On Wednesday, August 5, the Lebanon School Board (“Board”), presented three approaches for the 2020-2021 academic year for the Lebanon School District (“LSD”): the Five-Day In-Person Model, the Hybrid Model, and the Remote-Only Model; under both the Five-Day In-Person Model and the Hybrid Model parents could select Remote-Only for their children. Ultimately the Board voted to implement a Hybrid Model beginning on September 8, 2020. We request that the Board revisit this decision in a special public meeting of the Lebanon School Board for the following reasons:

1. The Board overruled the expressed wishes of Lebanon parents, despite their overwhelming support for children to return to school following the Five-Day In-Person Model; 2. Medical organizations recommend a Five-Day In-Person Model; 3. The emerging scientific data on school reopening and local experts support the Five-Day In-Person Model; 4. Scientific literature highlights the known multiple and various ways that remote learning, as proposed in the Hybrid Model, will be harmful to our children, parents, and community; 5. The Board failed to adequately describe the Hybrid Model before or during the School Board’s vote on August 5, 2020; 6. The Lebanon Proactive Planning Team did not consist of the appropriate expertise to assist with an informed discussion of the medical data. 

Our sincere concern is that the Board’s decision was not based on current scientific recommendations, and will result in harm to our children and lower quality education (despite best efforts). Additionally, enforcing remote learning will result in job losses and strain on families without significant benefits.

We expand on these points below (links to supporting sources at the end of this petition):

1. The Board overruled the expressed wishes of the parents. The Board and the superintendent sent a survey on or about July 17, 2020. The published results of the survey indicate that 917 responses to the survey. Out of this number, 75.9% of the respondents, all of whom are presumably parents of children in the LSD, answered that they planned for their children to attend school in-person five days per week. The Board failed to discuss the information in its deliberation meaningfully. Within the proposed Five-Day In-Person Model, parents could select remote learning for their children, providing a solution to 24.1% of respondents with concerns about in-person schooling and reducing the class sizes, a concern of our teachers.    

2. Medical organizations recommend a Five-Day In-Person Model. The national recommendations of the Centers for Disease and Control (CDC), the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), and the NH Division of Public Health Services advises the nations’ schools to reopen for in-person learning if community rates of COVID-19 are low.  As stated by the CDC: "The best available evidence from countries that have opened schools indicates that COVID-19 poses low risks to school-aged children, at least in areas with low community transmission, and suggests that children are unlikely to be major drivers of the spread of the virus. Reopening schools creates the opportunity to invest in the education, well-being, and future of one of America’s greatest assets—our children—while taking every precaution to protect students, teachers, staff, and all their families." As of August 7, 2020, the City of Lebanon reported only '4' current cases of COVID-19, and in our neighboring towns, there are currently '0' cases of COVID-19. 

3. The emerging scientific data on school reopening and local experts support the Five-Day In-Person Model. As reported in the Massachusetts General Hospital ‘Resources for clinicians advising schools and community groups on strategies to prevent and manage COVID-19’, Section 4 - “Based on early data, schools do not appear to have played a major role in COVID-19 transmission. Based on contact-tracing studies performed early in the epidemic, little evidence has been found of efficient transmission in school settings”. Our local medical experts Dr. Greer and Dr. Chapman, both recommended a Five-Day In-Person Model to the Board. In addition, the Hanover School Board developed a report recommendation for five-day in-person schooling informed by a panel of pediatricians, infectious disease specialists, and public health epidemiologists - read the report here: https://www.sau70.org/uploaded/SAU/Reopening_2020/SAU_70_School_Reopening_Plan_2020-21_-_Draft.pdf A video of the Hanover School Board meeting where medical professionals presented a detailed rationale for the recommendation of a Five-Day In-Person Model here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGkqznI52BRLRtVx61Y5KFw/videos

4. Scientific literature highlights the known multiple and various ways that remote learning, as proposed in the Hybrid Model, will be harmful to our children, parents, and community. Despite potential but as yet unclear benefits of a Hybrid Model, we know that a Hybrid Model will have legitimate and significant impacts on children’s physical and mental health, as well as adverse effects on parents, including job losses. As described in Section 6 of the MGH report, "frank harms to children from school closures, as well as trickle-down community effects that would serve to minimize any potential benefits.” The report also states, “Many of these harms are expected to have a disproportionate effect on more intellectually or socioeconomically vulnerable children, especially children of color, as well as their families, particularly female family members.” A report on the impact of virtual learning highlights that in comparison to in-classroom learning, students can fall as much as 3 - 4 months behind with average quality virtual learning and up 7 - 11 months behind with low-quality virtual learning (McKinsey Report).

