A top school official says very few schools will open 100%, as Trump insists. 'The federal government is not the nation's school board'

• During a media briefing Thursday, a leader of The School Superintendents Association emphasized that while reopening schools is a priority, they'll only do so if and when it's safe.
• She said very few schools will reopen in the way they would pre-pandemic, and that decisions have been and will continue to be "fluid' to account for the pandemic's changing nature.
• The federal government can support swift, safe reopenings by passing legislation — without hinging it on a reopening condition — that helps fund necessary supplies.

As political and economic pressures mount to reopen schools — "100%," if President Trump has his way — the superintendents of America are assuring parents, teachers, and community members that they will only do so if, when, and how it's safe.

"We agree with President Trump that we should start with a position of opening schools, but we add the very clear caveat ... that we start with that position so long as it is safe and practical," Noelle Ellerson Ng, associate executive director of policy and advocacy at the the School Superintendents Association said during a webinar Thursday.

"Superintendents are aiming there, but they've very clearly come to see that that's not functional," she added.

As a result, they've been adjusting their approaches based on local data and emerging science — not political bribes — and will continue to do so. "The decision to reopen must be state and local," Ellerson Ng said. "The federal government is not the nation's school board."

"Very few" school districts will open up fully because "this is not just about opening schools"

During the webinar, held by AASA and the Infectious Diseases Society of America, Ellerson Ng said the superintendents she represents are prioritizing school reopenings and safety equally. "It's a both/and, not an either/or," she said.

"Just as the economy can't reopen until the schools reopen, the schools won't fully be able to reopen until we can get COVID under control," she added.

Ellerson Ng said decisions about school reopenings have been and will continue to be "fluid and living" based on the changing landscape of the pandemic.

But "it's very fair to say that there will be very few school districts that will fully open 100% like they did pre-COVID," she said, but many are announcing different strategies like pushed back start dates, hybrid approaches, or making the first quarter virtual while bracing for the fact that the first quarter will end just as flu season begins.

"Superintendents are not just asking about how can I open a school? A superintendent knows how to open a school. Every superintendent in this nation could open their schools tomorrow," Ellerson Ng added. "But they won't because this is not just about opening schools. This is about getting schools open and keeping them open safely to maintain as much of a semblance as normal for students as possible."

All are keeping a close watch on the emerging science and evolving data in their communities and will adjust as they go.

"It absolutely has to be a state and local decision informed by science guidance and best practices driven by doctors, health, policy, experts, and scientists. That is how you get ahead of something like a pandemic," Ellerson Ng said.

"And then you arm your education leaders like superintendents and school board members to then apply that to their areas of action, which is how to run a school system to best and safely support and serve students and staff in those buildings."

Superintendents call on the government to offer practical help

There is one area in which the federal government can help, however: By passing legislation — without hinging it on conditions of reopening — that will help fund necessary supplies like PPE, cleaning materials, and air filtration systems.

"We want to see those supports to empower superintendents," she said.

• Read more:
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• I'm a public school teacher and I want to return to my classroom. But not like this.
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• A preschool teacher in Sweden says she wonders 'how many people will die because of me' as parents are required to send kids to school