By: Lori Trahan
With Labor Day far in the rearview mirror, families across Massachusetts are focused on one thing: back to school.
As one of the few members of Congress with school-aged children, I know the challenges parents are facing heading into this school year – coordinating schedules, setting up a classroom in a quiet corner of the house, and preparing for the numerous scenarios that could derail child care, hand-offs, virtual learning – all so that my first- and fifth-grade daughters get the most out of their education.
However, these problems pale in comparison to the challenges our educators, many of them parents themselves, are having to overcome. We owe it to them to ensure that the health and safety of all school personnel are just as much of a priority as the wellbeing of students.
As parents, we’ve been told repeatedly that we should be making decisions about sending our kids back to school based on what’s best for us. The guidance is simple: you have a unique context, and it matters.
That same guidance should apply to our teachers, nurses, bus drivers, custodians and other school workers. But right now, that’s not the case. The different set of rules for teachers is especially dangerous when you consider many of their circumstances.
In addition to many being parents, some educators are part of the “sandwich generation” – tasked with caring for both their children and elderly parents at the same time and often under the same roof. To make matters worse, as many as one in every four teachers have a pre-existing condition that put them at a higher risk of serious illness should they contract COVID-19.
No teacher should be forced back into the classroom when their personal context is telling them to do the exact opposite. In fact, forging ahead with this approach will inevitably create high pressure and unsafe conditions for educators, students and parents alike.
Instead, teachers should be encouraged to do what’s necessary to keep themselves and their families safe. Rather than bullying schools into resuming in-person instruction, as the president has repeatedly done, government at all levels should be actively working to give educators the tools and support necessary to succeed this fall, no matter the format.
That starts with delivering the $100 billion in aid for schools that has already cleared the House of Representatives with bipartisan support and ending Education Secretary Betsy DeVos’s attempts to redirect relief from public schools to wealthy, private institutions.
The next step is to build out the support systems available to teachers, especially those who need to take precautions to protect their health or that of their loved ones.
That’s why, in the coming days, I’ll be introducing legislation to invest heavily in our teacher pipeline by bolstering teacher residency programs that get recent graduates with teaching degrees – and those nearing a degree – into the classroom, either virtually or in-person, to provide much needed back up.
Developed in close consultation with the largest teachers’ unions in our country, the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers, this new legislation will reduce the overwhelming burden shouldered by teachers while also providing students with individualized opportunities for instruction.
In addition to easing the pressure on teachers in what could be a volatile education landscape this fall that could see curricula migrate between hybrid and entirely virtual settings, my bill will better prepare prospective teachers to hit the ground running for school years to come and prioritize traditionally underserved communities along the way.
We saw this kind of effort work successfully in hospitals and health centers early on in this pandemic when medical and nursing students and recent graduates stepped up to continue delivering lifesaving healthcare during nurse and physician shortages or patient surges.
We can and should do the same for our teachers, who serve as the backbone of our communities and an extension of our families. They are among the final remaining shreds of normalcy in our kids’ lives. Yet, they are continuously being asked to do more with less.
It doesn’t have to be this way.
We must fund the future. We must fund our schools. And we must treat our educators like the essential workers that they are.
Trahan, D-Westford, represents the Merrimack Valley's 3rd District in the U.S. House of Representatives. She is a member of the House Education and Labor Committee.
