What Do We Really Need to Open Buildings Successfully?

Online teaching is so bizarre. I have a bunch of students I've never seen. Do they even have faces? Are they extra-terrestial? It's all a big mystery. How do I know they don't have ringers? Maybe one of my best students is really one of my worst students. There's really no way on earth I could tell. On the other hand, going back in is nuts. Even if we're all vaccinated, students won't be. Every week there is a new strain of COVID, and it looks like some new ones are affecting kids more than older ones. I see people moving to reopen buildings without any modifications whatsoever, screaming on Twitter, quoted in the Times, and the Times doesn't even pretend to be objective anymore. 

I'm fully vaccinated. I don't think I'd be at great personal risk in a classroom in September. That said, I couldn't say the same for my students, most of whom are under 16 and thus ineligible for vaccination. Will their parents jump up and down and demand they go to school full time? I'm gonna go out on a limb and say no, they will not. 

Now don't get me wrong, here, I'm not up on my soapbox demanding we stay online next year. I am not a big fan of teaching online. It's better than nothing, but I can't defend it much further than that. I would much rather be in a classroom. However, when I say that, I don't mean in a classroom with a small group of students who are socially distanced and prohibited from interacting. 

So what does that make me? A chronic malcontent? Perhaps. 

Now I can do all these things. I can teach online. I can teach to a small group, bizarrely separated from one another. It's just not the same, and Andrew Yang can lie about us and what we do from now until Doomsday. It will make no difference. There will always be self-important tinhorn politicians out there spinning nonsense about us so as to have someone to blame. 

But this is a health emergency. Pointing fingers is wasted energy. We just all have to, somehow, get through it. 

We are enormously lucky to have kept our jobs consistently through this disaster. I was watching Top Chef last night and a clearly talented young man was speaking of how he had to close both his restaurants. He was grateful for the chance to compete, since he had nothing else to do. That's an entire industry of people falling by the wayside. We managed to keep the schools open, and we did the best we could. If Andrew Yang thinks he could've done better, he's delusional. Money doesn't make you omniscient. 

So I posed a question here, but I don't have an answer. Sure, having a machine like the one pictured at the workplace would make things better. I wouldn't mind having one in my home some days. Sadly, I don't think the new chancellor's mind is open to such bold improvements. 

Meanwhile, we'll just have to take one step at a time, hope that kids can soon be vaccinated, and that we can get back to something remotely resembling normal. 

If you have better ideas, I'm all ears.