Definitely, we’ve cut ICU times down by over 40%Or we could be getting better at treating it.
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Definitely, we’ve cut ICU times down by over 40%Or we could be getting better at treating it.
No doubt, clowns act like the official folks with the platform haven’t been misleading or outright lying.the OP contains verifiable disinformation, FYI. It’s up to each person to view data as they see fit and make their own decisions on whether it’s worthy of taking to heart.
He doesn’t, his little balls have shriveled up with fear and he can’t help himselfWhich part of the data do you think is invalid?
Genuinely curious. I’m frustrated by how inconsistent our data collection is and how difficult that is making informed decision making about relative risk.
Alex, I can't tell you how much I've respected your contributions to this board as a moderator, football analyst and an oftentimes much needed voice of reason. So, it is incredibly disappointing to see someone I admire accuse me of posting "disinformation". It is completely out of line, and wholly undeserved. I have IN NO WAY posted disinformation whatsoever.the OP contains verifiable disinformation, FYI. It’s up to each person to view data as they see fit and make their own decisions on whether it’s worthy of taking to heart.
I’ll certainly invite you to refute the data from that Twitter account.Please quit bombing this board with your propaganda, urban legends, and disinformation.
There are places called 4Chan and the Corral that fit your agenda.
Condescending is too kind. Arrogant, I know more than everyone else was mire like. Someone who spends 7hours to spew that biased diatribe is obviously full of himself.(Sigh) I thought the post was going to be honest and balanced. (Big Sigh) It was very condescending though.
Alex, I can't tell you how much I've respected your contributions to this board as a moderator, football analyst and an oftentimes much needed voice of reason. So, it is incredibly disappointing to see someone I admire accuse me of posting "disinformation". It is completely out of line, and wholly undeserved. I have IN NO WAY posted disinformation whatsoever.
All I have done is shared the viewpoint of a parent who is doing his best to work his way through his decision, like so many others, and I did so after explicitly couching the post as one person's words that were not my own. They weren't even the words of my poker friend who shared them with me. They were the words of a parent in Virginia who I have never even met; a fact that I reiterated a second time after your first post on this thread, which I responded to without any accusation or hostility whatsoever.
And now you decide to essentially call me a liar.
Be better Alex, because you are better.
(And for the record, if you look back in the thread, you'll find that the post you cited from texasjustin was part of a side discussion he was having with webrom42, not with my original post.)
I’ll certainly invite you to refute the data from that Twitter account.
Take a few moments and breath through your nose. Try to let that brain warm up a little bit and look at that @EthicalSkeptic and you tell me. It’s data that’s available to everyone.Your claim that medical professionals are "cooking the books" and that the US is counting every death as a Covid death is pure conspiracy crank propaganda. Please take it to 4Chan or the Corral.
The only thing they’ve done different is managing information/messaging and the way they tally cases/deaths.
Obviously they handled the elderly much differently. But I we haven’t inquired with them about that.
We are expecting half of all parents in my district to request remote learning.Parents and kids want to go back to school but it seems like teachers are voicing the biggest opposition.
Apparently teachers think they are a special class above everyone else that is back at work.
Full disclosure, I myself am not a parent. But last night over my weekly Zoom virtual poker night, I got a sense of the stress those of you who are may be going through right now, as the parents in my game started discussing the fast-approaching decision they'll have to make regarding which option to choose when it comes to how to handle school for their kids this fall.
From what I gather (at least in the Fairfax Public School District in Virginia), parents have to choose between one of two options for their kids this fall:
-2 days a week in-person school
-100% virtual distance learning
As I understand it, many Texas school districts are offering a similar set of options to parents as well, and so I thought I'd share something that one of my poker friends in Virginia said very much helped him and his wife to make their decision.
To be clear, these are not my opinions nor my friend's. They are those of a Fairfax parent who wanted to express how he worked through the logic of the decision that he and his wife made. It is definitely a long read, but if you've also been struggling with which choice to make it may be a worthwhile one.
I sincerely hope this can help to alleviate some stress from my fellow Orangebloods. Hook 'em!
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To our fellow FCPS families, this is it gang, 5 days until the 2 days in school vs. 100% virtual decision. Let’s talk it out, in my traditional mammoth TL/DR form.
Like all of you, I’ve seen my feed become a flood of anxiety and faux expertise. You’ll get no presumption of expertise here. This is how I am looking at and considering this issue and the positions people have taken in my feed and in the hundred or so FCPS discussion groups that have popped up. The lead comments in quotes are taken directly from my feed and those boards. Sometimes I try to rationalize them. Sometimes I’m just punching back at the void.
