In-Person School Isn’t Safe Until It’s Safe for Students of Color
At least pretend like our deaths matter to you.
When the Centers for Disease Control altered their operational recommendations for K-12 schools in March, they included new recommendations like “revised physical distancing recommendations to reflect at least 3 feet”, signaling movement towards a full-scale re-opening of US schools. Alongside these recommendations is a section called “health equity considerations”, which notes the disproportionate risk of illness and death to minoritized racial and ethnic communities and acknowledges the need for comprehensive strategies that address their increased vulnerability to harm. Yet, these “health equity considerations” have seemingly had no effect on the creation of these new guidelines, which threaten the lives of the most marginalized students — those who are poor and Black and attend under-resourced schools. To protect these students, CDC recommendations need to shift away from rushing in-person instruction to pushing for policies that protect Black, Indigenous, and other communities of color, including the creation of safe in-person instruction facilities.
Like their adult counterparts, children of color are more at risk of severe sickness and death due to COVID-19 than white children. The effects of racism on marginalized children…
