Boston coronavirus numbers keep rising; BPS suspends all in-school classes, Roxbury numbers almost double
Boston Public Schools announced this morning that:
Effective tomorrow, Thursday, October 22, all BPS students will learn remotely until public health data shows a downward trend in positive COVID-19 cases.
She added schools will remain closed to classes until the citywide rate begins to fall, for two weeks in a row.
The notice affects special-needs, homeless and certain other high-needs students who had been spending part of their weekdays at their local schools. BPS had twice delayed the phased-in return of other students because of the city's Covid-19 numbers.
Cassellius cited statistics released this morning by the Boston Public Health Commission, that show 5.7% of Covid-19 tests in Boston came back positive over the past week - up from 4.5% the week before and 4.1% two weeks ago.
In specific neighborhoods, the BPHC numbers showed positivity rate jumped from 5.9% last week to 11.4% in Roxbury. East Boston, which had been seeing decreases in recent weeks, showed an increase from 5.4% to 8.3%. The 02122 and 02124 Zip codes in Dorchester increased from 6.9% to 9.4%. Hyde Park, though, showed a decrease from 10.5% to 7.5%. The statewide rate is currently about 1.3%.
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Comments
Magoo sez
Magoo checking in here from beautiful New Zealand. Sayonara suckers. Woop woop woop. Magoo signing off. Magoo.
Good riddance and don't call
Good riddance and don't call or write.
Glad you're leaving
You won't be missed.
Ugggh
Zoom school
Uggghhh...teachers being
Uggghhh...teachers being treated like they don't matter.
too bad we don't care enough
too bad we don't care enough about our kids to keep restaurants and bars closed. ass backwards
Does this decision
Apply to charter schools?
No
Unless you count the "in district charter schools" that are BPS schools. The Brooke School and Roxbury Prep, for example, are NOT BPS schools.
Inevitable
Pretty inevitable state wide soon enough. Hopefully a better response this time starting with the Federal government and we can attempt to have a 2021-2022 school year.
Gonna be a long hard winter ahead, hard to see how we avoid a return to phase 1 or lockdown. Europe a good preview of coming attractions.
Is Europe a Preview?
Their schools are still open (aside from Northern Ireland and Czechia.) Meanwhile, it's late October and most BPS kids haven't been in a classroom since before St. Patrick's Day.
It's a question of priorities.
On the balance, Ten Tables
On the balance, Ten Tables has finally reopened.
On the balance
On the balance, cafes are finally open.
The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas
This shut down is going to be acutely crushing for some of our most vulnerable children here in Boston. Those few families are going to be bearing the consequences of the rest of us getting our nails done, going to the gym, eating in restaurants, etc., all of which are still allowed.
I'd like to live in a city where I can just enjoy life without my everyday actions and pleasures trampling and hurting others and I look to the major to ensure that. If the mayor makes choices that balance the needs of many against the lives of these families I'd like to see him treat the caretakers like family and see that they are compensated, protected, and taken care of like family while they care for their children in this extreme circumstance.
Ursula Le Guin for reference https://www.utilitarianism.com/nu/omelas.pdf
Apt analogy
A shame that so few people will recognize the reference.
Overall this is not good, but
Overall this is not good, but I did want to note, that is an amazing amount of testing.
Definitely
Because of the college students coming back. That would totally explain the increases in positivity in Roxbury, Eastie, and Dot. Oh yeah parties in Southie are causing this, too.
Misson Hill
Is part of Roxbury and has plenty of students
Walsh
The fact that Walsh pushed the high need learners in, and kept all other students home when the numbers were over 4% still makes ZERO sense. Marty is making it up as he goes along. Why can't the City give exact numbers for what is considered acceptable, and what isn't? The only thing the City is doing right is jerking around the kids, families and teachers. I am actually sort of surprised UHub hasn't published some more articles about the "high tech" solutions within some BPS schools for ventilation, like putting a box fan in a partially open window.