Full disclosure, we initially chose the 2 days option and are now having serious reservations. As I consider the positions and arguments I see in my feed, these are where my mind goes. Of note, when I started working on this piece at 12:19 PM today the COVID death tally in the United States stood at 133,420.
“My kids want to go back to school.”
I challenge that position. I believe what the kids desire is more abstract. I believe what they want is a return to normalcy. They want their idea of yesterday. And yesterday isn’t on the menu.
“I want my child in school so they can socialize.”
This was the principle reason for our 2 days decision. As I think more on it though, what do we think ‘social’ will look like? There aren’t going to be any lunch table groups, any lockers, any recess games, any study halls, any sitting next to friends, any talking to people in the hallway, any dances. All of that is off the menu. So, when we say that we want the kids to benefit from the social experience, what are we deluding ourselves into thinking in-building socialization will actually look like in the Fall?
“My kid is going to be left behind.”
Left behind who? The entire country is grappling with the same issue, leaving all children in the same quagmire. Who exactly would they be behind? I believe the rhetorical answer to that is “They’ll be behind where they should be,” to which I’ll counter that “where they should be” is a fictional goal post that we as a society have taken as gospel because it maps to standardized tests which are used to grade schools and counties as they chase funding.
“Classrooms are safe.”
At the current distancing guidelines from FCPS middle and high schools would have no more than 12 people (teachers + students) in a classroom (I acknowledge this number may change as FCPS considers the Commonwealth’s 3 ft with a mask vs. 6 ft position, noting that FCPS is all mask regardless of the distance). For the purpose of this discussion we’ll say classes run 45 minutes.
I posed the following question to 40 people today, representing professional and management roles in corporations, government agencies, and military commands: “Would your company or command have a 12 person, 45 minute meeting in a conference room?”
100% of them said no, they would not. These are some of their answers:
“No. Until further notice we are on Zoom.”
“(Our company) doesn’t allow us in (company space).”
“Oh hell no.”
“No absolutely not.”
“Is there a percentage lower than zero?”
“Something of that size would be virtual.”
We do not even consider putting our office employees into the same situation we are contemplating putting our children into. And let’s drive this point home: there are instances here when commanding officers will not put soldiers, ACTUAL SOLDIERS, into the kind of indoor environment we’re contemplating for our children. For me this is as close to a ‘kill shot’ argument as there is in this entire debate. How do we work from home because buildings with recycled air are not safe, because we don’t trust other people to not spread the virus, and then with the same breath send our children into buildings?
“Children only die .0016 of the time.”
First, conceding we’re an increasingly morally bankrupt society, but when did we start talking about children’s lives, or anyone’s lives, like this? This how the villain in movies talks about mortality, usually 10-15 minutes before the good guy kills him.
If you’re in this camp, and I acknowledge that many, many people are, I’m asking you to consider that number from a slightly different angle.
FCPS has 189,000 children. .0016 of that is 302. 302 dead children are the Calvary Hill you’re erecting your argument on. So, let’s agree to do this: stop presenting this as a data point. If this is your argument, I challenge you to have courage equal to your conviction. Go ahead, plant a flag on the internet and say, “Only 302 children will die.” No one will. That’s the kind action on social media that gets you fired from your job. And I trust our social media enclave isn’t so careless and irresponsible with life that it would even, for even a millisecond, enter any of your minds to make such an argument.
Considered another way: You’re presented with a bag with 189,000 $1 bills. You’re told that in the bag are 302 random bills, they look and feel just like all the others, but each one of those bills will kill you. Do you take the money out of the bag?
Same argument, applied to the 12,487 teachers in FCPS (per Wikipedia), using the ‘children’s multiplier’ of .0016 (all of us understanding the adult mortality rate is higher). That’s 20 teachers. That’s the number you’re talking about. It’s very easy to sit behind a keyboard and diminish and dismiss the risk you’re advocating other people assume. Take a breath and think about that.
If you want to advocate for 2 days a week, look, I’m looking for someone to convince me. But please, for the love of God, drop things like this from your argument. Because the people I know who’ve said things like this, I know they’re better people than this. They’re good people under incredible stress who let things slip out as their frustration boils over. So, please do the right thing and move on from this, because one potential outcome is that one day, you’re going to have to stand in front of St. Peter and answer for this, and that’s not going to be conversation you enjoy.
“Hardly any kids get COVID.”
(Deep sigh) Yes, that is statistically true as of this writing. But it is a cherry-picked argument because you’re leaving out an important piece.
