‘School hesitancy’ has changed

Before coronavirus vaccines, and before spring weather, many families across the country opted to keep students in remote learning for fear of the pandemic’s spread. But now, our colleague Dana Goldstein reports, their reasons have changed.

“If you close schools down for the better part of a year or, in some places, for over a year, it is actually not as simple as throwing open the doors in terms of getting the people back,” Dana told us.

Across the country, “school hesitancy” abounds as families have established routines based on remote learning. Some are reluctant to interrupt their newfound stable alternatives for a return peppered by hybrid schedules — with students in class some days of the week and working from home on others — or the risk of closures and quarantines.

Dana found that other families, limited by language barriers or poor communication from districts, didn’t even know their schools had reopened. And some teenagers from low-income families have taken on full- or part-time jobs to help their families make ends meet, so remote learning works better for them.

Pauline Rojas, 18, works 20 to 40 hours per week at a fast-food restaurant, and has used the money to help pay her family’s internet bill, buy clothes and save for a car. Her high school in San Antonio, Texas, is open, but her shift starts just minutes after her class ends. She couldn’t get there in time if she were coming from in-person class, Dana said.