this age bracket have been due to COVID-19, and 0.02% of these deaths have been from pneumonia, a clearly more dangerous thing to battle for kids this age (please keep in mind that these numbers are rounded up). This accumulated statistic is from the year 2020-2021 This nationwide statistic is a great indication that going back to school full time is not a large risk at all.
In addition to the extremely low number of deaths in the 0-17 age bracket, a study done by Iceland’s Directorate of Health and Reykjavik-based human-genomic company deCODE Genetics, we learn the risks for children under the age of 15; the study states that kids this age are less than half as likely as adults in the older age bracket to contract COVID-19. The study also found that the older population is what drives the virus. The results of this study were brought to us from the National Geographic.
While it is fairly safe to say children are not the target, many adults are still at risk, and going back to school full time, with an entire student body will pose greater exposure to these teachers. While most, if not all the teachers in the Yarmouth school district have been vaccinated, those who do not feel comfortable returning will have the option of being fully remote.
With children not being the problem, and extremely little transmission between students and faculty, it is only logical that the Yarmouth School Board voted to open up the district to students coming back full time. While it isn’t all the way, it is still one big step in the right direction.
May 5, 2021
Without a doubt, the year 2020 will go down in the books. It will forever be remembered as a year of uncertainty, ups, downs, hardships, and successes. Moving into the year 2021, the world has been presented with the same uncertainty as 2020 but with brighter days on the horizon. Vaccinations have rolled out the door, schools are open, and people now realize their chances of dying from COVID-19 are much lower than initially expected. With this in mind, it only makes sense that we are bringing kids back to school full time, the way school is intended to be.
While schools have opened up to accomodate students again, the majority of them have only opened their doors to half of the student body. The idea behind creating two cohorts is to minimize and contain the spread of COVID-19. But children growing up rely on the social contact schools provide. With online learning as the new normal, young children don’t really know what it is like to participate in school 5 days a week. Children not only benefit academically from being back to school full time, but they also benefit from the social encounters they have.
In a recent study done by the American Academy of Pediatrics, we learn that in a study of 90,000 students and staff members, there were “no cases of in-school child-to-adult” transmission. In a foreign study taken overseas in Sweden done by the Karolinska Institute with over one million participants (students and staff) there were zero deaths from COVID-19. Both of these sources were brought to us in an article from the University of Minnesota touching on the low risk of students being in school full time.
While there is still risk, it is important to see the risk within perspective. In recent days, the Yarmouth School Board has decided the risk is worth the reward. After doing their research on COVID-19, they have decided to send students in the district back to school 4 days a week with Wednesday continuing as a remote day. The model, up until this point, has included a hybrid schedule of half the student body attending remotely while the other half remains in person with a small number of students opting to be “fully remote.” Many students have been on the fence about going back to school full time, as the COVID-19 virus still continues to linger.
While this is a real risk for many older people with underlying illnesses, it is less than unlikely for someone of high school age with no underlying issues to become fatally sick. According to the Center for Disease Control, from the ages of 0-17, in both the male and female bracket there have been 277 deaths due to COVID-19 and 41,811 deaths “from all causes”. While COVID-19 is the only thing talked about today, you don’t hear that in this same timeframe, same age bracket and same demographic of boys and girls, there have been 703 deaths involving pneumonia. To put this into perspective, 0.007% of deaths in this age bracket have been due to COVID-19, and 0.02% of these deaths have been from pneumonia, a clearly more dangerous thing to battle for kids this age (please keep in mind that these numbers are rounded up). This accumulated statistic is from the year 2020-2021 This nationwide statistic is a great indication that going back to school full time is not a large risk at all.
In addition to the extremely low number of deaths in the 0-17 age bracket, a study done by Iceland’s Directorate of Health and Reykjavik-based human-genomic company deCODE Genetics, we learn the risks for children under the age of 15; the study states that kids this age are less than half as likely as adults in the older age bracket to contract COVID-19. The study also found that the older population is what drives the virus. The results of this study were brought to us from the National Geographic.
While it is fairly safe to say children are not the target, many adults are still at risk, and going back to school full time, with an entire student body will pose greater exposure to these teachers. While most, if not all the teachers in the Yarmouth school district have been vaccinated, those who do not feel comfortable returning will have the option of being fully remote.
With children not being the problem, and extremely little transmission between students and faculty, it is only logical that the Yarmouth School Board voted to open up the district to students coming back full time. While it isn’t all the way, it is still one big step in the right direction.