Fairfax's virus data continue to worsen daily. Northam & Brabrand define 10% PCR as the NEW BAD, saying "safety protocols will make the difference," BUT HOW CAN YOU MEASURE THAT?

Students have the choice to stay home, teachers do not: where's our equity? @Karen4Schools @FCPSSupt

Arlington's viral numbers spiked so hard in the past week they have indefinitely paused 95% of their in-return plans. Prince William's numbers are scary, and they are in disarray about in-person return. Boston, NYC, and LA-USD are likely going to remain virtual indefinitely.

Despite what the happy shiny FCPS videos show , the concurrent learning pilots have been too brief and cherry-picked to provide meaningful data. Every teacher I know truly believes the model will double our workload and stress us to the breaking point.

Why am I bitter? Why am I complaining? Because today is the day I have to make a choice between my job and financial security and my health, placing a confidence in FCPS leadership that I just don't feel. That at least 50% of the teachers in the district or more do not feel.

I either have to file for an unpaid LOA that I can't afford to take, or take my chances when we return in the next couple of months, to engage in a teaching model I don't believe will work, and is not worth the effort for us to adopt just for students to get "social interaction"

Virtual learning is working -- not perfectly, but FCPS leadership provided us with the training and resources to make it work, and tasked us with doing so. It's hard on everyone of us, but it is working for the vast majority of students in the county.

For those for whom it is not working, we can devise small, closed pods of the neediest students at all levels, with volunteer teachers, who do not mix or change classes. There are other solutions other than this ill-advised return to mixed class Petri dishes at the MS & HS levels

Not to mention, what kind of real social interaction are students going to have, masked up, not allowed to congregate, everyone anxious about getting sick, for two days a week, and virtual the other days? How am I supposed to effectively teach two different groups simultaneously?

There are multiple FCPS Board members who have expressed their lack of faith in the concurrent model, who are being told the pilots are proving them wrong. But there is no way the pilots can simulate 100s of students in the buildings, mixing and maybe/maybe not practicing safety.

And yet, it's like we see the iceberg ahead, and are sailing straight for it, assuming we can simply bash right through it, and all will be fine. This is the context against which I have to make my decision today, and I just don't know what to do.

I don't have faith in FCPS leadership, and I believe that several school board members are being deliberately obtuse to the situation (not you, @Karen4Schools, as you've gone out of your way to talk with me). I love teaching, and no, I am not crazy about virtual teaching, but...

...it's crazy to continue on this collision course with disaster. This is the choice that I and hundreds of teachers across the county are facing right now in Fairfax. I'm in physical & mental hell right now. I haven't slept well or even eaten much in the past week. I'm wrecked.

We are being told to chill out and have confidence that the safety protocols will make the difference -- and they have absolutely no way to model or measure whether that is the case. We had someone report a case in my school today, with a tiny cohort returned so far.

No info yet on whether they got it at school or outside of school, but that kind of thing will increase exponentially when we return en masse into the buildings. But we're told, it will all be fine if we all mask up, wipe down, and stay distant.

I adore my students and most of them are responsible, caring kids. But let's face it, they're teenagers. They are going to push the protocols, break them, and teachers are going to be tasked with having to be the Virus Prevention Police. I didn't sign up for that - no teacher did

Some of them will even come to school sick, not knowing they're sick, or, I hate to say it but we've already seen it in the news, because parents will send them in, knowing they're sick. For what?Two days a week of mask-to-mask instruction in a dystopian environment of anxiety?

How am I supposed to get meaningful teaching accomplished where I am literally worried every single day, hour, minute, about getting sick, about whether students are doing what they're supposed to do to stay safe (kids who refuse to take hats off in the hallways, for God's sake!)

What kind of environment do parents who are hell-bent-for-leather to get their kids back truly believe they are going to experience. The days of March 2020 and before are GONE, folks. We're not going to have cozy, warm, engaged learning occurring in this kind of environment.

I'd like to be wrong on all of this, but I know I'm not. This is literally all I think about nearly every minute of the day I am awake. This insane push to get in-person learning going again, in a questionable learning model, just doesn't make any sense, and yet, what can I do?

I love teaching, my job, and my school. I don't want to stop. But I also don't want to die from COVID. I don't want to lose my mind trying to make an educational model that has "WTH?!" written all over it, that we're being blithely told is "fine & will even be easier for you!"

But I honestly don't know what to do, and I don't have any faith in the FCPS leadership that THEY know what they're doing, and I have absolutely no good options about what to do, because I don't know what to believe or who to trust. But what I do know is...

...the virus data is are bad right now in Fairfax, worse than July, and is getting worse. We're being told "well, we know how to deal with it now." Umm, we knew in the spring how to deal with it: close and go virtual. And it worked until folks broke quarantine. Sending us back...

...with masks, Clorox wipes, and stern lectures on how to wipe everything down, and make sure teenagers don't behave like teenagers and take their masks off, not congregate, and stay distant ISN'T GOING TO WORK WHEN YOU'RE DEALING WITH 100s OF THEM IN THE SAME PLACE/SAME TIME!

So, yeah that's where I am today, folks. I have about 2 hours before the close of business to decide what I am going to do and I still don't know. I only know that the virus is going to get worse, a small but vocal group of parents is going to get more crazy about returning...

...and that even if I believed we could do this safely, the concurrent learning model just isn't going to be tenable or manageable for the HS level (and I suspect the MS as well). I know that there are kids who need in-person instruction and more attention, but I don't believe...

...this model is going to make that happen, nor is this environment going to make children of all ages feel safe, secure, and relaxed enough to learn. And I am no hypocrite: I won't be able to disguise my fear and anxiety, because I truly don't believe we should be going back.

But I can't afford NOT to go back. And that's the choice hundreds of teachers are looking at today, right now, right this very minute, folks. We're scared, we're angry, and we don't feel valued, and we don't believe that anyone truly cares about us or our professional opinions.

And if we're feeling that, and being told that "you need to be citizens of the schools like citizens of a nation in crisis, make sacrifices, take risks, and do things not in your job descriptions, and just deal with it," can you understand why we're so upset, afraid, and angry?

I'm done. I've said about everything there is to say... well, there's plenty more I can say that I think needs to be said, but I don't think it matters now.

Ask every FCPS teacher you know how they feel right now--it will be an eye-opening experience for you, I assure you.