The head of the Manitoba Teachers’ Society is calling on the province to shut down schools by Wednesday.
Education Minister Kelvin Goertzen announced Friday that classes for all kindergarten to Grade 12 students will be suspended from March 23 to April 13, in response to the novel coronavirus arriving in Manitoba. Suspending classes means students will stay home, but teachers and staff will still work.
In a letter addressed to Goertzen, MTS president James Bedford took issue with the week-long wait and asked that educators be allowed to work from home.
“In many classrooms across Manitoba, increasing the distance between desks is not feasible since the classrooms are already crowded,” wrote Bedford, whose organization represents 16,000 public school teachers.
“In younger grades, there are no individual desks because the students often sit at round tables. More importantly, we have learned from watching other cities that asymptomatic transmission is possible and that time is of the essence in helping to flatten the curve.”
Bedford has heard from “many teachers” that they developed take-home learning packages over the weekend so students have them on Monday, ensuring children stay on course to finish the curriculum on time.
Goertzen said last week that the province gave a week’s notice of class suspensions so parents can make child-care arrangements and the education system can prepare.
Goertzen said Monday that the move was guided by medical advice.
“You do not want politicians making decisions politically in a time of pandemic. You need to be guided by people who are experts in this,” he said.
“I get why there’s questions and that’s entirely fair … but I think medical professionals have to be leading that.”
During the province’s daily COVID-19 update, Manitoba’s chief public health officer Dr. Brent Roussin said closing schools is a matter of timing.
“Almost all of the evidence shows that the closing of schools should really occur when we see either cases in schools, or we have sustained community-based transmission,” Roussin told reporters Monday.
“We have not seen community-based transmission, we have not seen cases within our schools.”
All seven cases of COVID-19 in Manitoba have been travel-related, and he doesn’t expect any community transmission at this time, he said.
Currently, classes are set to resume in mid-April, but Roussin said the province will continue assessing the situation and an extension will be granted if needed.
