On Sunday, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that the public schools will begin to reopen from December 7, starting with elementary schools for students whose parents agree to a weekly testing regimen for the novel coronavirus.
He said “It’s a new approach because we have so much proof now of how safe schools can be. He said the 3% benchmark was being scrapped and pointing to research that shows young children appear to be less vulnerable to COVID-19.”
Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza, who joined the mayor at a news conference, said with the new measures he believed the city could safely and successfully keep our schools open for the duration of this pandemic.
Michael Mulgrew, the president of the United Federation of Teachers, said in a statement that the labor union was supportive of the mayor’s phased reopening so long as stringent testing was in place.
Pre-kindergarten classes will also reopen Dec. 7 alongside elementary schools. Schools that serve children with special educational needs, known as District 75 schools, will reopen Dec. 10. De Blasio said middle schools and high schools would reopen at later dates that had not yet been set.
With the reopening of schools next month, to enter a classroom, students must have a signed consent form agreeing to coronavirus testing or a letter of medical exemption from a doctor, de Blasio said. Tests will be soon be carried out in schools on a weekly, not monthly, basis, but only about a fifth of students will be tested in a given week.
The mayor said the plan was to have in-person learning five days a week where possible when schools reopen.