One can reasonably argue that, due to the school closures in March, children have had the least EXPOSURE to COVID. In other words, closing schools was the one pandemic mitigation action we took that worked. There can be no discussion of the rate of diagnosis within children without also acknowledging they were among our fastest and most quarantined people. Put another way, you cannot cite the effect without acknowledging the cause.
“The flu kills more people every year.”
(Deep sigh). First of all, no, it doesn’t. Per the CDC, United States flu deaths average 20,000 annually. COVID, when I start writing here today, has killed 133,420 in six months.
And when you mention the flu, do you mean the disease that, if you’re suspected of having it, everyone, literally everyone in the country tells you stay the f- away from other people? You mean the one where parents are pretty sure their kids have it but send them to school anyway because they have a meeting that day, the one that every year causes massive f-ing outbreaks in schools because schools are petri dishes and it causes kids to miss weeks of school and leaves them out of sports and band for a month? That one? Because you’re right - the flu kills people every year. It does, but you’re ignoring the why. It’s because there are people who are a--holes who don’t care about infecting other people. In that regard it’s a perfect comparison to COVID.
“Almost everyone recovers.”
You’re confusing “release from the hospital” and “no longer infected” with “recovered.” I’m fortunate to only know two people who have had COVID. One my age and one my dad’s age. The one my age described it as “absolute hell” and although no longer infected cannot breathe right. The one my dad’s age was in the hospital for 13 weeks, had to have a trach ring put in because she could no longer be on a ventilator, and upon finally getting home and being faced with incalculable time in rehab told my mother, “I wish I had died.”
While I’m making every effort to reach objectivity, on this particular point, you don’t know what the f- you’re talking about.
“If people get sick, they get sick.”
First, you mistyped. What you intended to say was “If OTHER people get sick, they get sick.” And shame on you.
“I’m not going to live my life in fear.”
You already live your life in fear. For your health, your family’s health, your job, your retirement, terrorists, extremists, one political party or the other being in power, the new neighbors, an unexpected home repair, the next sunrise. What you meant to say was, “I’m not prepared to add ANOTHER fear,” and I’ve got news for you: that ship has sailed. It’s too late. There are two kinds of people, and only two: those that admit they’re afraid, and those that are lying to themselves about it.
As to the fear argument, fear is the reason you wait up when your kids stay out late, it’s the reason you tell your kids not to dive in the shallow water, to look both ways before crossing the road. Fear is the respect for the wide world that we teach our children. Except in this instance, for reasons no one has been able to explain to me yet.
“FCPS leadership sucks.”
I will summarize my view of the School Board thusly: if the 12 of you aren’t getting into a room together because it represents a risk, don’t tell me it’s OK for our kids. I understand your arguments, that we need the 2 days option for parents who can’t work from home, kids who don’t have internet or computer access, kids who needs meals from the school system, kids who need extra support to learn, and most tragically for kids who are at greater risk of abuse by being home. All very serious, all very real issues, all heartbreaking. No argument.
But you must first lead by example. Because you’re failing when it comes to optics. All your meetings are online. What our children see is all of you on a Zoom telling them it’s OK for them to be exactly where you aren’t. I understand you’re not PR people, but you really should think about hiring some.
“I talked it over with my kids.”
Let’s put aside for a moment the concept of adults effectively deferring this decision to children, the same children who will continue to stuff things into a full trash can rather than change it out. Yes, those hygienic children.
Listen, my 15 year old daughter wants a sport car, which she’s not getting next year because it would be dangerous to her and to others. Those kinds of decisions are our job. We step in and decide as parents, we don’t let them expose themselves to risks because their still developing and screen addicted brains narrow their understanding of cause and effect.
We as parents and adults serve to make difficult decisions. Sometimes those are in the form of lessons, where we try to steer kids towards the right answer and are willing to let them make a mistake in the hopes of teaching better decision making the next time around. This is not one of those moments. The stakes are too high for that. This is a “the adults are talking” moment. Kids are not mature enough for this moment. That is not an attack on your child. It is a broad statement about all children. It is true of your children and it was true when we were children. We need to be doing that thinking here, and “Johnny wants to see Bobby at school” cannot be the prevailing element in the equation.
“The teachers need to do their job.”
How is it that the same society which abruptly shifted to virtual students only three months ago, and offered glowing endorsements of teachers stating, “we finally understand how difficult your job is,” has now shifted to “screw you, do your job.” There are myriad problems with that position but for the purposes of this piece let’s simply go with, “You’re not looking for a teacher, you’re looking for the babysitter you feel your property tax payment entitles you to.”
