Different Takes: Nation Drops The Ball On Gathering Valuable Health Data From School Reopenings

Los Angeles Times: What's Happening With COVID In Schools? We Don't Know
With students starting to return to classrooms across the country as COVID-19 infection rates shrink, parents, teachers and the public as a whole are watching anxiously. There already have been some worrisome stories about kids who crowded in hallways or on bus lines, infections that cropped up within days and campuses that closed again as a result.But it’s hard to know what all this means. Were people catching the virus from one another at school, or were these cases from the community at large? Does an outbreak of positive test results at school then translate into people becoming seriously ill and maybe even dying, or are outbreaks almost entirely benign? These are valid questions in uncertain times. The biggest concern of all, though, is that helpful answers might not be forthcoming. (9/8)

Dallas Morning News: What Schools Can Learn From The Many Summer Camps That Avoided COVID Infections
As the school year begins, we find ourselves in a complicated, difficult situation. We want to safeguard our kids and communities, and we don’t want to harm teachers or create vectors of infection. At the same time, we know schools are important not only for learning, but also for providing stability, safety, mentoring, food and child care. Our challenge is to find ways to make school as safe as possible in the era of COVID-19. Where can schools look to find an example of how to open in a safe and balanced manner? Summer camps can provide important lessons to aid our return to school. (Steve Baskin, 9/7)

The Hill: COVID-19-Induced 'Sophomore Medical Student Syndrome' 
Coronavirus data has flooded our world for six months. The public is scared. At the same time, physicians continue to work every day and many do not seem frightened at all. Physicians, including me, are most concerned about patients who avoid needed care and fear medical settings, which are actually safe. Physicians know something the public does not. How? (Thomas W. Lagrelius, 9/7)

Los Angeles Times: School Custodians Like Me Aren't Treated Like Essential Workers
It’s back-to-school time again in California. This year, of course, looks so much different from any previous one I’ve experienced during my 37-year career as a school custodian. The vast majority of our students are learning from home and most of their teachers and instructional assistants are working from home as well. But that doesn’t mean our campuses are quiet.At most any school site in California, you’ll find the informational technology staff prepping laptops and programming systems for learning remotely and office staff registering and keeping track of students every day to make sure they are engaged in distance learning. (Ben Valdepena, 9/7)

Lexington Herald Examiner: Kentucky Children Need Federal COVID-19 Relief Now
To say that autumn 2020 may bring surprises is the classic understatement. Can you imagine a year ago seeing a September when kids are in front of a screen at home instead of in a classroom at school? Or an October when talk about college football playoffs isn’t beginning to percolate? Or a Halloween when … well, you get the point. Talk about surprises! Even a couple weeks ago, I could not imagine autumn of this year without kids and families being supported by Congress and yet, unless the U.S. Senate and U.S. House get down to serious business, the secondary impacts of COVID-19 are going to devastate – and that verb is not hyperbolic – Kentucky’s children. Whether it’s child care or K-12 education, a stable place to live or food to eat, real economic supports or broader health care needs, kids are being forgotten as this next round of a Congressional response to the pandemic rolls ahead. (Terry Brooks, 9/3)

Dallas Morning News: COVID-19 Puts More Children And Teenagers At Risk Of Sex And Labor Trafficking
Since the onset of the pandemic, more than 1.5 billion children worldwide are isolated in their homes with digital devices for companionship and connection. Traffickers are moving from the street to the smartphone to seek opportunity for exploitation of vulnerabilities. In the first month of the COVID-19 shutdown, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children reported a threefold increase in reports of online exploitation and abuse, soaring from 300,000 reports to more than 1.1 million, with more than 70% of those reports coming from social media messaging. (Jessica Peck, 9/6)