More than a hundred parents, students and community members gathered in Gallery Park Wednesday night to push local public schools to open full-time.
Glenbrook High School District 225 and Glenview School District 34 have been holding classes remotely since the beginning of the year due to safety concerns about the coronavirus pandemic. Both districts have announced recently that they’ll be moving into hybrid models for those interested in the coming weeks — something that pleased the gathered parents and students but doesn’t fulfill their entire goal.
Rally organizers say the effort was spearheaded by a group of local parents, including Kati Spaniak, before the districts made their announcements about the hybrid timeline. She and other organizers said they decided to still hold the rally to “continue the momentum” and show schools they want to be back for full-time in-person learning, not just hybrid.
“We’re not taking it off the gas here,” she said. “These kids need to be in school full-time, and have an option for kids that want to stay home.”
Officials in the two districts decided over the summer to reopen their buildings in phases, saying they wanted the extra time to monitor health data and bring students back cautiously with proper health protections in place.
More Top Picks Best Dump Trailers
“The idea … is to do this slowly, smartly, in a way that we can make sure we understand how to bring people back into the building safely,” District 225 Board President Bruce Doughty said during a recent meeting.
Mary Clare Noteman and her daughter, Maggie, attended the rally together. Maggie, a freshman at Glenbrook South coming from a private school, has yet to meet not only her teachers but most of her classmates in person, she said.
“Other schools in the neighborhoods are doing it,” Mary Clare Noteman said. “Universities are doing it. The kids are prepared, they’re ready to do it and they want to be in the classrooms with their teachers.”
A handful of speakers, which included students, parents and former CEO of Chicago Public Schools Paul Vallas, shared their thoughts on why schools need to be back in person. Most of their sentiments revolved around the mental and physical wellbeing of students.
Dana Russo, an OB-GYN and mother in District 34, said e-learning presents issues of anxiety and depression within kids, as well as child neglect and a lack of surveillance for abuse at home that teachers would normally be able to watch for in person.
“We rely on our teachers to protect our youth in school, and now they are challenged to do so through Zoom meetings, looking at students’ 2-inch by 2-inch screens,” she said. “Human-to-human interaction is irreplaceable, but we are now in another crisis because of COVID, and it’s the welfare of our children.”
According to Russo, the decision in the spring to move to online learning was “the right one, undeniably.” She said, though, that they now know more about how the virus is spread and how they can take steps to decrease the spread.
“We know COVID is not going away,” she said. “We just need to find a way to return back to school and mitigate the risk of COVID and not eliminate it.”
Several students from Glenbrook North and Glenbrook South shared their experiences with e-learning, saying students have realized online learning can’t replicate learning done in a classroom.
Marlo Pulliam, a senior at Glenbrook South, first started her speech by introducing herself as an incoming senior, rather than a current senior. She corrected herself, saying it doesn’t feel like they’ve had their first day yet. Though the students will be starting in a hybrid model soon, she said it won’t be the same.
Pulliam went on to say that students are unable to focus or find the motivation to learn through online school, that their “mental health is deteriorating” and that they deserve more from those making decisions for them.
“High school is a place where we learn, grow, express our individuality and find ourselves and who we want to be,” she said. “Our education is important. Our education should be live and not limited through a computer screen, sitting alone in our rooms for our last year and being denied the opportunity to succeed.”
Glenbrook North senior Jackson Carsello echoed Pullium’s comments. He said many of his peers are struggling with mental health issues and that they are being deprived of opportunities for social interaction, both in class and through sports and extracurricular activities.
“Not allowing us to go to school or play sports has basically taken away a big part of who I am, as well as experiences and memories of high school that we will never create,” he said.
The Illinois High School Association moved high school football, boys soccer and girls volleyball to the spring. Non-contact high school sports like boys and girls cross country, golf, girls tennis and girls swimming were allowed to be played this fall, according to the IHSA.
Vallas and others said every death is “one death too many” but that the risks of keeping kids out of school is higher than the risks of them catching COVID-19.
He closed out the night by pointing out the property taxes residents pay and how much of it goes to the schools. He urged the crowd to keep pushing their leaders to make the decisions that will bring students back.
“You have to make your voices heard,” he said. “You’ve got to take control of your schools. You’ve got to take back your schools, and you cannot allow people to dictate the best interest of your kids.”
District 34 will begin hybrid learning Sept. 29. In this model, kindergarten and early childhood students will attend half days twice a week, first through fifth grade will attend half days four times a week and middle school students will attend full days twice a week.
District 225 will begin a phased-in approach to a hybrid model, bringing back a portion of students each day for the first two weeks starting Oct. 5. At full implementation, which they expect to happen by Oct. 20, half of the students will attend school each morning and the other half will attend each afternoon.
In both district, students will be allowed to continue with fully remote learning should families choose that option.
More Top Picks Best Study Desks For Small Bedrooms
Twitter: @kaitlinedquist