For almost a year now, kids have been expected to stay home and complete school remotely, through Zoom and Skype. Parents were told the Wuhan coronavirus is too dangerous to send children to school, that the kids could become infected with the virus and unknowingly spread it to parents and grandparents, even though they may be asymptomatic. We quickly found out transmission at schools was relatively small, and almost nonexistent. Despite that, schools – especially those in Democrat-run states and cities – remain on lockdown. But this time it's not because science has said the virus could be transmitted on campuses. It's because the teachers and their unions have decided they like working remotely instead of being physically in the classroom.
Elected officials across the board have said kids need to return to the classroom, not just so they get a proper education but so that they get the social interaction that is so desperately needed.
Joy Behar, one of the co-hosts of "The View," had a different idea. What if we act like the last school year didn't happen and hold kids back a year?
Sending kids back to school this year is so fraught with anxiety and uncertainty. Why not just have everyone repeat the year? Is that such a far out idea?
— Joy Behar (@JoyVBehar) January 31, 2021
Conservatives pointed out the flaws in Behar's suggestion:
People without kids have no idea how cruel of a notion this is. People with any understanding of the science behind school safety know how senseless it is. https://t.co/1eQaf0e7Tk
— Bethany S. Mandel (@bethanyshondark) January 31, 2021
But one of the biggest questions that came about: what do you do to smaller, redder states that allowed children to continue going to school? Do they continue on like normal or remain in the same grade?
What are people in all the sane parts of the country, who followed the science and the scientists, whose kids had a fairly normal year that all of ours kids should have had, going to do? https://t.co/nxlBO9DuNr
— Karol Markowicz (@karol) January 31, 2021
Not just that but here in Chicago, all the public school kids have been out but the private school kids have been in. So you keep 25% back but force 75% to repeat? Also, if this year meant nothing why are we paying teachers for it?
— Emily Zanotti (@emzanotti) January 31, 2021
If school isn't that important, why have them in the first place, Joy? If school isn't teaching kids anything, why have them? This is a slippery slope, Joy.
Why don't we just do away with schools? No one needs them, right? ?? https://t.co/SjtQZzjpwb
— Beth Baumann (@eb454) January 31, 2021