“Teachers have a greater chance to being killed by a car than they do of dying from COVID.”
(Eye roll) Per the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), the U.S. see approximately 36,000 auto fatalities a year. Again, there have been 133,420 COVID deaths in the United States through 12:09 July 10, 2020. So no, they do not have a great chance of being killed in a car accident.
And, if you want to take the actual environment into consideration, the odds of a teacher being killed in a car accident in their classroom, you know, the environment we’re actually talking about, that’s right around 0%.
“If the grocery store workers can be onsite what are the teachers afraid of?”
(Deep breath) A grocery store worker, who absolutely risks exposure, has either six feet of space or a plexiglass shield between them and individual adult customers who can grasp their own mortality whose transactions can be completed in moments, in a 40,000 SF space.
A teacher is with 11 ‘customers’ who have not an inkling what mortality is, for 45 minutes, in a 675 SF space, six times a day.
Just stop.
“Teachers are choosing remote because they don’t want to work.”
(Deep breaths) Many teachers are opting to be remote. That is not a vacation. They’re requesting to do their job at a safer site. Just like many, many people who work in buildings with recycled air have done. And likely the building you’re not going into has a newer and better serviced air system than our schools.
Of greater interest to me is the number of teachers choosing the 100% virtual option for their children. The people who spend the most time in the buildings are the same ones electing not to send their children into those buildings. That’s something I pay attention to.
“I wasn’t prepared to be a parent 24/7” and “I just need a break.”
I truly, deeply respect that honesty. Truth be told, both arguments have crossed my mind. Pre COVID, I routinely worked from home 1 – 2 days a week. The solace was nice. When I was in the office, I had an actual office, a room with a door I could close, where I could focus. During the quarantine that hasn’t always been the case. I’ve been frustrated, I’ve been short, I’ve gone to just take a drive and get the hell away for a moment and been disgusted when one of the kids sees me and asks me to come for a ride, robbing me of those minutes of silence. You want to hear silence. I get it. I really, really do.
Here’s another version of that, admittedly extreme. What if one of our kids becomes one of the 302? What’s that silence going to sound like? What if you have one of those matted frames where you add the kid’s school picture every year? What if you don’t get to finish the pictures?
“What does your gut tell you to do?”
Shawn and I have talked ad infinitum about all of these and other points. Two days ago, at mid-discussion I said, “Stop, right now, gut answer, what is it,” and we both said, “virtual.”
A lot of the arguments I hear people making for the 2 days sound like we’re trying to talk ourselves into ignoring our instincts, they are almost exclusively, “We’re doing 2 days, but…”. There’s a fantastic book by Gavin de Becker, The Gift of Fear, which I’ll minimize for you thusly: your gut instinct is a hardwired part of your brain and you should listen to it. In the introduction he talks about elevators, and how, of all living things, humans are the only ones that would voluntarily get into a soundproof steel box with a potential predator just so they could skip a flight of stairs.
I keep thinking that the 2 days option is the soundproof steel box. I welcome, damn, beg, anyone to convince me otherwise.
At the time I started writing at 12:09 PM, 133,420 Americans had died from COVID. Upon completing this draft at 7:04 PM, that number rose to 133,940.
520 Americans died of COVID while I was working on this. In seven hours.
The length of a school day.
We are expecting half of all parents in my district to request remote learning.
The staff poll came back at 70% teachers wanting to return with a vast majority of the 30% having legit medical issues or family issues that would preclude them from teaching in person
keep in mind the 30% that wouldn’t “come back” would still come to work but stay in isolated areas and ....get this..... teach the kids that also request to be remote.
hearing that teacher doesn’t want to come back to work doesn’t mean they don’t want to work, it means they have grave concerns with their own or their families safety. And we have the demand for teachers that want to teach remotely because there are parents that want their kids to be taught remotely.
you want to try again ?
Germany just finished a two week period where they went to school like normal. It was the final two weeks before their summer break. A trial run before the fall.
They had no issues. But not surprisingly there’s ZERO news about this.
Here’s a quote from a German doctor about why they miraculously did so much better than anyone else in treating CV19:
My wife is German. Her family doctor growing up is her mother’s best friend. I’m going out on a limb and guessing I have a better idea of how Germany has handled this than you do.Holy shit guy, are you serious. You should go to Germany and get a good look at how they are handling this. After all the garbage you talk I am literally at a loss that you would bring up Germany.
