D.C. Public Schools will reopen for in-person learning on February 1. It will be the first time since last March that many teachers will be in the classroom offering face-to-face instruction. Each public school will offer different options for in-person learning and services, but not all students or teachers are coming back to the physical classroom.

Schools went virtual in March 2020 due to the coronavirus outbreak. Educators were quickly challenged to come up with innovative ways to teach their classes with limited resources and trainings. Some CARE classrooms opened this past November, meaning students returned to the school building and received virtual instruction.

With nearly a year of living under a world changed by COVID, families continue to shuffle between the hardships of a pandemic and keeping their children active and engaged during virtual learning. Most students are falling behind, with low-income students faring worse than their wealthier peers.

To prepare for students’ return to the classroom, the school system says it has invested more than $33 million in safety measures, including $3.6 million for additional PPE, $5.5 million in building readiness, and $24 million toward HVAC enhancements. Everyone is required to wear masks and stay six feet apart.

But not everyone wants to go back to the building, especially when the pandemic isn’t over. Already, COVID-19 has claimed more than 900 lives in the District and more than 35,800 residents have tested positive for the virus. Ward 8, which has seen the most deaths due to COVID, has the most elementary school students that have declined seats for in-person education, according to DCPS data.

As DCPS prepares to reopen, parents, students, and educators shared their thoughts on schools welcoming students and teachers back with in-person learning during a pandemic. Many of these interviews happened at an event over the weekend organized by the Creative School, an organization dedicated to empowering youth in Southeast D.C. Here’s what people told us.

Kirk Keys, Youth Advocate & Community Connector,  Stanton Elementary, The Creative School, Ward 8

“I have mixed feelings. For one, I definitely miss the kids. I feel that virtual school is not the move. We have to combat this current situation some way some how. I can see why school needs to reopen, but I also don’t know if it’s the safest situation for them to be opening up. The achievement gap is widening — these school weren’t prepared for virtual learning. A lot of students didn’t have computers or the resources at home to succeed. It’s really just a reality that DCPS sits with that we are consistently unprepared when it comes to kids’ well being and access to learning. What time will be the right time, I’m not sure. My answer to this is a new way of doing school. There is no right way to go back to doing what we used to do cause most didn’t like the way we used to do it in the first place. A change in how we do school is what I would seek. Normalcy will probably never be normal again. If times are going to change then we should be changing with the times.”

Kayla Lindsay, 9 years old, Ward 7, Hillcrest

“I feel kinda comfortable because I feel like people that work in my school, they can work with masks on and sanitize things. I miss recess and PE.”

Keyonna Jones, mother of  Kayla Lindsay, Ward 7,  Hillcrest

“I’m a little nervous like anything else. I would say that before COVID my children’s school is one of the stellar schools. It’s one of the reasons why we chose it in the first place. That doesn’t just go with education, it goes with the organization to staff to preparedness. Just knowing the integrity of the school makes me more comfortable.”

Will your child go back to school on Feb. 1? 

“Absolutely not. We may think about it in the future. I hope they have some hyper options where you can do three days a week in-school, out-of-school options — that’s what I’m looking forward to.”

Mr. SPN (Pronounced Spin), Story Architect, The Creative School, Ward 8

“For a decade I was a middle and high school English teacher. I worked with grades 8, 9, and 10. I’m really torn with school reopening now. I’ve had conversations with many of my old students about how hard it is for them right now to thrive in a school environment. My mom is a early childhood educator in Florida. She’s been working in a school almost the entire year, — about five days before Christmas she got COVID-19. Roughly seven teachers in her building got it, including some of them being hospitalized. This work is so critical that it happens in person. Education is still something that is a human experience. Now it has to happen when educators and students are safe. I will hope that kids have an opportunity to be in physical spaces with each other and educators again, but that it’s handled well. I don’t think D.C. schools is ready next month. In all of the pressures that have been put on teachers over the course of this whole experience and even before that , I just don’t know that they’ve gone through all of the steps to make sure teachers are safe. I say that just knowing that, right now, some of the highest numbers that we’ve seen and that the vaccine is just coming out, just being administered to teachers and the fact that they won’t have enough time to get both rounds before they step back into the classroom is troubling.”

Kemonte Coleman, 14 years old, Board Member at the Creative School, Ward 8

“I’m ready to go back to school. I feel like it’s not safe, but I want to get back into that learning environment inside the school instead of doing virtual learning. I feel like I get my work done when I’m inside of the school. It’s so much work to do virtually. They don’t explain it as they would inside the school.”

Marshall Pollard, Executive Director, The Creative School, Ward 8

“I work with 8-18 year olds in Southeast D.C. in neighborhoods along Alabama Ave. To be honest, I’m not confident that our schools were ready to receive our children before the pandemic. To say that our young people should go back to these places that weren’t equipped — full of amazing human beings, don’t get me wrong, human beings who are there to fight the fight — but a system and an experience that has demonstrated it does not lead to our health and wealth. To say that our young people should go back to these places seems to be really shallow thinking. I’m motivated to figure out, how do we connect real relationships to these young people whether it’s virtual or in person. In a safe way or not, our young people are crying out to be connected to relationships that influence them and that keep them safe, feeling good and wanting to keep going in a season of life that is  demobilizing. I think that’s what we need to do right now.”

Tenika Brown, Ward 7, Hillcrest 

“It’s a lot of anxiety around school reopening. As parents, we want to ensure it’s a comprehensive approach for students’ safety. One thing I have not yet heard from the chancellor is that they partnered with DC Health to establish an on-site contact tracer. In order for us to ensure students safety, we must be able to safeguard and identify clusters of students that are impacted in the event that there is a positive COVID outbreak that takes place. What I am also not 100% sure of is what does 3rd and 4th quarter look like in the event that we phase back in the other 75 percent of the students, because DCPS is only operating at the other 25 percent capacity now because of the CARE classroom. How do we reintegrate the other 75 percent back safely and who has been established as [points of contact], as checkpoints, and/or direct contacts for these students interactions? So right now I would not support additional students back into the school because the plan is not comprehensive as it relates to the safety due to the COVID-19 pandemic.”

Editor’s note: While DCPS does not have on-site contact tracers, the system has pledged that schools will notify DC Health if someone tests positive for COVID-19. “If there are any confirmed cases of COVID-19 reported to DCPS by a student, family, or staff member — whether they have been in a school building or not — we will share that information with DC Health for contact tracing purposes,” DCPS says on its Reopen Strong website. “Notices of reported positive cases will be shared with a school community.”