My Broken Heart | Diane Ravitch's blog

My Broken Heart | Diane Ravitch's blog

My Broken Heart

I was born in 1938. I’m in pretty good health, considering my age. But one of the valves in my heart has a leak. It must be repaired. On April 8, I am having open heart surgery. The surgeon will break open my breastbone to reach my heart, then wire it back together. He assures me I will be fine, but fatigued, when it’s over.

I have tried to take it in stride, but it’s hard not to find it scary. Terrifying, actually.

To cheer me up, I keep thinking of hokey old songs that use the word “heart” in them. There are so many of them. Dozens. Scores. Hundreds. I’ve been singing Hank Williams’ “Your Cheating Heart,” and “My heart cries for you, sighs for you, dies for you, please come back to me,” “Peg of My Heart,” “My Heart Belongs to Daddy,” “You’re Breaking My Heart Cause You’re Leaving, you’ve fallen for somebody new,” Doris Day’s “Once I had a Secret Love, that lived within the heart of me,” “ Hoagy Carmichael’s “Heart and Soul, I fell in love with you,” Elvis Presley’s “Wooden Heart,” Patsy Cline’s “Heartaches,” another version of a different “Heartaches,” The Charms, “Hearts Made of Stone,” Billy Eckstine’s “My Foolish Heart,” The Four Aces, “Heart of My Hearts,” Tony Bennett’s “I Left My Heart in San Francisco,” “Deep in the Heart of Texas,” and many more. “Heart of My Heart” is the one I keep singing to myself; it’s a barbershop quartet song. The Elvis Presley song is adorable, Elvis like you have never seen him before.

It’s a habit in my natal family to try to turn bad news into humor.

My heart is not amused.

When the nurse-practitioner called to review procedures, she asked me what kind of animal valve I wanted in my heart. Without hesitation, I said I wanted the valve of a Longhorn steer. My heart really does belong to Texas.

One of the first people I turned to for advice about a surgeon was Checker Finn’s wife, Renu Virmani, who is a world-renowned cardiologist. She assured me that the surgeon recommended by my cardiologist was the best in New York City. The more I inquired, the better I felt about the person I chose. When I met him, he relieved my anxieties. At least some of them.

The blog will continue while I am hospitalized. I have written some in advance. Some of of my good friends agreed to write special contributions for me in my absence (most are original and never been previously published). And I expect to jump in to comment and maybe even post a few things as soon as the anesthesia wears off.

So please think of me on April 8. I will be grateful for your thoughts, prayers, and good wishes.

I’m not going away. I will be back with a stronger heart and a passion for justice. And maybe the heart valve of a lion or a tiger or a Longhorn.

My Broken Heart | Diane Ravitch's blog

A road map to safely reopen our schools | by Randi Weingarten | Feb, 2021 | AFT Voices

A road map to safely reopen our schools | by Randi Weingarten | Feb, 2021 | AFT Voices

A road map to safely reopen our schools

The grim toll of the coronavirus pandemic has many measures: Twenty-eight million infections and 500,000 lives lost. Eight million more people enduring poverty, many of them children. Family businesses shuttered, weddings without guests, and epidemics of depression and isolation. The shocking one-year decline in life expectancy in the first half of 2020 alone. It’s tempting to tick through “what-ifs.” What if the last administration’s response had been competent, not chaotic? What if officials had prioritized reopening schools over bars and gyms, and used the time schools were closed to prepare them to safely reopen? But we must shift from “what if?” to “what now?”

My union has been working to safely reopen schools for nearly a year, and we welcome the sea change the new Biden administration brings. Yet some critics, in a cynical attempt to exploit families’ legitimate frustrations, spread the myth that teachers and their unions don’t want to return to in-person teaching and learning. Educators know that in-person learning is essential for children to thrive; they are asking to be safe in the midst of a once-in-a-century pandemic. With commonsense safety protocols, COVID-19 testing and vaccines, our public schools can reopen for in-person learning and can do so with the overwhelming support of teachers and support personnel.

The AFT recently polled educators, who have been working harder than ever to help our kids in this pandemic. Eighty-five percent of AFT teachers and school staff support a return to in-person learning with the science and health and safety guardrails that the AFT laid out — safeguards like masks, physical distancing, sanitizing, ventilation upgrades, testing and contact tracing. Educators also strongly approve of the Biden administration’s plan to reopen schools.