5. The Board failed to adequately describe the Hybrid Model before or during the School Board’s vote on August 5, 2020. The Board failed to adequately inform parents of details of the Hybrid Model or provide an opportunity for the public to adequately respond to the Board’s preference of a Hybrid Model. The main attractions to the model are the reduced class size, yet even with the Five-Day In-Person Model, 25% of parents plan to adopt the remote option, reducing class sizes. There have also been concerns about the possibility of the Hybrid Model, increasing the risk of community virus transmission due to the added interaction of students with other individuals when not in the classroom. As recently reported by a Harvard Epidemiologist, “the Hybrid Model is probably the worst option.” Finally, as the board does not plan to meet again until August 26, this leaves little time for parents to prepare for the beginning of the school year leading to significant disruption. 

6. The Lebanon Proactive Planning Team did not consist of the appropriate expertise to assist with an informed discussion of the medical data. While we appreciate the Lebanon Proactive Planning Team’s dedication under such trying circumstances, there was a significant absence of epidemiologists, pediatricians, or other public health officials from our Lebanon Proactive Planning Team to assist with interpreting critical scientific information on reopening. 

We wish to acknowledge the understandable concerns of our tremendous teaching staff about restarting in-person schooling. With incredibly low incidence and prevalence of COVID-19 in our area and access to a world-class healthcare facility where the 24-hour turnaround testing can occur locally, we are currently in a position to cautiously offer Five-Day In-Person schooling to our community, in keeping with national and local recommendations. 

We, the parents for an evidence-based strategy for school reopening, request that a special public meeting of the Lebanon School Board is arranged by the Chair immediately to revisit the school reopening decision. At this meeting, parents, teachers, medical professionals, and other interested parties should be allowed to participate in the public session to determine based on the medical literature and the majority parental opinion what is best for the LSD schools for the academic year 2020-2021. We propose that the Board:

1) Respect the wishes of the majority of parents in the school district and revisit the discussion of school reopening;

2) Work with public health experts to devise a plan that monitors COVID-19 in our schools and pause in-person schooling should a threshold of COVID-19 cases occur that exceeds an acceptable level of risk;

3) Address the absence of experts from our Lebanon Proactive Planning Team, responsible for creating and monitoring our reopening plan by adding public health experts such as epidemiologists or pediatricians. Given the tight timeline, we recommend engaging with the Hanover School Board to access the data and strategies they have rigorously developed with their expert panel. 

Sincerely,

Lebanon Parents (please add your name and Ward to the petition):

Paul Barr, Ph.D. Health Services Research, Ward 1

Shama Alam, Ph.D., Epidemiologist, Ward 1

Jared Toon, B.Sc Construction Professional, Ward 2

Viktoriya Kovalenko, Ward 2

Kevin Purcell, Ward 1

Tracy Purcell, Ward 1

Brock Christiansen, Ph.D. Epidemiologist, Ward 1

Erika Moen, Ph.D. Biomedical Data Scientist, Ward 1

Renee De Palo, Mental Health Specialist, Ward 2

Jillian Zambon, Ed.D, Ward 3

Jared Rhoads, MS, MPH, Ward 2

Becky Rhoads, Au.D, Ward 2

Kerry Vrakatitsis, MD, Ward 2

Links to further information.

https://bit.ly/mghcovidlibrary (MGH report- Resources for clinicians advising schools and community groups on strategies to prevent and manage COVID-19)

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/community/schools-childcare/reopening-schools.html (CDC guidance on school reopening)

https://services.aap.org/en/pages/2019-novel-coronavirus-covid-19-infections/clinical-guidance/covid-19-planning-considerations-return-to-in-person-education-in-schools/ (AAP guidance on school reopening)

https://www.wgbh.org/news/local-news/2020/07/30/harvard-epidemiologist-hybrid-model-for-reopening-schools-is-probably-among-the-worst-options (Harvard professor views on Hybrid models)

https://www.education.nh.gov/who-we-are/commissioner/covid-19 (COVID-19 reopening resources - NH Department of Education)

https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/public-and-social-sector/our-insights/covid-19-and-student-learning-in-the-united-states-the-hurt-could-last-a-lifetime (McKinsey report - COVID-19 and student learning in the United States: The hurt could last a lifetime)