Some Boston Public School students walked out of their classrooms across the city Friday morning, calling for the district to switch to remote learning for two weeks due to the recent surge in COVID-19 cases caused by the omicron variant.
The organizers of the walk-out, led by the Boston Student Advisory Council, are also calling on district leaders to provide PPE to staff, expand testing of students and teachers, change quarantine guidelines and cancel mid-year exams. BPS Families for COVID Safety and Boston Teachers Union also supported the event, among other organizations.
At Boston Latin School, about 15 students left the building at 10:30 a.m. The protest then continued with a virtual speak-out on Zoom attended by more than 300 people. Organizers said they weren’t yet sure how many students walked out but said they had heard significant interest from students.
“Schools shouldn’t really be opening up at this time because the cases are high now right after break and there’s a lot of people missing,” said Emma Ngo, a Boston Latin eighth grader who walked out this morning. “And we think it’s best that if we go remote just for now until things probably settle down a bit.”
Governor Charlie Baker and the state’s Department of Elementary and Secondary Education have resisted a shift back to remote learning and currently are not allowing remote learning days to be counted toward the required 180 days of school instruction. But both Boston Mayor Michelle Wu and BPS Superintendent Brenda Cassellius said earlier this week that Boston would consider remote learning as an option.
“We’ve been working with the mayor and with the city to be prepared in case we do have to pivot to remote,” Casselius said on Greater Boston earlier this week. “We are prepared on a school level and a district level.”
Ash O’Brien, a Boston Latin School student who walked out, said he hopes officials will listen to the students’ message.
“It’s kind of sad that we have to take care of some of this, but it’s also very important as a student body that we support ourselves and don’t just let the people at the top just decide what’s happening with us,” O’Brien said.
Jake Freudberg is a student at Tufts University.
