Race, class divisions are stark in fight over reopening schools
Pandemic fears still run high for some as others rally to return
When Barrington School District 220 began welcoming students back into the classroom in October, nearly 90% of children who attend Hough Street School in the heart of the village arrived for in-person instruction.
Heading west past the horse farms and rolling fields of Barrington Hills, the district’s Sunny
Hill School in Carpentersville also reopened. But only about 1 in 4 families at Sunny Hill — where 90% of students are economically disadvantaged — allowed their children to return to the classroom.
This tale of two schools — less than 8 miles apart, but a world away when it comes to parents’ reactions to the coronavirus — began a rocky new chapter this week, as District 220 joined a growing list of suburban Chicago schools that are pausing inperson instruction due to the record high rate of COVID-19 cases.
Now, many parents, particularly from middle- and upperincome communities in the Chicago area, are again demanding a reopening of schools, saying their children are suffering from social isolation and academic regression they believe pose a greater danger than the virus itself.
Yet as parents in more affluent communities like Elmhurst, Lincolnshire and Libertyville organize rallies in support of open schools, fears that in-person
classes will increase the risks of coronavirus exposure to students and staff — and, by extension, to their families — are only growing, especially in lower-income and more racially diverse communities disproportionately affected by the pandemic.
That all of this is playing out during an economic crisis and perhaps one the most polarized presidential elections in U.S. history has only escalated tensions.
Troubled by the disparate attitudes toward the virus, Dr. Tina Tan, professor of pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, observed that, “Everything has become a political debate, and a lot of more affluent individuals don’t believe in the science.”
“Some of these parents believe kids don’t get very sick, and even if their kids get COVID, it would just be the sniffles,” Tan said. “But the opposite is true, and a certain subset of children can become very ill with long-term consequences.”
Tan said residents from low-income communities have had higher rates of contracting the virus for many reasons, including family members in the household who are more likely to be front-line workers providing essential services to the public.
Economically disadvantaged families may also find it impossible to social distance when a member of the family is ill with COVID-19, due to living in modest homes that are often shared by numerous relatives, Tan said.
“If you’re living in a 10,000-square-foot home, it’s easy to find a room for a family member who is sick, so they don’t infect the rest of the family,” Tan said. “But when you have a multigenerational family living under the same roof in a two-bedroom apartment, how do you social distance when someone is sick?”
In one suburban school system, Cicero District 99 — where the community’s COVID-19 rate has double digits in recent weeks — the teachers union is strongly opposing a request that teachers begin delivering remote lessons from empty classrooms in November. Rachel Esposito, president of the Cicero Council of the West Suburban Teachers Union, noted Friday that a large majority of families indicated support for remote learning in a district survey.
The Cicero district enrolls around 11,000 students in prekindergarten through eighth grade, about 92% from economically disadvantaged families and 96% who are Hispanic, according state data released Friday.
“There is a divide between families from affluent communities who have access to great health care, and those who don’t have the same access, which is the case for most of the families in Cicero,” Esposito said.
While she said she was well aware that many local families have lost loved ones to COVID-19 in recent months, the dire situation was underscored by a recent conversation she had with a neighborhood priest.
“He typically presides over 10 to 12 funerals a year at his church in Cicero, but he estimates that by the end of this year, it will be between 130 to 160 funerals, which hit me like a ton of bricks, knowing the devastation COVID has caused to this community,” Esposito said. “People in Cicero want to take a pause from reopening schools, because they are scared, and they are definitely suffering.”
District 99 Superintendent Rodolfo Hernandez on Friday cited the recent rise in COVID-19 cases and the “current conditions” in noting that the school board has delayed the resumption of in-person learning “out of an abundance of caution,” despite having received “confirmation from the (Cook County Department of Public Health) that it was safe” to reopen schools to students. He said the decision to bring teachers back into buildings on Nov. 9 was made “after careful thought and deliberation” and in consultation with the union.
In Addison School District 4 — where nearly 60% of students are considered low-income and nearly 65% are Hispanic — children have been returning to school in stages over the last few weeks.
And while the district is using a staggered schedule so that no more than a fifth of students are in the schools at one time, only about 40% of families have chosen to send their children back for in-person learning, the district confirmed.
Still, with Addison’s seven-day positivity rate hovering around 15% — and the DuPage County Health Department recommending that schools revert to remote learning because of “substantial community transmission” of COVID-19 — teachers rallied outside of a Board of Education meeting Wednesday seeking an immediate suspension of in-person learning.
