Includes Goal for Returning Students to School
Gov. Tony Evers unveiled a three-phase plan Monday (4/20) to get Wisconsin back to work, which mirrors guidelines by the White House.
The “Badger Bounce Back” plan was issued as Executive order #31 by the Governor’s Health Services Secretary Andrea Palm.
But while the plan includes returning children to school early in the process, the state is far from meeting the public health criteria that would actually allow that to happen.
The plan calls for returning children to classrooms in the first phase. However, in order for the state to get to that point, it would need to fulfill steps that:
“Make sure workers and businesses are prepared to reopen as soon as it is safe to do so by bolstering contact tracing, testing capacity, PPE resources, and healthcare capacity,” according to the Governor’s office.
In addition, the plan requires a 14-day stretch with no increases of COVID-19 cases statewide, according to the order.
In a briefing by the Governor Monday and attended by WCRIS, he also explained why a regional plan is not possible at this time, even though many rural counties report none or few COVID-19 cases.
Evers said that many people are carrying COVID-19 virus but are asymptomatic so a lack of cases in some parts of the state does not mean the virus is absent; that the rural areas with fewer or no cases have hospital systems that could not absorb an outbreak; and, that rural areas have populations with an average older age, which makes them more at risk, and with dire consequences, if they get the disease.
The Badger Bounce Back Plan is here.
Returning to the Classroom?
Other countries are now just re-opening their schools and are finding that it is more challenging than one might think, with ramifications for everything from busing to lunchtime.
When the State of Wisconsin gives the all-clear to return to the classroom, it likely will provide guidelines from public health experts on how it should be done.
Based on experiences in other countries, some say it might be easier to start with high school and middle school students. Given that social distancing will be around for a while, they say older students are, theoretically, more mature and have more impulse control and are better trained to follow directions.
Resources that might be helpful as your school thinks about the future include:
1) A free webinar Wednesday, April 22 at 1:30 CST by the National Business Officers Association for Independent Schools. It says it’s for members but non-members have been able to register: “Thinking Ahead: COVID-19 Consideration for Re-opening Your School.”
2) Reopening Danish Schools: A Glimpse of What’s to Come?
3) Chinese School Conduct Trial Run for Students’ Return
4) How your families can make reusable masks at home: https://projectprotect.health/#/
Image thanks to Steve Apps – Associated Press