Here’s a quote from a German doctor about why they miraculously did so much better than anyone else in treating CV19:
“When I have an early diagnosis and can treat patients early — for example put them on a ventilator before they deteriorate — the chance of survival is much higher,” Professor Kräusslich said.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.ny...urope/germany-coronavirus-death-rate.amp.html
This article came the same day that Cuomo said he was going to use the national guard to steal ventilators from upstate NY. You know when ventilators were going to save everyone.
Just a few weeks later it was becoming clear that putting folks on ventilators too soon was killing people. https://www.statnews.com/2020/04/21/coronavirus-analysis-recommends-less-reliance-on-ventilators/
But yeah, I’m sure Germany just found a way to make the ventilators work better than everyone else.
My wife is German. Her family doctor growing up is her mother’s best friend. I’m going out on a limb and guessing I have a better idea of how Germany has handled this than you do.
Haha you crack me up man.
My mother in law would have been here in March, we would have been in Germany for much of June.First - pics
second - you clearly have very little self awareness
Third - try to go back and visit the folks with her and see if they let you in.
My mother in law would have been here in March, we would have been in Germany for much of June.
You always seem to think I have zero respect for this thing. I talk trash about the data and the way it’s presented to us. If you are too stupid to see that we are being manipulated then that’s on you.
I’ve got plenty of self awareness. That’s how I’m still married after 28.5 months deployed as a infantryman and 12 more years of civilian time. Honestly I think I’m the only guy I know who’s still married from those days. I have two amazing kids that excel in everything they do. This while being down to earth solid little humans.
I’m just not a pussy. That matters. Maybe you should do some Low T.
the OP contains verifiable disinformation, FYI. It’s up to each person to view data as they see fit and make their own decisions on whether it’s worthy of taking to heart.
I love when dudes dish it out but can’t take it.Ha! Oh I am sure you are super tough and smart. So smart you fail to see the difference between how we and Germany have handled this. You should hop over to the Texas shut down thread and impart some of your wisdom. SMFH.
and you called me a pussy. Wow. Haha!!
I love when dudes dish it out but can’t take it.
So you are saying that Germany will classify someone as a CV19 death if they are hit by a train but test positive? Do you realize that we do that here?
You keep saying this. What is conspiratorial? Point something out. The only thing even remotely refutable was the story a police officer told me just yesterday. I’ll also give you a shiny nickel if you can point to a single political comment I’ve made.You're defending the poster who highjacked this thread and carpet bombed it with conspiracy propaganda while you're simultaneously criticizing/nitpicking the OP who started a reasonable thread about an important subject facing Texas parents right now. How does this align with what @Ketchum outlined about better moderating the board to foster constructive & informative conversations while avoiding political highjacking?
The poster you are defending is in a thread about parental decision-making regarding school, but instead of discussing that, he's making outlandish claims that medical professionals are "cooking the books" and that the US is counting all deaths as Covid deaths. Not to mention the other urban legends and propaganda he's posting. How is that a reasonable thing to bring to this conversation and why are you defending his political highjacking? His posts belong on 4Chan or the Corral.
I’ve got two. My daughter scored high enough on her SAT in 7th grade with the Duke TIP to get into college. She’s about to be a freshman, never brought home a B. She’s started on every athletic A team in school and plays up on D1 Classic soccer team. I think SMU is looking like a likely destination for soccer. My son is on the same track but he’s only going into 4th grade.Guy, you are the absolute worst. I hope you don’t have kids. I do and have to deal with this decision in the real world. You make me sick.
you should read the post above yours. You and Alex should move full time to the twitter cesspool. You clearly feel more at home there.
I know how hard teachers work, and trust me, most of us aren’t in the “teachers aren’t willing to work” camp. I appreciate all you do for your students.I worked three times harder during remote learning than I did for in person lessons, and I already worked pretty damn hard. And all I was doing was producing two video lessons a week. It was the endless hours trying to chase down the 30-40 kids that were completely non-participatory.
plus my wife suddenly being like “oh, you’re home. Here’s 20 projects I want you to do.”
. I’ll do in person learning in a heart beat if proper protocols are in place.
How much would you like to wager that teachers being afraid to work keep schools from opening?I know how hard teachers work, and trust me, most of us aren’t in the “teachers aren’t willing to work” camp. I appreciate all you do for your students.
How much would you like to wager that teachers being afraid to work keep schools from opening?
At this point I’m starting to think maybe you just aren’t very intelligentMore of the blame actually falls at the feet of the “Covid is a hoax” crowd. You. Thanks for screwing this up.