Joyce Brinton Anderson
Dear School Board Members,
Almost two years ago on March 13, 2020, Gov. Lujan-Grisham closed New Mexico schools down because of the Covid19 pandemic. Schools in New Mexico remained closed for over a year, and now our children, the students of LAPS, live in a constant atmosphere of uncertainty, with the threat of school closing down and their sports, music,drama, prom, and other activities being canceled, hanging over their heads. As of Tuesday’s school board meeting the citizens of New Mexico and the students in the Los Alamos Public School district will have lived 698 days in a Covid world. If you ask any of our students they will tell you, they are done. Their parents are done. We are done.
In March 2020 we knew very little about Covid19, but now, almost 700 days later we know much more. We have vaccines, we have medicines that treat this disease, and we have tests we can administer to ourselves in the comfort of our own homes to see if we are sick. Because of this, I am very discouraged that this school board wants to reverse course with its Covid policies and take us back to a March 2020 world.
It is not the responsibility of the school board or the school district to stop Covid19. In fact, it's pure arrogance to think that we ever could stop a respiratory virus. Because we cannot stop Covid19, it is time to give the families of this school district choices and options and the ability to assume their own risks. LAPS has done a good job of providing options for families that continue to have concerns over Covid19. However, it is unfair to expect the rest of us to remain hostage to a few families.
A study released last week by Johns Hopkins University, showed that lockdowns “had little to no effect on Covid mortality”. (See the full study here: https://bit.ly/35HgKrh). We need to move forward, like the state of Iowa, and many others, and treating Covid19 as endemic, like the flu (See this story: https://bit.ly/3HMYJWZ).
I have observed my family, friends, and former school teaching colleagues in Arizona sending their kids to school, and working in schools under normal conditions for over 18 months. Thirty-six states do not require masking in schools. In these states the rates of Covid match those of New Mexico, and in many cases are even lower, with no masking in schools, no daily case counts, and no testing to stay. Even the Democrat governor of Colorado, Jared Polis, cited New Mexico's failure on Covid response, specifically mask mandates, as one of the reasons he was dropping statewide Covid mandates (see story here: https://cbsloc.al/3HzoSrR).
Finally, I am greatly concerned that members of the school board want to replace Jennifer Guy on the Covid task force with unelected, unaccountable and unknown LANL employees. Mrs. Guy, along with this board have to account to the families of this school district, and the voters of Los Alamos County. LANL people do not. In the nine years that I have know Jennifer Guy, she has always been honest, forthright, level-headed and has the tremendous ability to bring all of the sides together. It would be a grave mistake to replace her.
I am asking that the board move toward normalizing school life in Los Alamos as much as they can, and as quickly as they can. We cannot afford to backtrack as a district. Our kids and our teachers are suffering under the weight of failed Covid policies. It is time to move forward to normal with all urgency.
Thank you for your time today.
Sincerely,
Joyce Anderson
LAPS parent of many children.