In September 2020, when most public schools were either fully or mostly remote, you took the courageous step of opening our schools, full time, for all students. It was a brave move in an uncertain world and we are grateful.


As we approach the two-year mark since the pandemic began, we ask you to lead the way once more and remove the unnecessary burden of this pandemic on our children.



Since early in the pandemic, we’ve known that the risk of COVID to children is much lower than the risk to adults. Children can and do get COVID, but in almost all cases, these children suffer only mild symptoms or none at all. Interventions to slow the spread have been tried. As we now know, most have NOT worked and commitment to them appears to be waning and unlikely to return.



While most children do not become seriously ill from COVID, they are bearing the brunt of onerous mitigation efforts, the negative impact of which is likely to be felt for years to come. For two difficult years, children have had to wear masks all day while many parents have not. Each day, our children live with the fear of being quarantined, when they have done nothing wrong!  Some children have endured weeks of isolation multiple times. What is equally concerning are that many preschoolers, as young as two years old are spending their first years in school with faceless friends and teachers.



While this is hard on most children, those children with learning disabilities, speech or hearing issues, autism, OCD, and other challenges are even more unsuited to these adjustments. And, perhaps most alarming is that rates of suicidal ideation and suicide attempts among teenagers have skyrocketed.



At this point, most offices are open, travel is back, simcha halls are full, and restaurants are at capacity, but children continue to live in a pandemic-focused world. And for what? As we have seen with the most recent outbreak school mitigation efforts are clearly not stopping the spread of COVID.

It’s time to stop inflicting upon our children the unnecessary and ineffective measures taken to stop the spread of COVID.

HOW DO WE DO IT?



SCHOOL CLOSURES MUST STOP
Yet again, school closures and remote learning are back despite high vaccination rates and low risk of serious illness. We must resist any temptation to return to this ideology. Even a brief switch to remote learning will impede healthy socialization and be most detrimental to our special needs and young children. Additionally, school closures and remote learning place a tremendous financial burden on working parents required to stay home to watch their school-aged children.



MASKS MUST GO
Children should be seen and heard. There is ample evidence that the non-medical masks worn by most are barely effective.  Masks are uncomfortable and unnatural, impede socialization, and pose challenges to all students. Punitive measures against school children for improper mask wearing must end. To the extent there are government mandates, we should only comply with what is required, while advocating strongly for those mandates to be removed.


QUARANTINES MUST END
Quarantines are a constant trauma to our children. Quarantines presumably protect others and are not meant to protect the quarantined child. We need to protect our children and stop asking them to quarantine for us. Healthy children should not be quarantined. The CDC recently endorsed test-to-stay in schools and is recommending shorter quarantines for those who are infected. If local health departments continue to push quarantining healthy kids, we need to push back for our children’s mental and physical health.



TESTING AND VACCINATIONS MUST NOT BE FORCED
At this point the vaccine seems to provide protection against serious illness and death, which was never a serious risk for children. Schools should stop requiring testing and/or vaccinations. Medical decisions should be made between parents, children and their doctors. Repeated testing, after minor symptoms, puts unnecessary stress on children and their families.  We must not tolerate discrimination or bullying of  children based upon their vaccination status. We can certainly advocate for vaccinations, when appropriate, while continuing to oppose divisive mandates.



Finally, we recognize the broad range of opinions on these issues. Parents have the right to take additional voluntary precautions for their children. However, we cannot support continued closures, masking, quarantines, vaccinations and testing of our children. We believe that the time has come to stop forcing our children to sacrifice endlessly for the hopeful protection of others. Adults do not need children to protect them. It is our job to protect our children - physically, mentally and emotionally.

As parents we look to you, the educators to whom we have entrusted our children. To lead the way in putting our kids first. The future of this generation of children depends on fostering a strong partnership. Together we look forward, in defense of our children, to accomplish these objectives.

Respectfully,