Get Off My Lawn: I Don’t Care What You Think My Kids Should Be Doing Right Now
By Jennifer Wagner
The other day, I dropped an opinion piece — with no personal commentary — on my Facebook timeline from someone who was concerned about students going back to school in person.
I stuck my phone in my pocket and didn’t think much about the post until someone texted a few hours later to let me know the comments section had devolved into a virtual barroom brawl.
If you’re a parent right now, your feeds are probably similarly filled with articles about sending your kids back in person or removing your kids from public schools or pursuing homeschooling or debating health and safety best practices.
There are plenty of folks in the school choice movement who believe this is a pivotal moment to introduce families to different schooling options they might not previously have considered. I agree.
But also, y’all need to make some space.
Right now, I’m not personally interested in learning more about microschooling or pandemic pods because those things don’t affect me. Are they good ideas? Objectively speaking, yes, and I’m glad they’re available for families that want them. But they don’t affect me because my kids’ private school has gone back to the classroom with no remote or hybrid option. Because I signed a tuition contract back before the K-12 world turned upside down, that is my reality.
In an ironic twist, our school of choice—which I still love very much—gave us no choice. Some of my friends were equally frustrated when their public schools went online-only or gave an ultimatum that students who didn’t attend in person couldn’t participate in extracurriculars or sports.
I am worried at the moment about my kids’ learning and their mental health. I am worried about the teachers and staff at their school. I am worried about their support network, which includes older and immuno-compromised family members.
It feels like we’re assembling the plane while taxiing down the runway, and forgive me for being rude, but I’m simply not interested in your take on my choices — or lack thereof. My anxious brain already is running in circles trying to answer seemingly unanswerable questions about what comes next.
We school choice types put a lot of stock in trusting and empowering parents. That’s never been more important than it is right now.
But in order to trust and empower, you have to listen.
And for heaven’s sake, stop trying to make it political.
It’s possible to support the President but disagree with his repeated calls for schools to reopen in person because it doesn’t make sense for your family. It’s equally possible to be an anti-Trump Democrat who wants your children to return to the classroom because they have special needs that can’t be met via remote learning. Kids go to school to learn. Some also go because it’s a safe place with a hot meal. Some might not want to go because they are nervous about getting sick or getting someone they love sick.
It’s not as simple as the storyline of teachers unions versus Trump or citing yet another research report from a country that’s handled COVID-19 differently than we have.
Let me be crystal clear:
THIS.
IS.
PERSONAL.
Sending my kids back to school means I have to shift my risk tolerance from low to high. Instead of the half-dozen families we’ve been hanging around since April, I’m now introducing more than 300 new potential risk points — and those folks are in turn exposed to my risk.
It all makes me nervous, and it’s okay to be nervous.
I’m incredibly lucky to have access to mental health support, but lots of people don’t, so they’re dealing with all of this stress with no outlet — and possibly with diminished or no income and a whole bunch of fear about non-school-related stuff.
They don’t need you telling them what to do with their lives right now.
Again, not trying to sound like an a-hole (but totally fine if #IATA): Back off with all the judgment.
As reformers, that’s not who we are. At our core, we trust parents, and we believe in their ability to advocate for their kids, to know what’s right. Our job is to help them find options, not tell them which one to choose. We also shouldn’t punish schools or families for making choices we wouldn’t make for our own kids.
If we maintain our focus on making sure all families’ needs are met, we can be part of every single conversation about K-12 education in America right now — and moving forward. If we circle the wagons and bark advice people aren’t asking for, we run the risk of alienating a whole lot of folks that might never forgive us for looking like pandemic opportunists.
Jennifer Wagner is a mom, a recovering political hack and the Vice President of Communications for EdChoice, a national nonprofit that supports and promotes universal school choice.
