President Trump said Tuesday that he’ll pressure governors to reopen schools in the fall, warning state leaders against using education to “make political statements” about recovering from the coronavirus pandemic.
“We’re very much going to put pressure on the governors and everybody else to open the schools,” Mr. Trump said at a White House summit on opening schools safely. “It’s very important for our country, it’s very important for the well-being of the students and the parents.”
The president criticized Harvard University for deciding to allow mainly freshmen to come to campus in the fall, saying the Ivy League school is taking “the easy way out.”
“I think it’s ridiculous,” he said. “That’s not what we want to do. I guess their endowment’s plenty big.”
The president said “everybody” wants children to return to school, after months of school closures due to the COVID-19 crisis that is still surging in many states. Florida on Monday ordered its K-12 schools to reopen in August.
“The moms want it, the dads want it, the kids want it. It’s time to do it,” Mr. Trump said. “We want to get them open quickly, beautifully in the fall. This is a horrible disease, but young people do extraordinarily well.”
First lady Melania Trump said children who’ve been out of school “are missing more than just time in the classroom.”
“They’re missing the laughter of their friends, learning from the teachers and the joy of recess and play,” she said.
The nation’s largest teachers’ union said the administration lacks a credible plan to reopen schools.
“If Donald Trump and [Education Secretary] Betsy DeVos have proven anything over the past four years, it’s that they do not care about students,” said NEA President Lily Eskelsen Garcia. “They have zero credibility for how to best support students, and how to reopen classrooms safely.”
She said schools and teachers don’t have enough personal protective equipment, and schools can’t socially distance with 40 students in a classroom.
“America must listen to the health experts on when to reopen schools and to educators on how to return to in-person instruction,” she said.
The president said reopening schools “will be up largely to the governors, but they’re in very strong consultation with us.”
There was no dissent among the invited guests at the White House forum on proceeding quickly to reopen schools within the next few weeks.
Brad Weller, a 7th grade science teacher in Shippensburg, Pennsylvania, told the president, “We’re ready to go back. It’s time.”
University of Alabama system Chancellor Finis St. John IV said the university system is planning to reopen on Aug. 10. He said the state schools will implement a four-part plan: getting all students tested before they return to campus, deploying a symptom-tracking app for students to use regularly on campus, instituting a contact-tracing program “to manage student outbreaks during the year,” and conducting sample testing throughout the school year.
“Our students are yearning to come back to campus,” Mr. St. John said. “We can reduce risk and manage risk in a way that allows us to go forward.”
Ms. DeVos said educators must “rise to meet the needs of every student.”
“Students can’t afford to fall further behind,” she said. “Even before the virus, too many were trapped in schools that don’t meet their needs. This is the time to reopen schools, to rethink schools, to be more nimble, more agile and more responsive to students’ needs in a 21st-century changing world. This moment demands action, not excuse-making or fear-mongering.”