This is not to suggest that educators are not afraid of this deadly virus that spreads asymptomatically and invisibly. Our poll found that 64 percent worry they might get infected with COVID-19 at work and 71 percent fear they could infect someone in their family. Yet the vast majority are willing to return to their schools with the necessary safeguards, including priority access to the vaccine, given the essential work they do.

AFT President Randi Weingarten outside Edward T. Steel School in Philadelphia on Feb. 8, calling for health and safety upgrades to make schools safe.

Educators’ overwhelming support for a safe return to in-school learning raises the question of whether, if the federal government early in the pandemic had provided a plan to reopen schools similar to the Biden administration’s, with the resources to fund it, millions more students would be learning in person now, instead of remotely. It’s time to work with teachers and their unions to reopen schools safely for in-person instruction, instead of blaming them for the continuation of a pandemic made incalculably worse by the last administration.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently issued new guidelines for reopening schools. The guidelines reinforce the need for mitigation strategies to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, testing to detect asymptomatic transmission, vaccine prioritization for teachers and school staff, and accommodations for educators with pre-existing conditions and those taking care of others at risk.

Teachers unions have negotiated such health guardrails in Boston, Chicago, New York City, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and elsewhere — playing a critical role in enabling in-person learning to resume that other school districts could emulate.

But countless places lack the resources to implement the necessary safety provisions, because the pandemic and resulting recession have drained state and local coffers. The Biden administration’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan would fund vaccinations, direct relief to families bearing the brunt of the COVID-19 crisis, and provide crucial local and state aid — including $170 billion to help schools, colleges and universities reopen and operate safely.

This funding is needed immediately to safely reopen schools for in-person teaching and learning for the remainder of this semester, and to allow schools to prepare for this summer, which can and should be a voluntary “second, second semester.” Wealthy parents have an array of summer programs for their children. All students, particularly from under-resourced communities, should have access to programs this summer for reconnection, recreation, enrichment, social and emotional support, and academic growth.

Even as we deal with the challenges at hand, we must reimagine learning beyond COVID-19 and create the conditions to help all children thrive. Rather than the traditional spring state testing, we should assess and respond to students’ wide-ranging needs; support our most vulnerable students; focus on educators’ professional learning and growth to meet these unprecedented challenges; and promote equity and excellence in all of our public schools.

As we approach one year since the first school closures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, students, families and educators are understandably frustrated. But we all want the same thing — to be together in school, with the conditions and support not only to recover from what has been lost but to thrive and grow. People are recognizing anew how important our public schools are. Let’s do what is needed to make them safe for students and staff to return.

A road map to safely reopen our schools | by Randi Weingarten | Feb, 2021 | AFT Voices

NANCY BAILEY: President Biden’s Ideas About Schools and Covid-19 Miss the Mark

President Biden’s Ideas About Schools and Covid-19 Miss the Mark

President Biden’s Ideas About Schools and Covid-19 Miss the Mark

I watched President Biden’s CNN Townhall. I like President Biden and feel that he is sincere and wants to do a good job. He is well-focused on helping the country move forward. His kindness shines through. But his school plans for Covid-19 are worrisome.

As expected, Covid-19 dominated the Townhall conversation. A whole segment could have been on schools and Covid-19. Unfortunately, the school issue wasn’t well-addressed with only two questions.

Opening Schools in 100 Days

I wish the President had never said that schools should open in 100 days. It reminds me of when politicians from both parties said that with No Child Left Behind, all third graders would read proficiently by 2014. In 2021, students still have reading problems. Covid-19 is different from reading, of course, but making predictions about Covid-19 seems like a gamble.

It’s also not like all schools have been closed. Some schools have in-person learning or a hybrid approach. Schools may open then close due to Covid-19 cases. Teachers have been safely teaching remotely since the beginning of the pandemic.

If he had to pick a time, perhaps it should be Fall, as noted by Dr. Leana Wen, M.D. CONTINUE READING: President Biden’s Ideas About Schools and Covid-19 Miss the Mark