Teachers could stay in classroom if exposed to COVID-19

[struggle4progress]

By JEFF AMY Associated Press
August 20, 2020, 11:12 AM ET

ATLANTA -- New guidance from President Donald Trump's administration that declares teachers to be “critical infrastructure workers” could give the green light to exempting teachers from quarantine requirements after being exposed to COVID-19 and instead send them back into the classroom.

Keeping teachers without symptoms in the classroom, as a handful of school districts in Tennessee and Georgia have already said they may do, raises the risk that they will spread the respiratory illness to students and fellow employees ...

NEA President Lily Eskelsen Garcia said in a statement that the designation “has no legal merit and is more of a rhetorical gambit to give President Trump and those governors who are disregarding the advice and guidance from public health experts an excuse to force educators into unsafe schools” ...

American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten expressed similar sentiments, saying “the Trump administration will always try to change the rules to threaten, bully and coerce” ...

https://abcnews.go.com/amp/Health/wireStory/teachers-stay-classroom-exposed-covid-19-72495975

[dchill]

1. Horrifying.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

2. What teacher is going to want to go back to the classroom after exposure?

And if they try to mandate the teachers return, I bet we'll see mass resignations of teachers everywhere.

[tblue37]

3. What parent wants his or her kids in an exposed teacher's classroom? nt

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

11. Yep.

[Luciferous]

4. This is also going to be the policy for my school district- I really don't

want to go back to work

[crickets]

5. This kind of thing needs to be a crime. It's going to kill people. nt

[struggle4progress]

6. Get up! Stand up!

[Meowmee]

7. I hope they are charged

With murder when even more people die.

[Hekate]

8. Murderous bastards

Godless, soulless, bastards

[uponit7771]

9. This is irresponsible, no one knows how contagious they are after getting infected

[ProfessorGAC]

10. Schools Around Here...

...are doing 14 day iso if one shows any of the symptoms!
No positive test is needed. Sore throat, low grade fever, cough...
14 days.
Exposed to anybody under the 15 minute/<6' rule to a known positive, 7 school days on the bench.
These districts worked on their protocols for weeks.
They're not revising them now because an idiot conman decided it might be ok.

[appalachiablue]

12. Brutal, and seems illegal as hell. Meanwhile, in So. Fla.:

'Miami-Dade FL Schools Say Almost 600 Staff Have Tested Positive for Coronavirus.' Daily Kos, Aug. 21, 2020.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/8/21/1971173/-Miami-Dade-schools-say-almost-600-staff-have-tested-positive-for-coronavirus

[dsc]

13. One question I have as a teacher is does this designation affect the federal leave

that people exposed get? I have enough leave in any case but many teachers don't.