On behalf of concerned parents and teachers in CUSD, we are asking that the board set the reopening date to the beginning of the second school semester for 2020/2021, rather than opening immediately upon getting clearance from the state. We also ask that the board delay reopening until Orange County is in stage orange or yellow, rather than reopening upon reaching stage red, which is still a stage in which there is substantial community spread.

We petition the board by first affirming that most of us in the community want the same two things for our children: 1. Health and safety, and 2. A return to physical school. We desperately want our children back in school and recognize the hardship distance learning places on teachers, parents, and students. However, we believe that safety and science must come first.
Why is this important?
We believe that a delayed approach to reopening is best for several reasons:

1. We have watched schools and universities reopen all over the country only to have to close again due to rising numbers or positive outbreaks in the school, creating crisis and upheaval for teachers and students alike. We are concerned about the impact of this on both learning, and student and teacher health. We are also concerned that the reopening of schools could cause another spike in our community. Most kids will be asymptomatic but also contagious, so there is no way to screen and assure that kids will not spread it to their classmates and teachers, and then to family members and the community at large.

2. We are still learning about the virus and it’s effects on children. Similar to adults, children with severe COVID-19 may develop respiratory failure, myocarditis, shock, renal failure, and multi-organ system failure. Emerging research also suggests children with COVID-19 have developed other serious problems like intussusception or diabetic ketoacidosis. Children infected with SARS-CoV-2 are also at risk for developing multisystem inflammatory syndrome.

3. CUSD teachers and administration have done an amazing job of making distance learning more interactive this year. It’s not what anyone wants. But kids, parents, and teachers have accepted this reality and are making the best of it and we affirm our gratitude to the schools and teachers for the hard work being put into it. We believe delaying is best so that kids and teachers can finish the semester in the present model before the chaos of shifting to hybrid. Especially at the secondary level, the shift is going to involve major schedule changes (moving from everyone in morning classes to splitting classes into two shifts) and it will also result in double the teaching time for many teachers. We believe that continuing the course that we are on and transitioning at semester change will be safer, but also less stressful.

We recognize that there is intense pressure from some parents to reopen but the health and safety of our kids and our community has to come first. We have all sacrificed so much over the past several months and we ask that you not risk our children becoming carriers of the disease and undo the hard work people have put into eradicating this disease from our community.