EDITORIAL: Rhode Island’s Education System Goes From Mediocre to Just Plain Chaotic
EDITORIAL
EDITORIAL: Rhode Island’s Education System Goes From Mediocre to Just Plain Chaotic
This was after her confusing narrative that Rhode Island was “#1 in online learning,” a claim that sends chills through frustrated parents, educators, and students who knew another reality this spring.
Raimondo nearly every day proclaims Rhode Island is #1 at something, but the reality is that Rhode Island may only be #1 in ridiculous claims of being #1.
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLASTNo state is #1 in this pandemic and certainly, neither this state nor any other are winning anything -- it is all different degrees of losing.
Raimondo is not responsible for the disease and she has made a number of solid decisions, but also some major errors. The decision to return infected hospitalized nursing home patients to nursing homes caused the additional unnecessary spread and deaths. This helped drive Rhode Islands's per capita death rate to be the 5th highest in the United States.
As part of her Trump-like doctrine to return to schools, she ordered all of the school districts to develop “their own” plan for returning to the classroom.
This chaotic approach of asking beaten down administrators and faculty to develop their own plans with little support has been an exercise in futility and frustration. Doesn't the state have the expertise on the disease?
One would hope the state's consultants - paid millions via a no-bid contract - would have more expertise on best practices than a principal in Exeter-West Greenwich does on how to design a safe school environment to protect children and faculty.
Faculty Confused and Worried
As Maribeth Calabro of the Providence Teacher’s Union tells GoLocal, ["Raimondo] in one breath tells people to limit large number gatherings and increase mandatory mask-wearing - but schools will have up to 30 bodies, no masks, and then some teachers see up to 120 students in a day or the so-called stable groups, then go to busses with different students that go home to families that may be impacted.”
“I don’t see or feel that that is safer, nor do my teachers or the parents that I am listening to,” she added, after Raimondo's pronouncement Wednesday to Rhode Islanders that "you will be safer in schools than not in schools."
Raimondo’s Plan to Make Plans
Raimondo forced each of the school districts to utilize most of the summer and their resources to create multiple instruction plans — plans that most colleges cannot implement.
The state could have developed flexible best practices and helped the individual districts implement strategies for the classroom and/or online, but Raimondo ducked responsibility. The state passed the buck.
So instead of providing templates and customizable plans for schools to use, 30 plus districts each created at least three different plans -- now we have nearly 100 plans. Brilliant. We are now #1 in plans developed.
Parents in Peril
Now, the latest from the Raimondo administration is that no final decision will be made until August 17 — just two weeks before the edict to return to the classroom on August 31.
If you have a staff, a State Police driver, and your kids go to private schools, then maybe your life is a little more flexible, but for most parents, things like work responsibilities, back to school shopping, and daycare coverage are far more complicated.
Raimondo is right. We are #1 -- in unnecessary confusion and grandiose claims.
Heck, if parents need a little help they can sign up for Care.com.