“We prepare for all types of occurrences, from the God-forbid active shooter to the typical water main break, to the ice day and snow day,” he said. “I cannot think of something that has been at such a scale.”
By Thursday Mr. Lubelfeld had already started preparations, reaching out to the local food pantry, library and township to ensure that the 25 percent of students who received federally subsidized meals would have food. The district had purchased three-month subscriptions for internet hot spots for 50 families.
Still, when he walked in to the emergency school board meeting he had called that evening, Mr. Lubelfeld was unsure — until he faced impassioned parents and frustrated board members.
“Now is not the time for complacency; it is the time for decisive action,” pleaded Mia Levy, a mother of two students who is also a doctor and the director of the Rush University Cancer Center. “Your actions will save lives.”
Daniel Wertheimer, a father who had already pulled his children out of school, told Mr. Lubelfeld that “because you’re keeping the schools open, there’s going to be folks — elderly, our age — that probably die, and that decision is on you.”
Bennett W. Lasko, the president of the school board, expressed frustration that the district was left to make the decision alone, citing “imperfect information, inconsistent from one authority to another.”
“We’re volunteers up here, and we’re a reasonably smart group of people, but we’re not able to assess the pros and cons of closing schools,” he said.
Source Article from https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/13/us/politics/virus-school-closings-education.html
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