“We need to do what’s safest for our students and our community. The medical experts at the DuPage County Health Department recommended school districts move to all remote learning. We should absolutely be following that advice,” Addison Teachers Association Co-President Allison Andrikokus said in a news release ahead of the rally.
District 4 Director of Communications Brendan Marshall said the district is “committed to ensuring a safe learning environment and a high-quality education.” He said schools are operating under public health safety guidelines and that officials are monitoring the situation “on a daily, hourly and case-by-case basis.”
Nearby in Oak Brookbased Butler Elementary District 53 — which has one elementary and one middle school, and just 1% of students are considered lowincome — Superintendent Paul O’Malley said the percentage of students participating in full in-person learning has increased as of Wednesday to 77% from 62% at the start of the school year.
Indeed, the strong reactions to COVID-19 from more racially and ethnically diverse communities hit hard by the pandemic were evident in a national survey conducted by Consumer Reports in July. Fifty-seven percent of Black and 52% of Latino respondents said they preferred schools to remain closed with remote instruction, compared with just 25% of whites who were polled.
Many suburban parents who have protested school closures say while families worried about COVID-19 should have the option of their kids continuing remote learning, they are far more concerned about their children’s emotional health and flagging academic progress than the virus.
“I’m much more worried about my son being stuck at home, taking classes on a computer in the basement, than in him getting COVID,” said Hawthorn Woods resident Christina George, whose 15-year-old son is a freshman at Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, which has not reopened and is instructing 4,300 students with remote learning.
“I personally don’t feel afraid of COVID, because the fact remains that anytime you step foot out of the house, you assume some kind of risk,” said George, who has been among the leaders of the grassroots Stevenson Can Team, which touts the support of more than 500 students, parents, taxpayers and business leaders who want the option of a return to inperson learning.
George said the fact that residents living in affluent towns in Stevenson’s attendance area like Long Grove and Kildeer pay “incredibly high” property taxes — a $40,000 yearly tab is not unusual, she said — makes the high school’s remote learning especially galling.
The prospect of the high school reopening anytime soon dimmed when the Lake County Health Department issued a recommendation on Oct. 20 that all schools in the county shift to virtual learning because of growing COVID-19 infection rates.
“Is the virus itself political? No, but politics is playing into these decisions from our political leaders in some way, shape or form, and even after the election, it’s not going to just magically go away,” George said.
In Park Ridge, a Facebook group of parents calling for a return to in-person learning has just over 800 members, with followers encouraged to “flood” school board members’ inboxes and share links to articles they say support their belief that, if done safely, schools can and should reopen.
Even now, with rising COVID-19 rates both locally and statewide, the position of many parents does not appear to have changed, said Alexis Conway, one of the creators of the group.
“Based on the activity I’m seeing on our Facebook page, I would say there’s still a strong interest” in schools opening fully, Conway said.
With more than 93% of parents in Winnetka School District 36 signaling they wanted their children back in the classroom this fall, officials plan to spend up to $2.3 million — roughly $1,400 per student — on PPE this year to ensure the health and safety of students and staff.
Similarly, at New Trier High School, which District 36 feeds into, officials plan to spend up to $1.3 million to conduct COVID-19 saliva screenings for students and staff.
While District 36 officials have reported only eight cases of COVID-19 since the start of the school year, with the holidays approaching, Superintendent Trisha Kocanda sounded the alarm in recent days.
In a video message to parents posted on the district’s website, Kocanda expressed her dismay upon learning that some students were sent to school despite family members awaiting the results of COVID-19 tests, which is strictly forbidden.
In addition, Kocanda said some students have reported that their parents did not inquire about their health, nor did they have their temperature taken before school — both of which are required daily to comply with the district’s CrisisGo tracker report system.
“We urge you, and I implore you, to be extra mindful and vigilant about the daily process that we all have to take part of to extend in-person learning as long as possible,” said Kocanda, who also urged families to avoid traveling or attending large gatherings.
Studies have found the impact of the COVID-19-era school closures will likely prove most detrimental to students from economically disadvantaged neighborhoods, where children do not have the same access to resources like tutors, technology and activities like travel soccer and violin lessons. Yet families on the front lines of the pandemic may view the reopening of schools as a risk not worth taking.
“When you think of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, where basic survival and putting food on the table are most important, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if families from high-poverty communities are putting their kids’ health and safety first when making decisions about school reopenings,” said Jon Schmidt, a clinical assistant professor in the School of Education at Loyola University Chicago.
“Yes, they want their kids back in school, and their kids need to be back in school for multiple reasons,” Schmidt said. “But for many of these families, they have a visceral sense of what COVID means, because for them, this virus has been up close and personal.”