We thought the coronavirus would keep our kids out of school for only 14 days. Now, that’s looking like a fantasy. After President Trump said the pandemic might last as long as July or August, state officials across the country started acting. Measures being taken by many school districts — calling for indefinite cancellation.
In Florida, all school testing and grading have been canceled, indication schools will not reopen this academic year.
“All remaining testing for school readiness, voluntary pre-K and K-12 will be canceled for the school year,” Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said in a news conference. “Requirements for graduation and promotion and final course grades will be evaluated as though those assessments did not exist.”
De Santis said parents will have the option of keeping their kids in the same grade for the 2020-21 school year.
In Kansas, Governor Laura Kelly has ordered the closure of all K-12 schools for the remainder of the year.
“This situation has evolved rapidly and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future,” Kelly said. “The reality of this pandemic is that it cannot be controlled statewide if school buildings return to normal operations, or if they respond inconsistently within our local communities.”
And on Tuesday, a somber Governor Gavin Newsom said he hopes he’s wrong, but he doesn’t believe California schools will reopen before the summer.
“Don’t anticipate schools are going to open up in a week, please don’t anticipate in a few weeks,” Newsom said. “I would plan and assume that it’s unlikely that many of these schools, few if any, will open before the summer break.”
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has said that two-week school closures would do very little to stop the spread of COVID-19. Schools would need to be shut down for a couple of months or longer to really have any positive effect.
According to Education Week, more than 40 million kids in 39 states have been affected by school closures.