There are few places in the US where the level of COVID-19 in the community is low enough to manage with the available testing and tracing capacity. In those areas, it could actually be possible for schools to return to in-person teaching.
But in the most populous areas, or in those states governed by bungling authoritarian cultists, it’s not happening. No amount of threats from Betsy DeVos or her corrupt criminal boss will change that. Teachers will not be coerced into the petri dish, and school staff won’t have any reason to show up if teachers aren’t there. Aside from that, there will be impacts on a health care system already pushed to the limit. Nurses aren’t expendable resources, either. Attempting to order schools to reopen against all public health advice and common sense will have one result (teachers resigning, striking, or calling in sick) followed by another (schools closing again).
Keep in mind, the reason we did the shutdown was to diminish the impact on the health care system and buy time for the government to amplify testing capacity, conscript a legion of contact tracing personnel, develop targeted isolation protocols, and accelerate production of PPE and other medical equipment.
The government did none of that. None. Testing capacity remains strangled; our ability to contact trace is minimal and rapidly outmatched by the growth of the virus; equipment shortages are making the news again after nearly four months of disinterest and apathy from the White House.
Now we’re reopening without doing any of the necessary preparation. People go out; people don’t wear masks; people still don’t wash their filthy hands.
Because of all this, schools can’t reopen.
We should be putting this time and effort into improvements for remote learning. There are a number of issues people have had with it, and it does have gaps like socialization, physical activity, and a much-needed break for parents. Attempting to force teachers and staff into a dangerous situation (without PPE or any necessary modifications to the building, of course) is not going to solve any of that. Instead we should put these resources to work coming up with better ways to do remote learning, because that’s what school is going to be for the foreseeable future.